CHAPTER SIX

BRIEF HISTORY OF SCIENCE

BY
PROF. ANTHONY UWANDU UZOMA
&
ONYEAKAZI JUDE CHUKWUMA, PhD

This Chapter serves as handy, reliable and comprehensive guide for students to grapple
with the problems of the historical development of science. It will help the reader
comprehend easily the course of scientific development beginning from the ancient Egypt
and Mesopotamia, through the ancient Greek philosophers/scientists, down to the present
century. This historical analysis is very timely because it serves to erase the erroneous
impression that the Greeks and the Western world were the originators of philosophy and
science. The truths of African origin of these disciplines are re-established here. We
warmly recommend that this chapter be carefully studied with interest.

SCIENCE IN ANCIENT AFRICA

The history of science in Ancient Africa is rich and diverse. Many research findings have
demonstrated, as we shall see, that Africa is the cradle of the world civilization and has
contributed much to the origin and development of science, philosophy and other
disciplines. The various achievements of Egypt and its neighbors in the prehistoric times
show that Africa more than any other race contributed immensely to the beginning and
development of science. For example, available records show that writing traces its
development from the Egyptian and Summerian picture writing system. 1 It is in this wise
that R.R Palmer and Joel Colton write:
Europeans were by no means the pioneers of human
civilization. Half of recorded history had passed before
anyone in Europe could read or write. The priests of Egypt
began to keep written records between 4, 000 and 3, 000

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 B.C, but two thousand years later the poems of Homer were
still being circulated in the Greek city states by word of
mouth but the near east Africa, the Euphrates and Tigris
valley…had reached its Neolithic age two thousand years
before Europe.2.
In addition to the discovery of writing, the use of calendar was said to have started from
ancient Egypt too. As early as 4236 B.C., which is the earliest fixed date in the history of
mankind; the Egyptians had already constructed and adopted a workable yearly calendar.
They began with a lunar calendar, but with time they developed a far more accurate one
based upon the rising of the star called Sirius or the Dog Star.3. These ancient Egyptians
noted that the master timepiece of nature is the yearly cycle of the earth and the sun. They
discovered that the sun returns to the same place in the heaven every three hundred and
sixty five days. They therefore created a very sensible and practical calendar based on
this knowledge – interval of time (365 days) between successive heliacal risings of
Sirius. They divided the year into three seasonal periods of four months; the months were
set at thirty days each, twelve of them a year, and this left five days for a holiday. In the
words of James H. Breasted, this Egyptian 365 day calendar was “the earliest known
practically convenient calendar of 365 days”, and the 4236 B.C. marked “not only the
earliest fixed date in history, but also the earliest date in the intellectual history of
mankind”4

Geometry which started from the concern of everyday life was said to have had its origin
from ancient Egypt. Traditional account as preserved in Herodotus’s History (5th century
B.C.), credits the Egyptians with inventing surveying in order to reestablish property
boundries after the annual flood of the Nile. As the waters rose, they washed off the
landmark and boundary lines and created great confusion. Since the real-estate taxes
levied by Pharaoh’s tax collectors were based on the size of the field under cultivation, it
became necessary to find some way to measure land areas accurately. By the time they
had learned to measure these areas, the Egyptians had laid the foundation for the branch

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of mathematics called Geometry. The name “Geometry” indicates its origin, for the
Greek word “geometria” means “measurement of land.”
The same is true of the science of medicine. The black Egyptian called Imhotep, who
lived about 2900 B.C., is the father of the science of medicine, not Hippocrates of Greece
who appeared about 2,000 years after Imhotep,

And finally it is most appropriate to end this chapter with indisputable words of Professor
G. C.M. James thus;
Now that it has been shown that philosophy, art, and sciences
were bequeathed to civilization by the people of North Africa
and not by the people of Greece; the pendulum of praise and
honour is due to shift from the people of Greece to the people
of African continent who were the rightful heirs of such a
praise and honor.5

SCIENCE IN ANCIENT GREECE

In the Hellenistic Age of Ancient Greece, science became a major topic of study. The
Greeks had a long tradition of rational inquiry, or using their intelligence to make reason
out of things. Greek science arose in the district called Ionia, a strip of land on the west
coast of Asia Minor and a group of nearby inlands. The earliest Greek philosophers were
Ionians; and they confined their attention to Nature, the external world, following the
ideas they had gathered from Egypt and the oriental world. Their main concern was to
investigate the changes or succession of beings and to attempt to discover what was the
constant element in the midst of all these changes. For these wise men, in spite of all the
change and transition, there must be something permanent, because change is from
something into something else which persists, which takes various forms and undergoes
this process of change. They asked then, what is the world made of? Therefore the Ionian
philosophy or material element or stuff (the Urstuff) of all things. One
philosopher/scientist decided for one element, another philosopher decided for another.

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THALES: The philosopher acquires fame for teaching that the world-stuff of which all
things were made was Water because water takes the form of all things found in the
material world. Thales and his Ionian colleagues noted that the patterns of many natural
events were so regular that they could in some cases be predicted. For them all nature
follows a pattern, it obeys certain definite laws and does not act through the whims of
capricious gods. Thales predicted that the eclipse of the sun in 585BC. His reputation is
that of a man who takes a reasonable or ‘scientific’ approach to the mysteries of the
natural world. His theory was supported by his pupil.

ANAXIMANDER (611-547 B.C.), who was also interested in the nature (the basic
world-stuff) of the universe and he concluded that it was an indefinite substance, infinite
in quantity. He called it “the boundless” (“aperion”).

For ANAXIMENES (585-525BC) also of Miletus, Air not water, was the first principle
of all things. He likened this air or ‘pneuma’ with the very breath of life. He believed that
the earth was in form of flat, round disc, floating in the sea of air, and that the heavenly
bodies revolved around it. The original world-stuff (Air) is a kind of vapour, infinite and
alive, of which the condensation and rarefaction causes different things to emerge. Air
itself is invisible but it becomes visible in the process of condensation and rarefaction-
becoming fire as it is rarefied; and cloud, water, earth and finally stones as it is
condensed.

