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Jan 1, 1200
Roger Bacon
Many scientists before the Renaissance were liked Roger Bacon , an English philosopher and scientist of the 1200s. Bacon, A francisan monk who had studied at oxford and Paris, was viewed as a leading scholar of his time. He was one of the earliest to favor a system of scientific experimentation, rather than faithful acceptance of religious ideas and ancient beliefs, as a means of finding truth. Nevertheless, he was shaped by the thinking of the time and mainly practiced alchemy. -
Feb 19, 1473
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543)
Copernicus, the great polish scientist is viewed today as the founder of modern astronomy. His heliocentric theory demonstrated that the earth is a moving planet and that it revolves around the sun. He became a symbol of the new ideas and approaches that brought about the scientific revolution. -
Feb 19, 1473
Copernicus.
In the A.D. 100s' the astronomer Ptolemy stated that the earth was the center of the universe. Ptolemy's theory is called the geocentric, or "earth centered" theory. -
Feb 19, 1473
Copernicus's theory
When Nicolaus's theory was published is 1543 paid little attention. The theory to deny what people's senses told them. Anyone could "see" that the sun and planets moved around earth Anyone could "feel" that solid earth did not move. Kepler and Galileo. Nicolaus had neither the instruments nor the mathematics to prove his theory. Proof came later with the work of two other scientists Johannes Kepler, a German Astronomer and Galileo, an Italian scientist each helped to confirm his theory. -
Jan 1, 1543
Vesalius
Vesalius published a seven volume book called "on the fabric of the human body" The drawings of the human body that Vesulius included in his work were amazingly detailed for the time. They helped readers to gain a visual understanding of the many complicated components of the body and of how they work together -
Jan 1, 1550
Other scientific discoveries
DUring the 1500s and 1600s scientific discoveries were made throughout Europe. German Gottfried Leibnitz and the english thinker Issac Newton developed their mathematical ideas independent of one another. -
Feb 15, 1564
Galileo Galilei
Galileo believed that scientific study would change the way people understood themselves and their world. Science, he felt, would lead to higher standards of living at every level of society. He believed, too, that science would weaken the social and economic barriers that separated people. Because his findings challenged the traditional beliefs of the catholic church, church leaders kept him from teaching or writing about his ideas. -
Renè Descartes
Renè Descartes explained that the universe operates in a machine-like way according to the basic laws of physics. His philosophy became the basis of our modern western view of the universe and its physical properties. -
The story continues
In the early 1600's Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes published a novel called Don Quixote de la Mancha. It told the story of an aging man stuck in the myths of the past. Cervantes humorous tale reflected a new world that was rejecting the legends of old for a reality based on science. -
Johannes Kepler
Kepler was a brilliant mathematicion who used models observation, and mathematics to test copernicus's heliocentric theory. Some of the ideas on which copernicus had based his theory were wrong. That slowed kepler down, but he eventually proved heliocentric theory correct. He published his laws of planetary motion in 1609. It took the work of an Italian scientist, however, to produce clear evidence that the earth moves around the sun. -
Rene Descartes
Descartes's interest ranged across many fields. His work included studies in geometry and algebra, the scientific method, astronomy, and the physical sciences. He created a mathematical description of the way that light reflects from a smooth surface. This explain led to the law of reflection, a basic principle in the study of optics. Much of Descartes work challenged traditional church teachings. He was forced to live in the protestant kingdom of Sweden, where he died in 1650. -
Robert Boyle
An english -irish scientist, RObert Boyle, hekped to pioneer the modern science of chemistry. Chemistry studies the composition of metter and how i tchanges. In 1662, Boyle showed that temperature and pressure affect the space that a gas occupies. -
Issac Newton
In 1687 English scientist Issac Newton Published a book building on the work of Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo. They had shown that the planets, including Earth revolve around the sun. They had not, however, been able to explain to explain why these bodies moved as they did. -
Priestly and Lavoisier
Priestly and Lavoisier made their discoveries in the late 1700s. By this time, the scientific approach had spread across Europe. The store of a human knowledge and understand has increased beyond measure and in a very brief span of time. In fact, speed of discovery and rapid spread and exchange of knowledge were important characteristics of the Scientific of the scientific revolution. -
Joesph Priestley
An english chemist, Joseph Priestly, discovered the element oxygen in 1774. Antoine Lavoisier, a French scientist, later named it.
