Science in the Latin West during Medieval Age

Early Middle Ages (AD 476–1000)

In the ancient world, Greek had been the primary language of science. The attempts to translate Greek writings into Latin had limited success.As the knowledge of Greek declined during the transition to the Middle Ages, the Latin West found itself cut off from its Greek philosophical and scientific roots. Most scientific inquiry came to be based on information gleaned from sources which were often incomplete and posed serious problems of interpretation.

Deurbanization reduced the scope of education and by the sixth century teaching and learning moved to monastic and cathedral schools, with the center of education being the study of the Bible.

Clergymen - leading scholars of the early centuries for whom the study of nature was but a small part of their interest. The study of nature was pursued more for practical reasons than as an abstract inquiry: the need to care for the sick led to the study of medicine and of ancient texts on drugs, the need for monks to determine the proper time to pray led them to study the motion of the stars, the need to compute the date of Easter led them to study and teach rudimentary mathematics and the motions of the Sun and Moon.

Educational Reform (Charles the Great)

7 liberal arts

• Trivium (literary education) - rhetoric, grammar, dialect
• Quadrivium (scientific education) - arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy

High Middle Ages (AD 1000–1300)

• the birth of medieval universities
• The rediscovery of the works of Aristotle

Grosseteste - Founder of the famous Oxford Franciscan School. He built his work on Aristotle's vision of the dual path of scientific reasoning. (Concluding from particular observations into a universal law, and then back again: from universal laws to prediction of particulars.) Grosseteste called this "resolution and composition".

Bacon - described a repeating cycle of observation, hypothesis, experimentation, and the need for independent verification. He recorded the manner in which he conducted his experiments in precise detail so that others could reproduce and independently test his results - a cornerstone of the scientific method.

Late Middle Ages (AD 1300–1500)

The first half of the 14th century saw the scientific work of great thinkers.

William of Occam - postulate the principle of parsimony (known today as Occam's Razor). This principle is one of the main heuristics used by modern science to select between two or more undetermined theories.

Jean Buridan - developed the theory of impetus which was a step towards the modern concept of inertia.

Thomas Bradwardine and his partners, the Oxford Calculators of Merton College, Oxford - distinguished kinematics from dynamics, emphasizing kinematics, and investigating instantaneous velocity.

They formulated the mean speed theorem: a body moving with constant velocity travels distance and time equal to an accelerated body whose velocity is half the final speed of the accelerated body.

They also demonstrated this theorem—essence of "The Law of Falling Bodies" -- long before Galileo is credited with this.

Nicole Oresme - showed that the reasons proposed by the physics of Aristotle against the movement of the earth were not valid and adduced the argument of simplicity for the theory that the earth moves, and not the heavens. Despite this argument in favor of the Earth's motion Oresme, fell back on the commonly held opinion that "everyone maintains, and I think myself, that the heavens do move and not the earth."

Crisis of the Late Middle Ages

Black death of 1348 - it sealed a sudden end to the previous period of massive scientific change. The plague killed a third of the people in Europe, especially in the crowded conditions of the towns, where the heart of innovations lay. Recurrences of the plague and other disasters caused a continuing decline of population for a century.

Pascals Triangle

In mathematics, Pascals Triangle is a geometric arrangement of the binomial coefficients in a triangle. It is named after the French mathematician Blaise Pascal in much of the Western world, although other mathematicians studied it centuries before him in India,Persia, China, and Italy..

The rows of Pascal's triangle are conventionally enumerated starting with row 0, and the numbers in each row are usually staggered relative to the numbers in the adjacent rows. A simple construction of the triangle proceeds in the following manner. On row 0, write only the number 1. Then, to construct the elements of following rows, add the number directly above and to the left with the number directly above and to the right to find the new value. If either the number to the right or left is not present, substitute a zero in its place. For example, the first number in the first row is 0 + 1 = 1, whereas the numbers 1 and 3 in the third row are added to produce the number 4 in the fourth row.

Chinese Science

There has been more or less continuous contact between Europe and China since classical Greek times in spite of the distances between them and their totally different language. usually the connection was indirect and restricted to trade in luxury goods. but even in the classical times there were curious synchronism in philosophical movements in Europe and China

Silk road - an ancient trade route linking China with Rome.

"Chinese technology until the Renaissance was consistently more advanced than Europe"

Marco Polo - Venetian traveler and author, whose account of his travels and experiences in China offered Europeans a firsthand view of Asian lands and stimulated interest in Asian trade.

Zu Chongzi - 5th century mathematician who calculated "pi" to the seventh digit.

Liu Ju-Hsieh - mathematician who discovered "Pascal's Triangle".

Tao Ch'ien - a famous poet and philosopher who influence the idea to discover an elixir and the science of medicine.