HERACLITUS of Ephesus (535-475BC.) maintained that Fire was the first principle of
all things; fire was transformed into other elements, and these other elements in turn into
fire. “All things” he said “are forever in state of flux”. There is no birth and no death, but
only a ceaseless transformation of the restless elements.

EMPEDOCLES of Agrigentum (495-435 B.C.) seems to have combined the views of

his predecessors, asserting that there are four elements (Earth, Water, Air and Fire)

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which produce change by mixing and separating under the influence of two opposing
“forces” that he called love and strife. He maintained that these two forces, love and hate,
shared the rule of the world. All these theories imply that matter is a continuous
substance.

Two Greek philosophers, LEUCIPPUS (first half of the 5th century BC) and
DEMOCRITUS of Miletus (lived about 410BC) came up with the notion that there were
two real entities: atoms, which were small indivisible particles of matter, and void, which
was the empty space in which matter was located. Although all the explanations from
Thales to Democritus involve matter, what is more important is the fact that these rival
explanations stand out as platforms for future debates in which alternate theories were put
forth and criticized.

THE PYTHAGOREAN SCHOOL

The materialist explanations of the origins of the cosmos seem to miss an important
point. It doesn’t make much sense to think that an ordered universe comes out of a
random collection of matter. How can a random assemblage of fire or water produce a
universe without the existence of some ordering principle? The first to attempt this
problem was that of the followers of Pythagoras (approximately 582-507 BC), who saw
number as the fundamental unchanging entity underlying all the structure of the
universe. Thus with the Pythagoreans we find number emerging as the rational basis for
an orderly universe. They were struck by the importance of number in the world. All
things are numerable and we can express many things numerically. In applying their
theory of number to physics, the Pythagoreans with their mathematical concept of the
world analyzed bodies into surfaces, surfaces into lines, and lines into points. The
Pythagoreans discovered many theorems still obtaining in geometry today-particularly
those involving parallels, triangles, quadrilaterals, of prime numbers (those divisible only
by themselves and by 1). They also worked out a system of irrational quantities (those
which like the square root of 2 cannot be expressed by ordinary numbers).

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PLATO AND ARISTOTLE
Greek philosophy reached its peak with the appearance of Plato, Aristotle and their
followers, in the fourth century B.C. Like the Pythagoreans, PLATO (427-347 B.C.)
found the ordering principle of the universe in mathematics, specifically in geometry. He
maintained that all things in the material world are imperfect reflection of eternal
unchanging ideas, just as the mathematical diagrams are reflections of eternal unchanging
mathematical truths. ARISTOTLE (384-322 B.C) disagreed with his teacher, Plato, in
several important respects. While Aristotle agreed that truth must be eternal and
unchanging, he maintained that we come to know the truth through the external world
which we perceive with our senses. Hence, for him, our knowledge starts from sense; that
is, from the particular and ascents to the general or universal. Thus, it is clear that we
must get to know the primary premises by induction because the methods which even
sense-perception implants the universal is inductive. Aristotle was thus compelled to treat
not only deduction but also of induction.

THE ALEXANDRIAN SCHOOL

The history of science sometimes follows the course of empire. The conquest of
Alexander the Great shifted the centre of the Greek world of thought to Alexandria in
Egypt. Alexander had added Egypt to his growing empire in 332 B.C., and he built
Alexandria in that year. A remarkable school of philosophy and science thus grew up in
Alexandria, Egypt. Prominent figures of the Alexandrian school include Euclid,
Aristarchus of Samos and Archimedes.

THE DECLINE OF ANCIENT SCIENCE

Science fared badly during the 3rd, 4th and 5th centuries A.D. in the course of this period,
there was a general breakdown of civilization in the western world. Society became more
sharply divided than ever into “haves” and “have-nots”. In these troubled times,
Christianity came to the fore. Despite hampering restrictions and bloody persecutions it

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spread rapidly through the Empire. Finally in 312 A.D., the Emperor Constantine
proclaimed Christianity as the official religion of the states. From that day its triumph
was assured, though pagan cults continued to exist for many years. Christians were not
scientifically minded in those days; they were primarily interested in the problem of
human salvation. Nor did the pagan cults, like those of Attis, Isis, and Mithras, take any
interest in science. As for the conventional worship of the old Greek and Roman deities,
it had degenerated into the mechanical performance of ancient rites.
Science received little support from philosophy. The works of Aristotle and Plato still
attracted disciples, but scholars were more interested in expounding the views of the
masters than in the independent inquiry. The Stoics and the Epicureans of the day joined
hands in scorning science.

Plotinus of the Neo-Platonic School of Philosophy taught among other things, that at the
very apex of the scheme of things, is the Godhead – the “First”, the “One”, the “God”. It
is so far above all other forms of being that we cannot even define or describe it. The
world emanates from the Godhead by an endless process. Sensible matter- the world of
visible things, of flesh and blood, and plants and stones and seas – is the last of the
emanations from Godhead and is the least perfect of all. We should do our best to free
ourselves from contact with this world of gross matter by dint of constant reflection and
contemplation. Obviously, the effect of these doctrines upon science was very disastrous.
For when men deliberately turned their backs on direct observation of the phenomena of
nature, science has indeed fallen on evil days.

SCIENCE DURING THE MIDDLE AGES

The name middle Ages is commonly given to the long period from the collapse of the
Western Roman Empire in the 5th century to the time of the invention of printing at about
1450 A.D. Within this period there was the “Dark Ages” extending from the beginning of
the Middle Ages 455 A.D., to first intellectual reawakening of the West under

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Pope Sylvester 11, 999-1003. This was a barren period in the history of European
civilization.

For quite some time the intellectual life of antiquity seemed to be on the verge of being
blotted out, the field of natural philosophy was relegated to the background; the
literatures and culture of Greece and Rome became almost as if they never existed.
Outside the church there was no leisure for such things; and inside the church little
inclination. All true wisdom was given in the church creed- all that was necessary for
salvation. Heathen learning and philosophy became useless as they were regarded as
being either vicious or un-Christian, and so deserving to be rooted out and destroyed or
be treated with indifference.

