The Dark Ages

1
The Dark Ages

• The Period from 500 AD to 1000 AD has
  traditionally been called the Dark Ages
  
  
• Recent scholarship indicates that the Dark Ages
  in Germanic Europe had a period of cultural
  revival called The Carolingian Renaissance
  beginning in 800AD
• The only Roman institution that survived was the
  Church and it survived in a weakened form for
  centuries

2
Life During the Dark Ages

• The decline of almost all major cities, e.g.
  Vienna, Frankfort, Bath, and Lyons
• The decline in the craft areas and the resulting
  reduction of middle class citizens
• The decline of central government and the
  emergence of medieval feudal system
• decline of education throughout society. Most
  nobles could not read many priests could hardly
  write their name. The vast majority were
  illiterate. (est. of 98-99 of the population)

3
Life During the High Middle Ages 1000 AD to 1300
AD
90 of the people were Peasants a)
Freemen b)Serfs 2-3 of the people were
Nobles 1)Duke 2) Count 3) Marquis 4) Baron 5)
Knight 5 or so were Craftsmen or Shopkeepers a)
Guild members b) semiskilled workers
4
The Economic RevivalofThe Cities
1) Increased Trade a) Royal governments could
enforce the peace b) Rising Populations c)
Reappearance of clerical and professional
people d) stable coinage and adoption of Islamic
banking practices 2) a more peaceful
environment a) Church enforced the peace Peace
of God and Truce of God b) The Crusades c) The
Return of Roman Law
5
The First Universities in Europe

• First were in Italy Bologna and Salerno
• First were devoted to Law and Medicine
• University of Paris in 1200. Students studied
  law, philosophy, and theology
• Students came mostly from the Middle Classes or
  Poor. The usual time for a bachelors degree was
  five years. Examinations were oral and given when
  the student thought he was prepared for them.

6
Medieval Science

• Introduction of Arabic Numbers and Algebra
• The start of chemistry with alchemical
  interests
• Geography made progress because of commercial
  interests and Muslim maps.
• Medicine did not advance beyond the Muslims and
  the Greeks. At the first medical school, Salerno,
  the first teachers all came from Muslim
  countries.
• The academic emphasis was on the Arts and
  Humanities not the Sciences. All the great
  teachers of Middle Ages were professors of
  theology, e.g. Abelard, Magnus, and Thomas Aquinas

7
What was Reborn in The Renaissance?

• Art that dealt with the lives and acts of
  ordinary people as well as the traditional
  religious topics. Much art reveals a love of good
  looks, fine clothes, beauty and worldly success
• The Revival of Classical Learning
• The Renaissance Man the individual who is an
  expert on everything, a man of universal
  education.
• The Idea of a Liberal Education. The return of
  the classical curriculum of grammar, rhetoric,
  logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music

8
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Copernicus
• A brilliant student, he mastered all the
  scientific knowledge of his time medicine, law,
  mathematics and astronomy
• Using Ockhams Razor, Copernicus wanted a more
  elegant explanation than the ptolemaic one.
• Published after his death, he proposed his theory
  as an hypothesis and not a reality.
• One flaw in his hypothesis was his retention of
  the idea of perfectly circular motion.

9
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Tycho Brahe
• Born into great wealth from the time of his
  adulthood he was independently wealthy
• Backed by the King of Denmark, Brahe established
  an observatory on an island near Copenhagen.
• His discovery of a New Star caused a great
  controversy since it challenged ancient thinking.
• Brahe wanted a system that would combine
  Copernicus and Ptolemy.
• A new king cut Brahes funding and he moved from
  Denmark to Prague where he met Kepler

10
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Johannes Kepler
• Born to poor, but noble parents, he wanted a
  church career, but his atronomical work brought
  him to the attention of Brahe.
• Fortunately or unfortunately, Brahe died during
  the second year of Keplers employment.
• Keplers contribution is his three laws of
  planetary motion. (The one you should be most
  aware of is his first law that planets move in
  elliptical orbits.
• Kepler is an important precursor to Newton.

11
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Galileo
• The leading physicist of his age
• He understood that mathematics is the language of
  nature, the language of science.
• His astronomical observation overturned Aristotle
  and Ptolemy. The heavens are not flawless.
• Galileos condemnation by the church had a
  chilling affect on science in southern Europe.
• Galileos experience with the Inquisition drove
  him from astronomy to mechanics .

12
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Galileo (part 2)
• To a great extent invented the scientific method
  of hypothesis, experiment, conclusion
• His rejection of Keplers elliptical orbits is
  his greatest intellectual error.
• His Dialogue on the Two World Systems presented a
  debate between supporters of Copernicus and
  Ptolemy
• Galileo was one of the giants that made the
  Newtonian Scientific Revolution possible.

13
The Men Who Made The Scientific Revolution

• Descartes
• The Father of Modern Philosophy
• After Descartes, theology is not the dominant
  discipline of learning or even philosophy
• He established rationalism as the main focus of
  French philosophy and consequently European
  Philosophy.
• His mathematical discoveries made Newtons
  achievement possible. He is the second giant.
• His philosophy, however, retarded the growth of
  French Science.

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History of Physical SciencePhysical Science
105Fall 1999