What is Science? How do we as humans define it? Is it by the methods people use in investigation? Or is it how we apply concepts? In Okasha’s Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction (1) it attempts to force the reader to look at our own views of how science is defined and if it a satisfactory definition in the realm of Philosophy. The chapter provides several examples on how people determine science: “It is the attempt to understand, explain, and predict the world we live in,” or their defining methods that differentiate them from any other field (Okasha, 1-2). It further explains that these ideas, while not wrong, do not cover the entire spectrum. Religion, while not defined a science, attempts to explain the world we live in. Astrology,
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However, the beginning of scientific thought didn’t begin in this time. Starting with the ancient Greeks and working through time, it became like a snowball effect, with little bumps in the mountain changing its course as new information was discovered. The first step in the revolution came in 1542, by a “Polish astronomer Nicolas Copernicus” who published a book rebutting that the center of the entire universe was not the earth, but was the sun. This was at heavy odds with a Greek astronomer, Ptolemy’s, work. This was also highly disagreeable with the church as well. They feared this work so much so that any book establishing that the earth moved was banned, starting in 1616. This was the first step on a long road still being made in science. Following Copernicus’s work, Galileo and Kepler began their own works in astrology and physics, including the creation of the telescope and the debunking of the Aristotelian theory of “heavier bodies fall faster than lighter ones,” (Okasha, 4). The years after Galileo died, the scientific revolution really began to pick up speed. With the scientist like Descartes who believed in inert particles, to …show more content…
Fortunately, we live in a society where we’re granted all this knowledge and can expand and think on it, improving on what people know. The information provided by these men are inspiring and absolutely incredible considering the lack of materials, supplies and training they had during their time. Without them, we wouldn’t be where we are today, nor would the majority of the fields, including the non-science ones, be where they are today. Some of the prior readings that came to mind are from my organic chemistry, chemistry and historical textbooks back in high school and last semester in college. Those classes provided us an inside look on how several concepts we were learning applied to us and why they were important. I find this to be a vital concept to human understanding of the world around us. Learning the background, historical significance and then the concept, that’s what gives us a complete understanding of science. That’s what gives us knowledge we can use and expand on. Without that, we would make the same mistake history has made, or do things over that a man of the past has
However, the beginning of scientific thought didn’t begin in this time. Starting with the ancient Greeks and working through time, it became like a snowball effect, with little bumps in the mountain changing its course as new information was discovered. The first step in the revolution came in 1542, by a “Polish astronomer Nicolas Copernicus” who published a book rebutting that the center of the entire universe was not the earth, but was the sun. This was at heavy odds with a Greek astronomer, Ptolemy’s, work. This was also highly disagreeable with the church as well. They feared this work so much so that any book establishing that the earth moved was banned, starting in 1616. This was the first step on a long road still being made in science. Following Copernicus’s work, Galileo and Kepler began their own works in astrology and physics, including the creation of the telescope and the debunking of the Aristotelian theory of “heavier bodies fall faster than lighter ones,” (Okasha, 4). The years after Galileo died, the scientific revolution really began to pick up speed. With the scientist like Descartes who believed in inert particles, to …show more content…
Fortunately, we live in a society where we’re granted all this knowledge and can expand and think on it, improving on what people know. The information provided by these men are inspiring and absolutely incredible considering the lack of materials, supplies and training they had during their time. Without them, we wouldn’t be where we are today, nor would the majority of the fields, including the non-science ones, be where they are today. Some of the prior readings that came to mind are from my organic chemistry, chemistry and historical textbooks back in high school and last semester in college. Those classes provided us an inside look on how several concepts we were learning applied to us and why they were important. I find this to be a vital concept to human understanding of the world around us. Learning the background, historical significance and then the concept, that’s what gives us a complete understanding of science. That’s what gives us knowledge we can use and expand on. Without that, we would make the same mistake history has made, or do things over that a man of the past has