However, the monasteries still preserved some little respect for intellectual culture,
though it was elementary and chiefly ecclesiastical in character. Previous philosophy
survived for the most part only as it filtered through the writings of the Church fathers,
who frequently were hostile to it. Of the works of Plato and Aristotle, only the merest
fraction was known and this through translation and commentary.

As time went on, the men of the Middle Ages created great literature and produced those
marvels of architecture –the Gothic cathedrals that are still admired today at Amiens,
Feims, Chartes, Paris, Canterbury, Cologne and Burges. There were great philosophers,
too, in those days: - Albert Magnus, St Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, William of
Ockham. Yet, on the whole, the Middle Ages represented a period of stagnation in the
history of science. The few developments in the field of science are outlined below.

ARABIC SCIENCE
In the 9th century the Arabs became the chief standard bearers of science and philosophy.
The golden age of Arabic science lasted for about two centuries from roughly 900 to
1100 A.D. it is true that many if not the best “ARAB” scientists, were neither Arabs nor

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Moslems they were Syrians, Persians and Jews who had Arabic names and wrote in the
Arabic language. Generally, the Arabs excelled in medicine. Many of them were
physicians e.g. Phaxes (865-925), Alhaze (965-1038), Avicenna (980-1037), etc.

THE RISE OF EUROPEAN UNIVERSITIES

The growing thirst for learning was soon reflected in the rise of universities. They were
profoundly influenced by two new religious orders: The Franciscan order founded by two
new religious orders: the Franciscan order founded by the Italian, St. Francis of Assisi in
1209, and the Dominican order established by the Spaniard St. Dominic of Galagora in
1215. Both orders provided a great many outstanding teachers. Albert Magnus, and St.
Thomas Aquinas were Dominicans; Robert Grosseteste and Roger Bacon were
Franciscans.

ALBERT MAGNUS (ca 120 – 1280)

He was among the schoolmen who tried to interpret and systematize the rediscovered
works of Aristotle. He was considered the most learned man of his time. Into his
elaborate commentaries on Aristotle, Albert the Great wove all that was then known
about astronomy, geography, botany, zoology, and medicine.

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (1225 – 1274)

He was the greatest pupil of Albertus Magnus and has been called the “Christian
Aristotle”. His greatest work was his Summa Theologiae (The Sum and Substance of
Theology), in which with faultless logic he combined Aristotelian learning with the
teachings of Christian theology St. Thomas rejected Aristotle’s doctrine of the eternity of
the world, because Holy Scripture required a creation in time. He also modified certain
other doctrines. It was the aim of St Thomas to construct a complete system of thought
that would show that the universe was in logical accord with divine revelation and
“spiritual fact”. The supreme goal of all learning, therefore, was theology (the study of
God’s ways), the “Queen of the sciences”. (“Science” then meant simply “branches of

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knowledge”). Philosophy, including natural philosophy – the study of the physical world
– was considered to be the handmaid of theology.

In one respect St. Thomas and other schoolmen made a valuable contribution to the
development of modern science, for they held firmly to the belief that ours is an ordered
universe that can be comprehended by the light of reason. Modern science is based upon
this faith in reason (rationalism) and this belief that events can be coupled with causes in
a definite and orderly manner.

ROGER BACON (1214 -1294)

Roger Bacon, a Franciscan of Oxford University, was the greatest figure in the medieval
science. He was very critical of scholars who preceded him and who based their opinion
upon fallible authorities, or the weight of custom, and who covered their ignorance by
verbose arguments. Roger Bacon held the view that the true scientist should know
‘natural science by experiment, and medicaments and alchemy and all things in the
heavens or beneath them and he would be ashamed if any layman, rustic or soldier,
should know anything about the soil he was ignorant of.5’

Roger Bacon performed many experiments in alchemy and optics. His three works upon
which his scientific reputation chiefly rests were:
(i) Opus Maius (Greater Work), cutting at length his views on mathematics, physics,
philosophy, grammar and philology.
(ii) Opus Minus (Lesser work), summarizing the Opus Maius.
(iii) Opus Tertium (Third Work), which he sent to Pope Clement IV for fear the other
works might be lost in transit.

Bacon was one of the very few men of his age to appreciate the value of experiment in
science. He understood the nature of the rainbow and described many of the optical
properties of lenses. He was among the first in Europe to suggest the use of lenses for

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spectacles. He is said to have developed a format for making gun-powder in the course of
his alchemical experiments in 1249. He startled the men of his time with his seemingly
fantastic predictions of things to come – horseless carriage, ships that would move
without sails, machines that would fly through the air; other machines that would raise
great weights; suspension bridges that would span rivers. Of course these marvels came
to pass, for today we have automobiles, streamers, airplanes, cranes and suspension
bridges. In his attitude toward experimentation as the acid test of truth, Bacon was truly a
man of science. He was centuries ahead of his time.

SCIENCE IN THE MODERN PERIOD

The fifteenth century ushered in a new and constructive attitude towards the universe.
This was the period of the “Renaissance”, a French word meaning “rebirth”. This era
was called the “Renaissance” by those who regarded the Middle Ages as a dark time
from which the human spirit had to be awakened. It was called a “rebirth” because they
felt that after the protracted interruption, men took and resumed a civilization like that of
the Greeco-Romans, At the beginning of the 17th century the works of and Copernicus,
Galileo, Kepler and Newton gave a great impetus to astronomy and physics. The
important discoveries which marked the awakening of scientific thought dealt devastating
blow to the Aristotelian physics. Aristotle’s authority was criticized, reduced and
replaced by a new method and a new view of the cosmos. The scientific changes that
took place during this period are popularly known as the Copernican Revolution.
Eminent scientist of the time including Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo Galilee
(1564-1642) and Isaac Newton (1642-1727) established scientific observation and
experimentation on a solid foundation.

