A History of Western Science: The Basics offers a short introduction to the history of Western science that is accessible to all through avoiding technical language and mathematical intricacies. A coherent narrative of how science developed in interaction with society over time is also provided in this comprehensive guide.
The first part discusses the period up to 1700, with a focus on the conceptual shift and new ideas about nature that occurred in early modern Europe. Part two focusses on the practical and institutional aspects of the scientific enterprise and discusses how science established itself in Western society post 1700s, while part three discusses how during the same period modern science has impacted our general view of the world, and reviews some of the major discoveries and debates.
Key topics discussed in the book include:
- Natural philosophy, medicine, and mathematics in the ancient and medieval worlds
- The key figures in the history of science—Galileo, Descartes, Isaac Newton, Darwin and Einstein—as well as lesser-known men and women who have developed the field
- The development of scientific instruments, the transformation of alchemy into chemistry, weights and measures, the emergence of the modern hospital and its effects on medicine, and the systematic collection of data on meteorology, volcanism, and terrestrial magnetism
- The big questions – the origins of humans, the nature of reality and the impact of science.
As a jargon-free and comprehensive study of the history of Western science, this book is an essential introductory guide for academics and researchers of the history of science, as well as general readers interested in learning more about the field.
Introduction
Part I. The Scientific Revolution
1. Antiquity and the Middle Ages
Greek philosophers and nature
Greek mathematics
Medicine in antiquity
The classical tradition in mediaeval Europe
2. The sixteenth century: the Aristotelian worldview in decline
New intellectual currents: humanism and hermeticism
Natural history and medicine
Mathematics and ‘natural magic’
Astronomy
Philosophy of nature
3. The seventeenth century: a new worldview
Galileo and a new view of the heavens
Descartes and mechanistic science
The emergence of an experimental tradition
Mathematization of science
The mathematical science of Isaac Newton
A revolution in the prevailing worldview?
Part II. Autonomous science: methods, theories and researchers 1700-2000
4. The eighteenth century: disseminating the idea of science
Knowledge and practice: instruments
Collecting and classifying: natural history
From alchemy to chemistry
Newtonian mechanics and its problems
5. The nineteenth century (i): science at the service of the rationalization of society
A ‘scientific’ system of measurement
The modern hospital
Observatories, measuring stations and a global science
Science and Western imperialism
6. The nineteenth century (ii): professional science
Universities and professors
Women in science
Laboratories
Classification and conferences
The rise of the experiment: physiology
Measuring and experimenting in the study of nature
Further mathematization
Statistics
7. The twentieth century: industrial science
The rise of industrial science
The science of measurement
Research institutes
Control and modelling
Independence under pressure
Part III. The scientific worldview
8. The origin of the world
The Bible and the new image of the world
The development of geology
The origin of the universe
9. The nature of life and the origin of human beings
Early scientific ideas about humankind and its place in the world
The idea of evolution
Darwin’s contribution
Descent
The mysteries of the mind
The mechanism of heredity
Heredity and evolution
A science of human beings?
10. The nature of reality
A rational world?
The building blocks of reality
Research into radiation
The theory of relativity
Quantum mechanics
In search of a theory of everything
11. The influence of science on the general worldview
Scientification?
Accommodation of scientific findings
Rejection of scientific findings
Concluding remarks
Biography
Rienk Vermij is a Professor at the Department of the History of Science, Medicine, and Technology of the University of Oklahoma. His research topics include early ideas on earthquakes, the reception of Copernicanism, and the Enlightenment. He has published several books and many articles.
