History of science
The
history of science investigates the historical record of human events that are pertinent to the cultural context and the secular development of what is currently called
science, namely, a body of
empirical and
theoretical knowledge, produced by a global community of researchers, making use of specific techniques for the observation and
explanation of real
phenomena, this
techne as a whole being summed up under the heading of
scientific method. As such, the history of science draws on the
historical methods of both
intellectual history and
social history.
The
Scientific Revolution of the sixteenth and early seventeenth century saw the inception of modern scientific methods to guide the evaluation of knowledge. This change is considered to be so fundamental that some â€" especially philosophers of science and practicing scientists â€" consider such earlier inquiries into nature to be
pre-scientific. Traditionally, historians of science have defined science sufficiently broadly to include those inquiries.
[W. C. Dampier Wetham, Science, in Encyclopædia Brittanica, 11th ed. (New York: Encyclopedia Brittanica, Inc, 1911); M. Clagett, Greek Science in Antiquity (New York: Collier Books, 1955); D. Pingree, Hellenophilia versus the History of Science, Isis 83, 559 (1982).]The
history of mathematics,
history of technology, and
history of philosophy are covered in other articles. Mathematics is closely related to, but distinct from science (at least in the modern conception). Technology concerns the creative process of designing useful objects and systems, which differs from the search for empirical truth. Philosophy differs from science in that, while both the
natural and the
social sciences attempt to base their theories on established fact, philosophy also enquires about other areas of knowledge, notably
ethics. In practice, each of these fields is heavily used by the others as an external tool.
Much of the study of the history of science has been devoted to answering questions about what science
is, how it
functions, and whether it exhibits large-scale patterns and trends. The
sociology of science in particular has focused on the ways in which scientists work, looking closely at the ways in which they "produce" and "construct" scientific knowledge. Since the 1960s, a common trend in the
science studies (the study of the sociology and history of science) has been to emphasize the "human component" to scientific knowledge, and to de-emphasize the view that scientific data is self-evident, value-free, and context-free.
A major subject of concern and controversy in the philosophy of science has been to inquire about the nature of
theory change in science. Three philosophers in particular who represent the primary poles in this debate have been
Karl Popper, who argued that scientific knowledge is progressive and cumulative;
Thomas Kuhn, who argued that scientific knowledge moves through "
paradigm shifts" and is not necessarily progressive; and
Paul Feyerabend, who argued that scientific knowledge is not cumulative or progressive, and that there can be no
demarcation between science and any other form of investigation.
Since the publication of Kuhn's
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions in 1962, there has been much debate in the academic community over the meaning and objectivity of "science." Often, but not always, a conflict over the "truth" of science has split along the lines of those in the scientific community and those in the social sciences or humanities (for example, the "
Science wars").
In the West, from
antiquity up to the time of the
Scientific Revolution, inquiry into the workings of the universe was known as
natural philosophy, and those engaged in it were known as
natural philosophers. This included some fields of study which are no longer considered scientific.
Bertrand Russell's
History of Philosophy gives a good account of the historical development of (natural) philosophy. In many cases, systematic learning about the natural world was a direct outgrowth of religion, often as a project of a particular religious community.
One important feature of "pre-scientific" inquiry (whether in the West or elsewhere) was reluctance to engage in experiment. For example,
Aristotle, one of the most prolific natural philosophers of antiquity, made countless observations of nature, especially the habits and attributes of plants and animals. Aristotle focused on categorizing. He also made many observations on the large-scale workings of the universe, which led to the development of a comprehensive theory of physics; see
Physics (Aristotle). In
Taoist philosophy, for example, the tradition of
wu wei (action without action), would deprecate the setting up of
artificial conditions in an experiment in fear they would produce contrived results that could never describe nature as it is in the world around us. This continued until the development of
experiment in the Islamic world in the 7th and 8th centuries.
In prehistoric times, advice and knowledge was passed from generation to generation in an
oral tradition. The development of writing enabled knowledge to be stored and communicated across generations with much greater fidelity. Combined with the
development of agriculture, which allowed for a surplus of food, it became possible for early civilizations to develop, because more time could be devoted to tasks other than survival.
Many ancient civilizations collected astronomical information in a systematic manner through simple observation. Though they had no knowledge of the real physical structure of the planets and stars, many theoretical explanations were proposed.
Basic facts about human physiology were known in some places, and
alchemy was practiced in several civilizations. Considerable observation of macrobiotic flora and fauna was also performed.
It has been thanks to
Joseph Needham that the vast achievements of Chinese science and technology have been uncovered. Amongst other things, the Chinese invented
gunpowder, the
compass, the
kite, the
balloon,
printing and many other things. They also made innovations in
mathematics,
logic,
astronomy,
medicine, and numerous other fields.