Prior to the Renaissance period, since the Greek Ptolemy had codified ancient astronomy
in the second century 140 A.D., educated Europeans had held a conception of the cosmos
which was called Ptolemaic. According to this view, the universe or cosmos was a group
of concentric spheres, a series of balls within ball each having the same centre. The

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innermost ball and centre of the spheres was the earth, which is made of hard, solid,
earthily substance. The other spheres encompassing the earth in series were all
transparent, and they revolved about the earth (geocentricism). The celestial bodies were
thought to be of different material and quality from the earth. The earth was of heavy
dross; the stars, the planets, the sun and the moon seemed to be of pure glooming light.
The cosmos was a hierarchy of ascending perfection. The heavens were purer than the
earth.

This Ptolemaic system was formulated in rigorous mathematical terms, and in the Middle
Ages a complex geometry had been developed to explain the observed motion of the
heavenly bodies. The Ptolemaic was a mathematical system, and it was for purely
mathematical reason that it came to be reconsidered. There was a significant revival of
mathematical interest at the end of the middle Ages, and a renewed concentration on the
philosophical traditions of Pythagoras and Plato in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
These philosophies contained the doctrine that numbers might be the final key to the
mysteries of nature. Accompanying this doctrine was the metaphysical belief that
simplicity was more likely to be a sign of truth than complication, and that a simple
mathematical formulation was better that a more complex one. These mathematical ideas
motivated Nicholas Copernicus.

NICHOLAS COPERNICUS (1473-1543): HIS COPERNICAN REVOLUTION

From such a background of mathematical interest came Nicholas Copernicus, born in
Poland, of German and Polish background. After his studies in Italy, Nicholas
Copernicus wrote his monumental work: De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the
Revolutions of the Heavenly Orbs), published in 1543 after his death. In it he taught that
the sun is the centre of the solar system, and that the earth is one of the planets revolving
round the sun. This view had been held earlier by a few isolated thinkers. But it was
Copernicus who gave a mathematical demonstration to it. He was the first to realize that
the apparent movement of the sun from the east to the west is no conclusive proof that, it

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does actually move in this way. To him the movement of the solar system was purely a
mathematical problem. Instead of the intricate mathematical constructions of the
Ptolemaic system, Copernicus needed just fewer and simpler such constructions to
explain the known movements of the heavenly bodies. The heliocentric or sun-centered
theory was mathematically a little simpler than the geocentric or earth-centered theory
previously held. Copernicus argued that the earth rotates around a stationary sun. What
appears to us to be motions of the sun arise not from its motions, but from the motions of
the earth. The earth revolves round the sun like any other planet. Copernicus thus
substituted the heliocentric for the geocentric system of astronomy.

Using mathematical methods to explain his position on the solar system, Copernicus
argued that a scientific theory is a group of ideas deduced from certain assumption or
proposition. In his view, true assumption or proposition must achieve two goals.
Primarily, they must save the appearance of the heavenly bodies. Secondly, they must
never contradict the Pythagoreans that the motions of the heavenly bodies were circular
and uniform. Copernicus believed that any assumption that conflicted with observation
was a defective as one which denied the preconception that the motions of the heavenly
bodies were circular and uniform.

Nicholas Copernicus vehemently argued that the Ptolemaic system was not sufficiently
absolute, not sufficiently pleasing to the mind, because Ptolemy deviated from the strict
letter of the Pythagorean preconceptions. Ptolemy had assumed that the heavenly bodies
move in circles with angular speeds which were not uniform relative to the centers of
their circles; they were uniform relative only to points outside of such centers.
Copernicus rejected such an explanation. He criticized this along with those of ancient
astronomers, observing that given their ‘axioms of physics’ and the necessity of saving
the appearances they had either failed to explain what was observed in the heavens or
they had unnecessarily complicated their systems of the universe. Criticizing these earlier
astronomers Copernicus says:

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 Therefore in the process of demonstration, which is called
method, they are found either to have omitted something
essential, or to have admitted something extraneous and
wholly irrelevant.
Copernicus discovered that these ancient scientists were guilty of the latter error: they
had added three motions of the earth to each of the heavenly bodies in order to get at a
theory in which the earth was stationary in the centre of universe. Thus, three circle or
systems of circles had been added to each of the heavenly bodies in the Greek
geometrical system of the universe in order to explain the apparent movements of the
heavens from the point of view of a stationary earth. Copernicus deemed such circles an
unnecessary complication of the Greek schemes. He rather assumed that the earth spun
on its axis daily and moved round the sun in an annual orbit. By this assumption,
Copernicus reduced from eighty to forty-eight the number of circles required to explain
the apparent movements of the heavens in the versions of Ptolemaic system. This new
system is contained in Copernicus’ Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs, which gave a
detailed account of the planetary motions.

The new solar system propounded by Copernicus, maintain that the earth revolved round
the sun like the other planets. The earth enjoyed the same uniform and circular motions as
the other celestial bodies, motions that had been characteristic only of perfect and
incorruptible things in the old schemes. Copernicus stressed the fact that the earth is
similar to the heavenly bodies because they all possessed gravity. This gravity did not act
across space. It existed only within aggregation of matter, like the earth and the heavenly
bodies, providing their binding force, and bringing them into the perfect form of a sphere.
Copernicus presented a purposive and teleological argument thus:
I think gravity is nothing else than a natural appetency,
given to the parts by Divine providence of the maker of the
universe, in order that they may establish their unity and
wholeness by combining in the form of a sphere. It is

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 probable that this affection also belongs to the sun, moon,
and the planets, in order that they may, by its efficacy,
return in their roundness.6
To sum up, one may safely say that Copernicus supplied the simplest answer to the age-
long Greek problem of how to explain the apparent movement of the heavenly bodies in
terms of motions that were circular and uniform. Copernicus substitution of the
geocentric system of the universe with the heliocentric system has been referred to as the
Copernican Revolution. Latter scientists like Galileo, Kepler, and Newton gave their
support and helped to establish it firmly.

JOHANNES KEPLER (1571-1630): THE MATHEMATICAL MYSTIC.

The Copernican doctrine remained a hypothesis known only to experts for quite some
time. A greater number of the astronomers of the time were reluctant to accept it, having
been convinced of the Ptolematic system. Tycho Brache (1546-1601), the greatest
authority on the actual positions and movements of the heavenly bodies in the
generations immediately after Copernicus, refused to accept the Copernicus system in
full. But his assistant and follower, Johannes Kepler, fully accepted the Copernican
theory and advanced it.