Inventions

• Magnetic Compass - (AD 270) instrument that indicates direction by means of a needle pointing in the direction of the magnetic North Pole. It enabled Chinese navigators to find their way on the open sea.
• Printing Press - (woodblock printing) 700, a machine that presses inked type or etched plates onto paper or textiles that are fed through it.
• Gun Powder - (1000) an explosive mixture of potassium nitrate , charcoal, and sulfur. Used in fireworks and explosives
• Paper making

Astronomy - first planetarium which was made by an emperor.

Stellar explosion that took place in the "Crab Nebula" in 1054.

Mathematics - Asian abacus, "pi" was calculated to the seventh digit, decimal system, Pascal's Triangle

Military - Crossbows, poison gases, Bamboo-made cannons, Rockets

Medicine - "Elixir of life" potion, acupuncture, autopsy

What is the Imortance of studying History of Science?

Science is a body of empirical, theoretical, and practical knowledge about the natural world, produced by researchers making use of scientific methods, which emphasize the observation, explanation, and prediction of real world phenomena by experiment. For me, we have to study the history of science because:

Ø We can trace the exact origins of modern science.

Ø We can differentiate the development that happened in science

Ø So we can acknowledge the different scientists that give important contributions in the field of science.

Ø In studying the history of science, we can improve our way of living by making the past our basis.

Astrology: A science or not?

Astrology is a pseudoscience or superstition by the scientific community, which sites a lack of statistically significant astrological predictions. It is a group of systems, traditions, and beliefs which hold that the relative position of celesial bodies and related details can provide information about personality, human affairs and other “earthly” matters. The word astrology comes from the latin term “astrologia” (astronomy) which in term derives from the greek noun “astron” (constellation or star) and “logia” (the study of). A practioner of astrology is called astrologer. Astrologers believe that the movements and positions of celestial bodies either directly influenced life on Earth or correspond to events experienced on a human scale.

Modern astrologers define astrology as a symbolic language, an art form, or a form of divinition. Despite differences in definitions, a common assumption of astrologers is that celestial placements can aid in the interpretation of past and present events, and in the prediction of the future.

Astrology has played an important role in the shaping of culture, early astronomy, the Vedas, and various disciplines throughout history. In fact, astrology and astronomy were often indistinguishable before the modern era, with the desire for predictive and divinatory knowledge one of the motivating factors for astronomical observation. Astronomy began to diverge from astrology after a period of gradual separation from the Renaissance up until the 18th century. Eventually, astronomy distinguished itself as the empirical study of astronomical objects and phenomena, without regard to the terrestrial implications of astrology.

ISLAMIC SCIENCE

· Most relevant to European science.

· Greek – Arabic – Latin – Hebrew

· The Arabic culture and language spread afar: to Portugal in the west and to the frontiers of China in the east and over many degrees of latitude.

Arabic scientific development:

Alchemy

• Medieval chemical art whose principal objectives were to find the PANACEA (cure for all illness) and to transmute base metals into gold.

Rhazes – makes the earliest known suggestions for furnishing a chemical laboratory.

Math

• Arabic Numerals – an Indian system of numerical rotation during 9^th century. It was invented in India passed through Persia to the Arabs, and was introduced to the Europe in the 10^th century
• Persian Mohammed Ibn Musa Al Khwarizmi – the Persian Mohammed where algorism, which is a medieval word for arithmetic came from. He also developed the process of retrification (transposition of a negative term of the equation into the positive side)

Toledan – the tables of proposition of stars which were drawn up in 1080.

Medicine

• Rhazes – made the first distinction between measles and small fox.
• Avicenna – Persian philosopher and physician. He is called the “Prince of Physicians”.

The great Arabic contributions to medicine are the introduction of new vegetables drugs (herbal medicine).

INDIAN SCIENCE

Ø Indian civilization is about the oldest still alive and achieves a high level of technology at an early stage.

The science in India has something to do with the following field:

• Agriculture – irrigation was developed at an early stage.
• Indian Astrology – Indian Astronomical text named Vendanga Jyotista dates back around 1200 BC. Detailed several Astronomical attributes generally applied for timing social and religious events with regards to marriage, career and election process.
• Zinc Metallurgy (refining metals) – zinc mines of Zawar were active during 400 B.C. Another important Indian contribution was in the isolation, distillation and use of zinc. Early iron objects found in India can be dated to 1400 BC. Rust free steel was an Indian invention and remained an Indian skill for centuries.
• Mathematics – the use of negative numbers was known in early India and their role in situation like mathematical problem of debt was understood. Decimal numbers was also known in early India.

List of Indian Invention and Discoveries

1. Atomism – the earliest reference to the concept of atoms date back to India in the 6^th century BC.

Ø According to Democritus – the terms “atomos” means uncuttable or smallest indivisible particle of matter.