See also
History of science and technology in ChinaMedieval Indian science and technology
Main articles: Indian science and Indian science and technologyBefore the Middle Ages, Indian philosophers in
ancient India developed
atomic theories, which included formulating ideas about the
atom in a systematic manner and propounding ideas about the atomic constitution of the material world. The
principle of relativity was also available in an early embryonic form in the Indian philosophical concept of
"sapekshavad". The literal translation of this
Sanskrit word is
"theory of relativity" (not to be confused with Einstein's
theory of relativity).
By the beginning of the Middle Ages, the
wootz,
crucible and
stainless steels were discovered in India. By the end of the Middle Ages,
iron rockets were developed in the
kingdom of Mysore in
South India.
Aryabhata in
499 presented a
heliocentric solar system of
gravitation where he presented astronomical and mathematical theories in which the Earth was taken to be spinning on its axis and the
periods of the planets were given as
elliptical orbits with respect to the sun. He also believed that the moon and planets shine by reflected sunlight and that the orbits of the planets are ellipses. He carried out accurate calculations of astronomical constants based on this system, such as the periods of the planets, the
circumference of the
earth, the
solar eclipse and
lunar eclipse, the time taken for a single rotation of the Earth on its axis, the length of earth's revolution around the sun, and the longitudes of planets using eccentrics and
epicycles. He also introduced a number of
trigonometric functions (including
sine,
versine,
cosine and inverse sine),
trigonometric tables, and techniques and
algorithms of
algebra.
Arabic translations of his texts were available in the
Islamic world by the
8th-
10th century.
In the
7th century,
Brahmagupta briefly described the
law of gravitation, and recognized
gravity as a force of attraction. He also lucidly explained the use of
zero as both a
placeholder and a
decimal digit, along with the
Hindu-Arabic numerals now used universally throughout the world. Arabic translations of his texts (around
770) introduced this number system to the Islamic world, where it was adapted as
Arabic numerals.
The
Siddhanta Shiromani was a mathematical astronomy text written by
Bhaskara in the
12th century. The 12 chapters of the first part cover topics such as: mean longitudes of the planets; true longitudes of the planets; the three problems of diurnal rotation; syzygies; lunar eclipses; solar eclipses; latitudes of the planets; risings and settings; the moon's crescent; conjunctions of the planets with each other; conjunctions of the planets with the fixed stars; and the patas of the sun and moon. The second part contains thirteen chapters on the sphere. It covers topics such as: praise of study of the sphere; nature of the sphere; cosmography and geography; planetary mean motion; eccentric epicyclic model of the planets; the armillary sphere; spherical trigonometry; ellipse calculations; first visibilities of the planets; calculating the lunar crescent; astronomical instruments; the seasons; and problems of astronomical calculations.
From the
12th century,
Bhaskara and various
Keralese mathematicians first conceived
differential calculus,
mathematical analysis,
trigonometric series,
floating point numbers, and concepts foundational to the overall development of
calculus.
Medieval Islamic and European science
With the loss of the
Western Roman Empire, much of
Europe lost contact with the knowledge of the past. While the
Byzantine Empire still held learning centers such as
Alexandria and
Constantinople,
Western Europe's knowledge was concentrated in
monasteries. The
Library of Alexandria, which had suffered during and after the period of Roman rule, had been destroyed by
642, shortly after the
Arab conquest of
Egypt. Philosophical and scientific teaching of the period was based upon few copies and commentaries of ancient Greek texts that remained in Western Europe and the
Middle East.
Islamic philosophy
Meanwhile, in the Middle East, Greek philosophy was able to find some support by the newly created Arab
Caliphate. With the spread of
Islam in the 7th and 8th centuries, a period of Islamic scholarship lasted until the 14th century. This scholarship was aided by several factors. The use of a single language,
Arabic, allowed communication without need of a translator. Access to Greek and Roman texts from the
Byzantine Empire along with Indian sources of learning provided Islamic scholars a knowledge base to build upon. In addition, there was the
Hajj, which facilitated scholarly collaboration by bringing together people and new ideas from all over the Islamic world.
Islamic scientists were crucial in terms of changing the emphasis in science from being a purely
rationalist pursuit to one in which
empirical data became more important. To this end, they developed the concepts of
citation and
peer review. Islamic/Arabic scientists also placed far greater emphasis on
experiment than had the
Greeks. In mathematics, the
Persian scholar
Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi gave his name to the Indian concept of the
algorithm, while the term
algebra is derived from
al-jabr, the beginning of the title of one of his publications.
Sabian mathematician
Al-Batani (850-929) contributed to astronomy and mathematics and
Persian scholar
Al-Razi to chemistry. In astronomy, Al-Batani improved the measurements of
Hipparchus, preserved in the translation of the Greek
Hè Megalè Syntaxis (
The great treatise) translated as
Almagest. Al-Batani also improved the precision of the measurement of the precession of the earth's axis. Arab
alchemy, though flawed as a science, inspired
Roger Bacon (who introduced the empirical method to Europe, strongly influenced by his reading of Arabic writers), and later
Isaac Newton.