Kepler a German has been described as “a kind of mathematical mystic, part-time

astrologer, and scientific genius” who “felt ecstasy at the mysterious harmonies of
mathematical forms”.7 Utilizing both his own extensive observations and the data
collected by Brahe, Kepler calculated a set of astronomical tables that were far more
accurate than any other in existence. Those tables were named “ Rudolphine Tables” .
Kepler won the proud title of “Law- maker of heavens” for discovering the three laws
which exactly describe the orbits of the planets and which furnished further proof of the
authenticity of the Copernicus theory. These laws called Kepler’s laws states as follows:
1. Each planet describes an ellipse, the sun being at on focus.

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2. The straight line joining the planet to the sun sweeps over equal areas in equal
intervals of time.
3. The squares of the periodic times of any two planets are to each other exactly as
the cubes of their median distances.

In this study of the planetary system, Kepler resolved the conflict between the ideas of
Copernicus and Brahe. Copernicus believed the orbits of the planets about the sun to be
circles. Brahe held that such belief did not agree with observable facts. Kepler discovered
that orbits of the planets were ellipses. The ellipsis, like the circle, is an abstract
mathematical figure with knowable properties. Kepler then demonstrated that as a planet
moves in its elliptical path about the sun, the straight lines connecting it with the sun
sweeps through an area of space proportional to the time taken by the planet’s motion;
that is, a planet sweeps equal areas in equal times; or more simply, that the closer a planet
is to the sun in its elliptical orbit, the faster it moves. He also proved that the length of
time in which the several planets revolve about the sun varies proportionately with their
distance from the sun; the square of the time is proportional to the cube of the distance.

Kepler demonstrated that the actual world of stubborn facts, as seen by Tycho Brahe and
the purely rational world of mathematical harmony, as surmised by Copernicus, were not
really in any discrepancy with each other; that they really correspond exactly. This was
the mystery of numbers. Kepler also did some fundamental research in optics, dealing
particularly with the properties of lenses and the theory of vision. His treatises on The
Optical Parts of Astronomy (1604) and Dioptrics (1611) are considered to be the
starting points of modern optical research. He also made important contributions to pure
mathematics. His calculations had a vital bearing on the later development of the
calculus. He invented his own system of logarithms.

The great scientific achievements of Kepler can be summarized in the words of Stephen
F. Mason thus: “with Kepler the spatial configuration of the solar system was finally

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cleared up, and the way made open for the interpretation of the pattern of the heavens in
terms of a dynamic equilibrium of mechanical forces. This was the great achievement of
early modern science. The Greeks had been mainly concerned with the static pattern of
the universe, dealing with motions only so long as the recurred uniformly and traced out
of geometrical figures. Because of their preconceptions, the pattern of the Greek systems
of the world remained complex. By dropping one preconception, namely the qualitative
distinction between the heavens and the earth, Copernicus obtained a much simpler
system and by dropping most of the other Greek conceptions, Kepler obtained the
simplest system of all. In so doing they opened the way for the interpretation of celestial
motions in terms of terrestrial mechanics. A development that would have been
inconceivable to the dominant Greek schools of thought and they possessed a science of
dynamics, which they did not” (P. 137)

GALILEO GALILEI (1564-1642)

Earlier revolutions in astronomy and anatomy had set the stage for the rapid development
of scientific thought. Into this stage strode Galileo Galilee, of Italian birth and rightly
described as the “first of the moderns” in science. Galileo broke the stronghold of the
ancient authorities, namely, Aristotle, Galen and Ptolemy,- on scientific thought. He
boldly exposed many of their errors and appealed to something newer: - the evidence of
experiment and observation. He insisted on quantitative measurement; and he measured
whatever he could. For example, the story has it, that in the cathedral of Pisa, Galileo
timed, with his pulse, the swing of a lamp hanging from the ceiling by a long chain. He
observed that whether a swing was long or short it seemed to take the same time. He thus
hit upon an important scientific fact – the period of the pendulum.

In 1609 Galileo constructed a telescope and was the first man to turn the telescope
skyward. Through it he observed that the moon had a rough and mountainous surface, as
if it made of the same material as the earth. Perceiving clearly the dark side of the moon
in its various phases and observing that in every position it only reflected the light of the

17
sun, Galileo arrived at a conclusion that the moon was not itself a luminous object. He
observed spots on the sun; found that planets had visible breadth when viewed through
the telescope; that fixed stars were only points of light and that Jupiter had satellites,
moons moving around it like the moon around the earth. These discoveries confirmed the
validity of the Copernican theory, which he had already accepted. And with these
discoveries he helped to win over many people to the Copernican idea. These discoveries
suggested that the heavenly bodies could be of the same substances as the earth, masses
of matter moving in space. The earth itself was a kind of heavenly body moving about the
sun. The difference between the earth and the heavens started diminishing. This dealt a
devastating blow at all earlier philosophy and theology and consequently earned Galileo
the condemnation and forceful public recantation of his views by the Church.

Galileo’s best contribution was his work in mechanics – the action of forces on bodies.
He accepted the atomic theory and gave mechanics an experimental and mathematical
basis. Where Kepler found mathematical laws describing the movement of planets;
Galileo found mathematical laws describing the movement of bodies on the earth.
Formerly it was accepted that heavier bodies fell to the ground faster than light ones.
Galileo demonstrated that despite all previous speculation on the subject, two bodies of
different weights, when allowance was made for difference in air resistance due to
differences of size or shape, struck the ground at the same time. He also discovered that
when falling freely, bodies moving on the earth fall with a velocity that increase
according to mathematical formula. Galileo made improvements in the construction of
compound microscope. He developed a balance scale apparatus to weight the air. He laid
the foundation for modern physics.

