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Essay about Human Beings and Nature: The Scientific Revolution

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Human Beings and Nature: The Scientific Revolution

The Scientific Revolution, perhaps one of the most significant examples of human beingsí relationship with the natural world, changed the way seventeenth and eighteenth century society operated. The power of human knowledge has enabled intellectual, economical, and social advances seen in the modern world. The Scientific Revolution which included the development of scientific attitudes and skepticism of old views on nature and humanity was a slow process that spanned over a two century period. During the Scientific Revolution, scientific knowledge enabled humans to control nature in order to improve society. With leaders such as Nicolaus Copernicus, Galileo Galilei, Francis …show more content…

Ptolemaic theory was supported by the Catholic Church, which also viewed humans as the center of God's creation. In his book On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, Copernicus kept many of Ptolemyís ideas, such as the assumptions of the circular orbit of planets and epicycles. However, he proposed a correction to Ptolemyís theory, stating that if the sun were at the center of the universe the epicycles could be reduced in number. As he states in The Heliocentric Statement, ìWhat appears to us as motions of the sun arise not from its motion but from the motion of the earth and our sphere, with which we revolve about the sun like any other planet. The earth has, then, more than one motionî(1). Although he maintained most assumptions of past astronomers, he attempted to eliminate the mathematical inconsistencies of old theory and offered a new approach to solving scientific problems. By freeing science from rigid conceptions of cosmic structures, Copernicus proposed that mathematics was the cornerstone of scientific thought. This would challenge the old dogmas, such as the earth being at the center of the universe. Consequentially, individualsí relationships with nature would change as they were freed from rigid conceptions of cosmic structure and many other conceptions from discoveries that would follow. Copernicus's use of mathematics provided a model for the new scientific thinking, and the empirical evidence of his successors would help persuade the

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