The Scientific Revolution

By Sunglasses_McGee
  • 1500 BCE

    Aristotle

    In this time period, Aristotle was the big man on campus. He was a Greek philosopher who first came up with the idea of the "geocentric solar system". His work was truly astounding, however most of it was proven incorrect.
  • 100

    Ptolemy

    The astronomer, Ptolemy, was the one who went further into Aristotle's ideas, creating a full-fledged diagram of our solar system. However, we later learn that this view is still incorrect.
  • Jun 6, 1200

    Roger Bacon

    A Franciscan monk by the name of Roger Bacon favored a system of scientific experimentation instead of "The Church said it is so; therefore it is so."
  • Apr 9, 1500

    Nicolaus Copernicus

    The Polish astronomer, Nicolaus Copernicus opposed Ptolemy's view of the solar system, and created a heliocentric system where the sun is the center of the solar system; not the earth. However, his ideas were not quite right.
  • Oct 11, 1543

    Andreas Vesalius

    Covering the field of Anatomy, we have Andreas Vesalius. Following the advice of Leonardo da Vinci, "I advise you not to trouble with words unless you are speaking to blind men". Vesalius, ignoring Galen's previous work, did a study of the human body and wrote a seven volume book called On the Fabric of the Human Body.

  • William Harvey

    William Harvey continued Andreas Vesalius' work, and studied blood circulation. He discovered how veins and arteries carry blood and he discovered how the heart works.

  • Johannes Kepler

    Due to the lack of instruments and mathematics in his arsenal, Copernicus could never really prove his theory. Eventually, hope came in the form of Johannes Kepler who fine-tuned the theory of a heliocentric solar system. He also wrote down the laws of planetary motion, even further proving the heliocentric solar system.

  • Francis Bacon

    Francis Bacon, an English philosopher and scientist, believed that theories could only be developed through observation only; no assumptions whatsoever. This ideology was written down in a book named Novum Organum.

  • Galileo Galilei

    The heliocentric system had been proven but the Roman Catholic Church still didn't believe in it. The church, and subsequently everyone a part of it, didn't want anyone saying that the earth was not the center of the universe. The Italian scientist, Galileo Galilei, was an enemy to the church, as he sought out to confirm that the sun is actually at the center of the universe. When he showed everyone his findings, he was labeled a heretic and was threatened with excommunication.

  • Rene Descartes

    Rene Descartes was a French philosopher and mathematician who is known as one of the leaders of the Scientific Revolution. He believed that assumptions should be questioned before they are accepted. He's also responsible for the line "I think, therefore I am."

  • Isaac Newton

    Now this guy really figured out the whole heliocentric system. Sir Isaac Newton published a book expanding on previous astronomer's ideas. In the expansion, he discovered that gravity exists and it's the reason all the planets in our solar system orbit the sun. With his findings, he came up with the law of universal gravitation.