BACON AND DESCARTES: HARBINGERS OF SCIENTIFIC CIVILIZATION

Two men have been described as prophets of a scientific civilization. They are Francis
Bacon and Rene Descartes. Both asked themselves how possible is it for human beings to
know anything with certainty or to have a reliable, truthful and usable knowledge of the

18
world of nature? Both disregarded previous beliefs and rejected the methods of the
scholastics. Both maintained that the medieval methods were obsolete and retrogressive;
that truth is not something that we postulate at the beginning and then explore in all its
ramifications, but that it is something which we discover at the end after a long process of
experimentations, investigation, experimentation or intermediate thought. Hitherto the
Medieval or Aristotelian methods proceeded by affirming or defining the nature of an
object and then describing how objects of such a nature do or should behave.

Bacon and Descartes by providing a constructive programme for the acquisition of

reliable knowledge became harbingers or philosophers of a scientific view, Bacon called
himself “the trumpeter of the new age”. They taught that there was a true and reliable
method of knowledge, and once this true method was known and followed, once the real
workings of nature were understood, men would be able to use this knowledge for their
purposes, control nature in their own interests, make useful inventions, improve their
mechanical arts, and add generally to their wealth and comfort. Bacon and Descartes thus
announced the advent of a scientific civilization.8

Though Bacon and Descartes made these common contributions to scientific

development, each had his individual characteristics and peculiar contribution. Let us
discuss each of them.

FRANCIS BACON (1561-1626): HIS EXPERIENTIAL AND EXPERIMENTAL

METHOD
Sir Francis Bacon, later called “Baron Verulum”, did not intend to be a philosopher of
science. He came to it because of “his philosophic passion for the knowledge of causes
and secret motion of things”, as he puts it.
Bacon looked for a new method on which to base the certitude of science. In his Novum
Organum or New Method of Acquiring Knowledge, published in 1620, Bacon insisted on
the inductive method. In using inductive method we proceed from the particular to the

19
general, from the concrete to the abstract. His new method, therefore , consisted: first of
all, in regarding as certain only what he falls within the scope of sensible experience, by
which he meant not ordinary experience, but that which excluded all phantoms or “idols”
the sources of common error. He therefore advised that if men should make scientific
progress, they must first discard all traditional ideas, rid themselves of prejudices and
preconceptions, (which he called “idols”), look at the world with fresh eyes, observe and
study innumerable things that are actually perceived by the senses.

In his famous “Idols of the Mind” Bacon made a classic statement on the errors of
thinking. He held that the deepest sources of error lie within the human mind itself. The
mind of man, by its very fabric and constitution, has within it certain radical tendencies to
error which must be recognized and corrected before it can interpret nature alright. These
sources of error he called “idols”. These are, firstly, the “idols of the tribe,” - the “false
appearances that are imposed upon us by the general nature of the mind. They spring
from our habit of making man the measure of all things, and assuming that nature must
necessarily behave according to our own sense of fitness. We “usually suppose and feign
in nature a greater equality and uniformity than is in truth”,9 and thus we distort nature
instead of interpreting her.

Secondly, there are “idols of the Cave”- errors arising, not from the general defectiveness
of the human mind, but from the limitations of each man’s individual up-bringing or
environment. Drawing analogy from Plato’s allegory of the cave Bacon says:
… Although our persons live in the view of heaven, yet our
spirits are included in the caves of our own complexions and
customs, which minister unto us infinite errors and vain
opinions, if they be not recalled to examination…10
We must, therefore, come forth into the light of things, abandon the
delusions of sect and coteries, and let nature be our Teacher.

20
Thirdly, there are the “idols of the market place”, - the “false appearances that are
imposed upon us by words”. We may try to think with the wise, but we have to speak
with the vulgar- that is, make use of words whose “popular” meanings often conflict with
the exact meaning intended. Thus in all our discussions we should begin by defining our
terms; otherwise we shall find ourselves arguing at cross-purposes and have to end where
we should have begun. In Bacon’s words:
And although we think we govern our words, and prescribe it well.
(Loquendum ut vulgus sentiendum ut sapientes); Yet certain it is
that words, as a Tartar’s bow, do shoot back upon the
understanding of the wisest, and mightily entangle and pervert the
judgment, so as it is almost necessary, in all controversies and
disputations, to imitate the wisdom of the mathematicians, in
setting down in the very beginning the definitions of our words and
accept and understand them, and whether they occur with us or
not...”11

Finally, there are the “idols of the Theatre” (i.e. the lecture theatre). These are errors of
prejudices that have arisen from the adoption of definite systems of thought. Ultimately
the idols of the theatre lead men to biased conclusion. So Bacon cautions:
The understanding must be completely freed and cleared of them,
so that the access to the kingdom of man, which is founded on the
sciences, may resemble that to the kingdom of heaven, where no
admission is conceded except to children.12
The point that Bacon is stressing here is that science, so far from leading to pride of
intellect, can only be successfully pursued in that very same spirit of humility required of
a true Christian. In this way Bacon tries to give a religions sanction to his scientific
propaganda.13

21
Thus Bacon used his “Idols of Mind” to illustrate the point that once the man of
science rids himself of these prejudices, he must begin to collect facts by means
of scrupulous observation and experiment. He should draw up three tables of
data, namely:
1. A table of positive instances, that is, a list of all the phenomena in
which a given property say, heat is present;
2. A table of negative instances: a list of phenomena in which the
property is not present; and,
3. A table of degrees of comparison: cases in which the property is
present to greater or lesser extent.
In the end, Bacon says that the value and justification of knowledge consists
above all in its practical application and utility: its function is to extend the
domain of the human race, the reign of man over nature. Thus in the Novum
Organum, he calls our attention to the practical effects of the invention of
printing, gunpowder and the magnet, which have changed the face of things and
the state of the world. He held that inventions such as these did not come from
the Aristotelian physics; rather they are the results of direct acquaintance with
nature herself.

RENE DESCARTES (1596-1650): HIS SYSTEMATIC DOUBT AND

MATHEMATICAL METHOD.
Though a French philosopher, who gave philosophical expression to the new mechanical
view of the universe, Rene Descartes was equally a great mathematician in his own right.
He is considered the inventor of co-ordinate geometry. He demonstrated that by use of
co-ordinates (or graph paper, in simple language) any algebraic formula could be plotted
as a curve in space; and contrariwise that any curve in space, however complex, could be
converted into algebraic terms and thus dealt with by methods of calculation. And one
effect of his general philosophy was to create belief in a vast world of nature that could
be reduced to mathematical form.

