What was the Scientific Revolution?

The Scientific Revolution was a transformative era during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Europe that marked an irreversible break from prior natural philosophy. This New Science featured a more mechanistic worldview, closer integration with mathematics, and a dedicated focus on gathering and interpreting empirical evidence. Thomas Kuhn later analyzed how conceptual breaks and accumulating anomalies challenge normal science to forge new paradigms.

What we know

• The Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries in Europe was an irreversible break with preceding natural philosophy, fundamentally changing how the natural world was investigated. [2]
• The New Science departed from Greek conceptions, adopting a more mechanistic worldview that was integrated with mathematics and focused on acquiring new evidence. [2]
• Thomas Kuhn argued for an episodic model of science where periods of cumulative progress are interrupted by periods of revolutionary science driven by accumulated anomalies. [3]
• The era famously culminated with Isaac Newton's publication of the Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica in 1687. [2, 3]

Still open

• While the period is frequently said to have begun in 1543, the SN 1572 supernova has also been suggested as an alternative beginning.

Where to go next

• how we knowWhich books started the Scientific Revolution?
• whoHow did Isaac Newton influence modern physics?
• how it workedWhat is a paradigm shift in science?
• the bigger pictureHow has the scientific method changed over time?
• whenHow did the Industrial Revolution succeed early modern science?
• an unexpected connectionWhy did early revolutionary astronomy not offer better predictions?Thomas Kuhn's analysis shows that the Copernican Revolution initially appealed through the promise of simpler solutions rather than offering more accurate predictions than the established Ptolemaic system.

Sources

• [1]Scientific Revolution (Wikidata Q214078) · CC0 1.0
• [2]Scientific Revolution · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [3]The Structure of Scientific Revolutions · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [4]Industrial Revolution · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [5]History of scientific method · CC BY-SA 4.0