Talk:Scientific Revolution

This is advocacy, not an encyclopedia article. Does anybody feel confident they know about the topic to be able to fix it, or should I get out the chainsaw? --Robert Merkel

This is pretty bad. The Scientific Revolution is a oft-used term by historians of science, and not nonsense as the writer of this atricle wishes us to believe. Ought to be completely rewritten. --Victor Gijsbers

Done. Still a lot of room for improvement, though. --Victor Gijsbers

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Reason for revert: for example:

Rather, Aristotelian philosophy dependend upon the assumption that man's mind could elucidate all the laws of the universe through reason alone.

From aristotle:

Whereas Plato was an idealist and a rationalist who believed that what we see is an imperfect copy of the intelligible Forms, Aristotle thought that what we know of the world must begin with the senses (see materialism and empiricism). Thus, Aristotle set the stage for what would eventually develop into the scientific method centuries later.

This confuses me... :) Martin

We need to revert the revert! The article we have on Aristotle is misleading, if not totally wrong. Aristotle did not in any way practice what we moderns call science! He wrote about subjects that were later investigated with the scientific method. However, as a matter if principle Aristotle and all later Aristotleians refused to compare their ideas with reality; they did not perform experiments. I think the article we have non Aristotle was written by a non-scientists. RK

As for the position that science is a religion, that is only a recent ad homenin attack by religious fundamentalists who are fearful of science. It is also used by people who, quitre literally, have no idea what the word means. Science is the opposite of religion; science is a method, and not a position. There are no beliefs about the physical world in science that one must hold to; rather, all one's ideas about the world are provisional truths, and one must be willing to change these beliefs if facts surface that justify such changes. In contrast, most religions do not allow for one to abandon one's core religious beliefs ever. Belief is essential to most faiths. This striking distinction muct be preserved in the article. RK

RK, Aristotelians did not refuse to compare their ideas with reality. They did not do experiments, true, but this was a logical consequence of their idea of natural and imposed behaviour: in an experiment, you will see imposed behaviour, not natural behaviour. Thus experiments do not help you to understand nature. The change from this view to the experimental tradition was one of the major developments of the scientific revolution, as I described. However, although Aristotle did not practice modern science, he surely practiced something we ought to call science. He based his science on observation; did you know Aristotle was the first great biologist? While living on the island Lesbos, he dissected lots of animals and wrote biological treatises based on what he observed. Victor Gijsbers

Ok, I agree with your analysis. I just think that this definition (terminology) is an important point. RK

Is the distinction between science and religion really essential to this article? I thought it was a rather tangential point, myself - better suited to science and religion[?] or some similar article. Martin

Nope, I'd say that has to go. It has nothing to do with the subject. Victor Gijsbers

Here I disagree. This is a great example of a scientific revolution: the change from observation to experimentation is a revolution. RK