22
Descartes was the founder of modern philosophy. He introduced the method or principle
of systematic doubt. He started by trying to doubt everything that he did not see quite
clearly and distinctly to be true; thus sweeping away past ideas and clearing the ground
for his own “great renewal” to use Bacon’s phrase. In his Discourse on Method in 1637,
Descartes started what gave rise to his doubting everything. He said inter alia:
I was brought up on letters from my childhood; and since it
was urged on me that by means of them one could acquire
clear and assured knowledge all that is useful in life, I was
extremely eager to learn them. But as soon as I had finished
the whole course of studies at the end of which one is
normally admitted among the ranks of the learned, I
completely altered my opinion. For I found myself
embarrassed by so many doubts and errors, that it seemed to
me that the only profit I had had from my efforts to acquire
knowledge was the progressive discovery of my own
ignorance. And yet I was in one of the most celebrated
schools in Europe…14
Descartes, therefore, decided to “abandon the study of letters, and resolved not to seek
after any science but what might be found within me or in the great book of the world”. 15
Thus Descartes gave more prominence to human reason than to the testimony of custom
or example. He stated this clearly:
…I learnt not to believe too firmly anything that I had been
convinced of only by example and custom. I thus gradually
freed myself from many errors that may obscure the light of
nature in us and make us less capable of hearing reason. But
after spending some years thus in study of the book of the
world, and in trying to gain experience, there came a day
when I resolved to make my studies within myself, and use all

23
 my powers of mind to choose the paths I must follow. This
undertaking, I think, succeeded much better…16
To achieve this goal, Descartes introduces four rules, the observance of which will lead to
true scientific knowledge. The rules are as he puts them:
The first was never to accept anything as true if I had not
evident knowledge of its being so; that is, carefully to avoid
precipitancy and prejudice, and to embrace in my judgment
only what presented itself to my mind so clearly and distinctly
that I had no occasion to doubt it. The second, to divide each
problem I examined into as many parts as was requisite for
its better solution. The third, to direct my thoughts in an
orderly way; beginning with the simplest objects, those most
apt to be known, and ascending little by little, in steps as it
were, to the knowledge of the most complex, and establishing
an order in thought even when the objects had no natural
priority one to another. And the last, to make throughout such
complete enumerations and such general surveys that I might
be sure of leaving nothing out.17
These four rules, we must admit, are very essential for scientific investigation and the
acquisition of true knowledge. Thus, with regard to the scientific method, Descartes
differed with Francis Bacon. In Descartes’ view, Bacon had started his scientific inquiries
from a wrong premise. He had begun with empirical facts of the natural world instead of
the general principle which provide a basis for deductive enquiry. Descartes admired the
fact of the mathematical method developing within the physical sciences, and he realized
that just as the student of mechanics limited the variety of things he could observe to
those that were measureable, so too he had to cut down the variety of theories that could
be suggested to those that could be mathematically developed. In the same manner not all
measureable qualities were of the same importance. Some had to be ignored to make the
study simple, as Galileo had disregarded air resistance in his study of gravitational fall. In

24
the same way Descartes held that not all ideas susceptible to mathematical treatment were
of equal importance; there were certain fundamental ideas ‘given by intuition’ which
provided the surest starting point for deductions of a mathematical character. Ideas
belonging to this group are those of motion, extension, and God. The idea of God was the
main foundation of Descartes’ system because God had made extension, and had put
motion into the world. God gave motion to the universe only once, at creation;
consequently the amount of motion in the world must be constant. Thus Descartes arrived
at the principle of the conservation of momentum.

Arguing from a quasi mathematical style, from sure and certain principle, Descartes felt
that one could deduce all the important features of the natural world. He acknowledge
that when details of natural things are being discussed, certain uncertainties are bound to
arise, as different consequences could be deduced from the same propositions, and in
such situations experiments are used to determine the cases. Despite this role of
experiments, Descartes de-emphasized the experimental method and regarded
experiments as merely illustrating the ideas that had been deduced from the principle
given by intuition. Descartes was primarily concerned with the deduction of the general
scheme of things from first principles.

Descartes distinguished between analysis and synthesis. Analysis is the practical way
things are discovered, while synthesis is the theoretical way the same things can be
deduced from first principle. He said that synthesis alone was used by the ancient
geometers in their writing, but it does not satisfy as does the other method, nor does it
content the minds of those who desire to learn, for it does not show the way in which the
thing was discovered.

The Pythagoreans had maintained that number is the essence of all things; that the perfect
heavenly bodies must have the perfect form of a sphere, and that their motions must be
circular and uniform. Descartes did not subscribe to this Pythagorean idea that

25
mathematical considerations determined the structure of the world. Rather he was of the
view that mechanical considerations determined the form and motions of the heavenly
bodies, and all the operations of nature. For him mathematics was only a methodological
device, and he criticized the attitude of pure mathematicians, saying that “there is nothing
more futile than to busy oneself with bare numbers and imaginary figures. Descartes, like
Bacon sees utilitarian projects as important goal of science. He believed that with his new
method we shall come to know the nature of things, as distinctly as we understand the
various trades of our artisan and by application of this knowledge to any use to which it is
adapted, we could make ourselves masters and possessors of nature.

ISAAC NEWTON (1642-1727): HIS THEORY OF UNIVERSAL GRAVITATION

The great scientific achievement of Isaac Newton and its importance to the world of
science is aptly described by Alexander Pope, thus:
Nature and nature’s laws lay hid in night;
God said, “Let Newton be, and all was light.18
Another epigram describes the importance of Newton in a very subtle way: ‘that there
was only one universe to discover, and this universe had been discovered by Newton.’19
Newton combined the idea of Kepler and Galileo in a grand synthesis. He made a great
achievement by showing Kepler’s law of planetary motion and Galileo’s Law of
terrestrial motion were two aspects of the same laws.
Studying the movement of the planets, as enunciated in Keplers laws, Newton discovered
that the acceleration of planets depends on the distance of the planet from the sun, and its
acceleration diminishes as the distance increases according to the law of the inverse
square, that is, planets have a tendency to fall toward the sun, just as bodies have a
tendency to fall toward the earth; gravitation regulates the movements of planets.

