Essays on Scientific Revolution

c. 1400 - c. 1690

Europe

The Scientific Revolution was a series of events that witnessed fundamental transformations in people’s attitudes towards the natural world, resulted in developments in mathematics, physics, astronomy, biology, and chemistry. The Scientific Revolution was characterized by an emphasis on abstract reasoning, quantitative thought, and the development of an experimental scientific method. The publication of Nicolaus Copernicus' "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium" in 1543, is considered as beginning of Scientific Revolution.

The Scientific Revolution began in astronomy, when the Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus suggested a comprehensive heliocentric theory. In 1543, he published his work "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium" about the heliocentric model of the solar system tried to demonstrate that the sun was the center of the universe. At the beginning of the 17th century, the German astronomer Johannes Kepler placed the Copernican hypothesis on firm astronomical footing.

During the Scientific Revolution, scientists began increasingly applying quantitative measurements to the measurement of physical phenomena on the earth, which translated into the rapid development of mathematics and physics. The work of Sir Isaac Newton "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica" (1687) represents the culmination of the Scientific Revolution at the end of the 17th century. Also, his work "Principia" formulated the laws of motion and universal gravitation, which dominated scientists’ view of the physical universe for the next three centuries.