- European 18th century: Christian faith was the answer to most basic questions
- Some began to embrace rational inquiry and pursue the new science
- Western science increased the political and military powers of Europeans
- Joseph Banks (president of the Royal Society) linked scientific inquiry to real-world applications and economic purposes
- Intellectual debate divided thinkers
- Ancients: authority of Aristotle and other classical authors as the foundation of knowledge in fields such as medicine, math, and astronomy.
- Modern: rejected classical authority & Christian theology, human reason as the key to knowledge, contradicted traditional Christian conceptions
- Deductive reasoning: arguing from general principles to specific truth
- Rene Descartes
- Axioms of true philosophy had to be firmly grounded in the human capacity to reason
- Logic could result in a unified system of truth
- Systematic doubt as key to knowledge
- Ability to reason as proof of existence
- Modern science based on experimentation and observations of the natural world
- Sir English Bacon:
- Main proponents of an inductive approach to science
- Controlled observations to larger truth
- Tycho Brahe:
- Using only the naked eye to observe
- Challenged Aristotelian concept of an eternally unchanging celestial sphere
- Demonstrated that a bright supernova had emerged beyond the Earth's atmosphere
- Johannes Kepler:
- Applied Brahe's data to analyze the orbit of the planet Mars
- Showed that planetary motion was elliptical rather than circular
- Challenged Aristotle and Christian teaching that all celestial motion was circular (perfect movement for perfect heavenly domain) and reinforced Galileo
- Identical laws prevail throughout the universe and those laws can be described using math
- New ideas caused discomfort in the early 17th century. A century later, science was on the rise and more Europeans began to reason and use their senses to observe nature.
- Isaac Newton
- Used deductive thinking to establish general principles
- Used Bacon's inductive approach to experimental science
- The universal law of gravitation: All matter exerts gravitational attraction in inverse proportion to mass and distance
- Inventors of differential calculus
- Tension between science and faith began to ease starting the early 18th century.
- Scientists began to systematically collect and organize a catalogue of the world's flora
- Carl Linnaeus
- Pioneering figure in modern botany
- Gathered plants specimens, restored botanical gardens, send his students around the world to gather specimens for study
- Published his classification of living things
- The Linnaean system orders species into hierarchical categories: genus/order/class/kingdom
- Developed the binomial system of Latin names of organism
- World's plants already had names but fit not consistent network of classification
- Created a single knowledge system
- Joseph Banks
- Adept at deriving practical economic lessons from Carl Linnaeus's works
- Leading figure in the drive for improvement: using scientific methods to increase the productivity of existing land and bring new land under cultivation
- Bring insights gained from natural science to agriculture
- Improve soil by sowing clover and turnips in fields
- Selective breeding of livestock to boost the production of wool, meat, and milk
- Wealthy gentle famer, invested in water engineering tech
- Experimented with crop rotation and crossbreeding farm animals
- Agriculture revolution led to more arable land for planting and greater efficiency in production
- Increased food supplies supported urbanization during the industrial revolution
- Agriculture led to greater inequality
- Village society was oriented toward stability and security; common access to pasture and woodlands
- New law allowed the English gentry to accumulate larger landholdings; allowing them to enclose common lands as private property
- Food security matter less than productivity and profitable crops sales
- Rural families could no longer sustain themselves; they drift to cities and coal mines for employment
- "One person's improvement, therefore, could be another's ticket to unemployment."
- Interests of the gentry was well represented in the Parliament and in the courts, those of the poor were not.
- Joseph Banks advocated for improvement on the imperial stage
- Globalizing the practical application of science through his advocacy of economic botany
- Developed a experimental facility at Kew Gardens
- Scientists brought new plant specimens from around the world to be examined, catalogued, and cultivated
- Biological diffusion
- British Navy needed secure supplies of timber, English botanists identified South Asian mahogany as a supplement to British and North American oak
- Use of science to justify the dominance of the British elite at home and abroad
- Believed that they would ultimately benefit from scientifically rational agriculture.
- British colonization in Ireland
- Claimed that the Irish were not using land efficiently, legally seized to make it more civil.
- Australia
- Regarded as empty land because its aboriginal inhabitants had not improved it
- Justified their empire by claiming it created the best possible life for locals