Galileo’s discoveries which held that moving bodies move uniformly in a straight line
unless deflected by a definite force, needed an explanation why the planets, instead of
flying off in straight lines, tend to fall toward the sun, the result being their elliptical

26
orbits- and why the moon, similarly, tends to fall toward the earth, Newton suspected that
the solution would be related to Galileo’s laws of falling bodies – that is, that gravity or
the pull of the earth upon objects on earth, might be a form of a universal gravitation, or
similar pull, characterizing all bodies in the solar system. Despite the much technical
difficulties, Newton, after inventing the calculus, and using a new measurement of the
size of the earth made by a Frenchman and experiments with circular motion made by the
Dutch Huyghens on the pendulum, succeeded in his calculations and in 1687 published
his Mathematical Principles of natural Philosophy. In this book, Newton demonstrated
that all motions that could then be timed and measured, whether on the earth or in the
solar system, could be described by the same mathematical formulae. All matter moved
as if every particle attracted every other particle with a force proportional to the product
of the two masses, and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.
This “force” was universal gravitation. This law remained true and was verified by every
new relevant discovery for about two hundred years. Only recently, were its limitations
discovered, for it cannot operate in the infinitesimal world of subatomic structure or in
the macrocosm of the whole physical universe as now conceived. Celestine Bittles
observes that, “in formulating his laws of motion, Newton enunciated the fact that a
change or acceleration of motion demands an outside impressed force; motion itself,
once started, goes on indefinitely in a straight line.”20

The practical consequences of the great scientific achievements of Newton and ultimately
of science, cannot be over emphasized. With Newton’s work the promise of science
appeared fulfilled. The tides could now be understood and predicted by the gravitational
interplay of the solar system enhanced navigation. Chronometers developed in the
eighteenth century, made possible the finding of precise longitude at sea. Merchant ships
and naval squadrons could thus co-operate with great success. A more exact
determination of longitude, at sea and on land, enhanced the value of cartography.
Mathematical advance, including the development of calculus, led to an increased use of
artillery..

27
SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
The eighteenth century, and more precisely the years of the century preceding the French
Revolution of 1789, is popularly known as the Age of Enlightenment. The spirit of the
eighteenth century Enlightenment was drawn from the scientific and intellectual
revolution of the seventeenth century. The enlightenment accepted and popularized the
ideas of Bacon and Descartes, of Boyle and Spinoza, and more importantly, of Locke and
Newton. It emphasized the philosophy of natural law and natural right. It relegated
tradition, and exalted the powers of human reason and of science, and was so strongly
convinced of the regularity and harmony of nature, and equally so deeply imbued with
the sense of civilization and progress.
It is worth noting that most of the natural philosophers of the seventeenth century had
shown great interests in the experimental, theoretical, and the applied aspects of science.
For instance, Newton made remarkable experiments in optics, developed the theory of
universal gravitation, and invented a reflecting telescope and a nautical sextant. But
during the eighteenth century, English scientists were primarily experimentalists, and the
French were essentially theoreticians, while applied science passed over from the
gentlemen-amateur scientists to the instrument-makers and engineers of England, and, to
a lesser extent, of French. The English astronomers, Royal, Bradley, (1692-1762) and
Maskelyne (1732-1811) made notable empirical observations and discoveries, while the
French scientists, Lagrange; (1736-1813) and Laplace (1749-1827), developed the theory
of mechanics and worked out the theory of the chemical revolution. By developing
experimental and applied science, English scientists and engineers gave an immediate
impetus to the improvement of industrial technique.

CONCLUSION
The above discussions give an eloquent testimony to the fact the twentieth century
brought unparalleled advances in many areas of science. Significant postulations, the
interpretations of which were taken for granted in the seventeenth, eighteenth and

28
nineteenth centuries, now have their scientific explanations clearly given. For example,
matter, space and time were conceived of as basic and fixed entities in the nineteenth
century. Matter has also believed to be made up of simple and indivisible particles
(atoms), and existing in a definite space and time. But the discoveries of the twentieth
century scientists have altered all these views. For instance, the concepts of relativity, the
Quantum theory, and the electronic theory of matter have presented us a new view of
reality.

END NOTES

1
Herbert Kondo (ed), The Book of Popular Science, p.125.
2
R.R. Palmer& Joel cotton, A History of Modern Science, New York: Alfred A Knopf, inc., 1978), p. 5.
3
Herbert Kondo (ed), The Book of Popular Science, p. 126.
4
Herbert Kondo (ed), The Book of Popular Science, p.171-172.
5
Stephen F. Mason, A History of the Sciences, p. 114.
6
R.R. Palmer and Joel Colton. A History of the Modern World, pp. 276-277
7
R.R. Palmer and Joel Colton. A History of the Modern World, p. 278.
8
R.R. Palmer and Joel Colton. A history of the Modern World, p. 272.
9
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning; 11. Xiv. 9 in G. B. Harrison, Major British Writers, Vol 1. New York:
Harcourt, Bruce and world Inc., 1959, p. 353.
10
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, p. 353.
11
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, p. 353.
12
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, p. 323.
13
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, p. 323.
14
Descartes, Philosophical Writings, Elizabeth Anscombe and Peter Thomas Geach (trans.), London: Nelsons
University Paperbacks, 197 p. 9.
15
Descartes, Philosophical Writings, p. 13.
16
Descartes, Philosophical Writings, p. 13-14.
17
Descartes, Philosophical Writings, p. 20-21.

29
18
R.R. Palmer and Joel Colton. A History of the Modern World, p. 281.
19
R.R. Palmer and Joel Colton. A History of the Modern World ,p. 281.
20
Celestine N. Bittle, From Aether to Cosmos: Cosmology, Milwaukee:The Bruce Publishing Co., 1941, p. 429

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