Revolution and enlightenment - Ch. 17
The movement toward modernity initiated by the Renaissance was greatly advanced by the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. The Scientific Revolution destroyed the medieval view of the universe and established the scientific method--rigorous and systematic observation and experimentation--as the essential means of unlocking nature's secrets. Increasingly, Western thinkers maintained that nature was a mechanical system, governed by laws that could be expressed mathematically. the new discoveries electrified the imagination. Science displaced theology as the queen of knowledge, and reason, which had been subordinate to religion in the Middle Ages, asserted its autonomy. The great confidence in reason inspired by the Scientific Revolution helped give rise to the Enlightenment, which explicitly rejected the ideas and institutions of the medieval past and articulated the essential norms of modernity.
Reading Schedule:
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Ch. 17 Sec. 1 The Scientific Revolution
Ch. 17 Sec. 2 The Enlightenment Ch. 17 Sec. 3 The Impact of the Enlightenment |
Ch. 17 Sec. 1: The Scientific Revolution
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Main Ideas:
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Ch. 17 Sec. 2: The Enlightenment
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Main Ideas:
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