Science

• The Scientific Revolution took place during the sixteenth and seventeenth century
• It started with the work of Copernicus in 1543 and ended with Isaac Newton's work in the early 1700s
• Characteristics of the Scientific Revolution:

  • Renewed drive to understand the physical world
  • Development of experimental methods and reliance on quantitative, mathematical methods
  • Search for practical applications of scientific knowledge (e.g. invention of microscopes and telescopes)
• Nicolaus Copernicus proposed a heliocentric model of the universe in 1543
• Johannes Kepler showed that planets, including Earth, follow an elliptical orbit, supporting the heliocentric model proposed by Copernicus
• Galileo's observations led him to support Copernicus's views, which got him into trouble with the Catholic church
• Galileo Galilei showed that the velocity of a falling object is not proportional to its mass, improved the telescope, and made new observations
• Isaac Newton came up with a new philosophy of a mechanised universe based on mathematical principles and experimental verification of hypotheses
• Newton used Kepler's laws of planetary motion to derive his Law of Universal Gravitation and proposed a universe held together by gravitational forces
• Newton's laws of motion allowed him to work out the masses of planets, explain the moon's orbit, and explain tides, bringing the Copernican Revolution to its end
• Scientific progress in the 20th century showed that the Universe is much more complex than Newton could have imagined
• Important advances in chemistry and physics in the 18th and 19th centuries:

  • Antoine Lavoisier discovered oxygen
  • Dmitri Mendeleev created the periodic table of elements
  • Work on electromagnetism by scientists like Faraday, Ampere, and Maxwell
  • Development of quantum mechanics based on Max Planck's Quantum theory
• Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity proposed an ever-changing multidimensional universe where gravity is a distortion of space-time continuum
• Darwin's Theory of Evolution (1859) led to a reassessment of the origins of life and man's place in nature
• Evolution refers to the gradual change in characteristics of populations of living organisms over successive generations, driven by natural selection
• Evolution has been a controversial issue due to conflicts with certain religious views, despite being well-supported by empirical evidence