Ø Dharmakirti and Dignaga – Indian philosopher and founder of Vaisheshika School of Atomism. They considered atom to be: point-sized, durationless, and made of energy.

2. Chandrasekhar limit and Chandrasekhar numbers – discovered by Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (novel price in physics for his work in the stellar structure and stellar evolution).
3. Universe – the earliest known philosophical models of the universe are found in Vedas dating back to the late 2^nd millennium BC.
4. Indigo – used as dye, a major center for its production and processing.
5. Firearms – in the 16^th century, they start to manufacture fire arms specially, large guns.

ASTRONOMY

Ø The study of celestial bodies or objects such as: stars, planets, comets, galaxies and its phenomena.

Ø Greek word “Astron” meaning “star”, and “Nomos” meaning “laws”.

20^th century – Astronomy splits into two major categories.

• Observational Astronomy – focused in acquiring data from observation which then analyzed by the aids of Basic principles of Physics.
• Theoretical Astronomy – oriented towards the development of computer or analytical methods to described astronomical phenomena and objects.

Some Contributions of Early Civilizations

Babylonians – beginning of mathematical and scientific astronomy. They discovered the Lunar eclipse record in repeating cycle known as “ saros”

Greek

• Aristharcus – calculated the mass of the earth, measure the distance and size of the moon and star. He is also the first to proposed a HELIOCENTRIC MODEL of the solar system
• Hipparchus – invented the first and the earliest known astronomical device “astrolabe”. Antikysthera mechanism (150-80 BC), early analog computer designed to calculate the location of the sun, moon and planets.

Persian

• Azophi – Andromeda Galaxy (described in his “Book of Fixed Stars”)

Egyptians

• Ali Ibn Ridwan – first to observed the Super Nova 1006 (SN), the brightest apparent magnitude stellar events recorded in history.

Subfield of Astronomy

v Solar Astronomy – the study of sun’s behavior and phenomena.

Parts of the Sun

• Photosphere – visible outer layer
• Chromospheres – above the photosphere, thin layer surrounded by core a transitional region of rapidly increasing temperature then by a super heated corona.
• Core – center of the sun.

v Planetary Science – an astronomical field examines the assemblage of planets, moon, comets, asteroids, and other bodies orbiting the solar system

Subdivisions of Solar System

• Inner planets – mercury, Venus, earth, and mars.

• Asteroid planets – asteroids
• Outer planets – giant gas, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune

v Extra Galactic Astronomy – study of objects outside the galaxy.

v Galactic Astronomy – study of galaxies

Three Parts of the Organization and Distribution of Galaxies

1. Elliptical galaxy – has the cross sectional shape of an ellipse where the stars moved along the random orbits without prepared direction.
2. Spiral galaxy – star is organized into a flat rotating disk usually with a prominent bulge or bar at the center. (e.g. – milky way galaxy)
3. Irregular galaxy – chaotic in appearance and one neither spiral nor elliptical it is due to the gravitational interactions.

v Stellar Astronomy – study of stars, its formations in dense region of giant dust and gas known “giant” molecular gas.

STONE AGE

Ø Old stone age – Paleolithic period

Ø New stone age – Neolithic period

Ø Began when human beings first arrived in the New World, 30,000 years ago and ended in 25,000 B.C.

Ø Tools and weapons were made of stone, animal bones and wood such as axes, arrowheads, hammers, chisels, javelins, and harpoons.

Ø Period when the Java man, Peking man, Neantherdal Man, and Cro-Magnon man existed.

Ø Began to use ornaments, paint pictures and carved pictures of clay, bone and ivory.

Ø Their greatest achievement is the discovery of fire.

Ø They learned domestication of plants and animals

Ø Began to engage in agriculture and developed pottery and weaving.

URBAN REVOLUTION

Ø Important transition began.

Ø Increased in technological innovation

Ø Beginning of the invention of the city.

Categories in Urban Revolution

1.Craftsman and Scientist – led to the search of metallic core. The rise of the first civilization.

Sumerian Astronomers – plotted the motion of heavenly bodies.

2. Copper and Bronze

Ø Goldsmith – a technique of heating metal over a strong fire.

Ø Bronze – most important material of the early civilization.

3. Sea Transportation – progressed from a sailing ship to vessel.
4. Irrigation – development of systematic irrigation.
5. Urban Manufacturing – centered product such as pottery, wines, oils, and cosmetics. (Commodities traded of metals). The science of chemistry started in the kitchen.
6. Wheel Vehicles – primarily provided by animals.

Ø Chariot – during war it also appeared as a weapon.

7. Buildings – used sun dried bricks.

Ø Sumerians – first to build columns with bricks.

Ø Egyptians – used stone to construct pyramid and temples.

8. Dissemination of technical knowledge.