European Renaissance from the 12th century
An intellectual revitalization of Europe started with the birth of
medieval universities in the 12th century. The contact with the Islamic world in Spain and Sicily after the
Reconquista and during the
Crusades allowed Europeans access to preserved copies of the Ancient Greek and Roman works along with the works of Islamic philosophers, specially
Averroes. The European universities aided materially in the translation and propagation of these texts and started a new infrastructure which was needed for scientific communities. As well as this, Europeans began to venture further and further east (most notably, perhaps,
Marco Polo) as a result of the
Pax Mongolica. This led to the increased influence of Indian and even Chinese science on the European tradition. Technological advances were also made, such as the early flight of
Eilmer of Malmesbury, who had studied Mathematics in
11th century England [ William of Malmesbury, Gesta regum Anglorum / The history of the English kings, ed. and trans. R. A. B. Mynors, R. M. Thomson, and M. Winterbottom, 2 vols., Oxford Medieval Texts (1998â€"9)]. It cannot be stressed enough that at this point in history European science was substantially less developed than Islamic, Indian and Chinese science. For the next four centuries, Europe would play 'catch up'.
At the beginning of the 13th century there were reasonably accurate Latin translations of the main works of almost all the intellectually crucial ancient authors, allowing a sound transfer of scientific ideas via both the universities and the monasteries. By then, the natural philosophy contained in these texts began to be extended by notable
scholastics such as
Robert Grosseteste,
Roger Bacon,
Albertus Magnus and
Duns Scotus. Precursors of the modern scientific method can be seen already in Grosseteste's emphasis on mathematics as a way to understand nature, and in the empirical approach admired by Bacon. According to
Pierre Duhem, the
Condemnation of 1277 led to
the birth of modern science, because it forced thinkers to break from relying so much on
Aristotle, and to think about the world in new ways.
The first half of the 14th century saw much important scientific work being done.
William of Ockham introduced the principle of
parsimony: philosophy should only concern itself with subjects on whom it could achieve real knowledge. This should lead to a decline in fruitless debates and move
natural philosophy toward
science. As a result of the Condemnations of Paris, scholars such as
Jean Buridan and
Nicolas Oresme started to question the received wisdom of Aristotle's mechanics. In particular, Buridan developed the theory of impetus which was a first step towards the modern concept of
inertia. The
Oxford Calculators developed this idea further and, influenced by
Islamic science began to empirically test some of these ideas.
In 1348, the
Black Death and other disasters sealed a sudden end to the previous period of massive philosophic and scientific development. Yet, the rediscovery of ancient texts was improved after the
Fall of Constantinople in 1453, when many
Byzantine scholars had to seek refuge in the West. Meanwhile, the introduction of printing (from China) was to have great effect on European society. The facilitated dissemination of the printed word democratized learning and allowed a faster propagation of new ideas. New ideas also helped to influence the development of European science at this point: not least the introduction of
Algebra. These developments paved the way for the
Scientific Revolution, which may also be understood as a resumption of the process of scientific change, halted at the start of the Black Death.
Modern science in Europe began in a period of great upheaval. The
Protestant Reformation, the discovery of the Americas by
Christopher Columbus, the
Fall of Constantinople, the
Spanish Inquisition, but also the re-discovery of Aristotle in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries presaged large social and political changes. Thus, a suitable environment was created in which it became possible to question scientific doctrine, in much the same way that
Martin Luther and
John Calvin questioned religious doctrine. The works of
Ptolemy (astronomy),
Galen (medicine), and
Aristotle (physics) were found not always to match everyday observations. For example, an arrow flying through the air after leaving a bow contradicts Aristotle's laws of motion, which say that a moving object must be constantly under influence of an external force, as the natural state of earthly objects is to be at rest. Work by
Vesalius on human cadavers also found problems with the Galenic view of anatomy.
|
Vesalius' experiments inspired interest in human anatomy. |
The willingness to question previously held truths and search for new answers resulted in a period of major scientific advancements, now known as the
Scientific Revolution. The Scientific Revolution is held by most historians to have begun in 1543, when
De Revolutionibus, by the astronomer
Nicolaus Copernicus, was first printed. The thesis of this book was that the Earth moved around the Sun. The period culminated with the publication of the
Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica in 1687 by
Isaac Newton.
Other significant scientific advances were made during this time by
Galileo Galilei,
Edmond Halley,
Robert Hooke,
Christiaan Huygens,
Tycho Brahe,
Johannes Kepler,
Gottfried Leibniz, and
Blaise Pascal. In philosophy, major contributions were made by
Francis Bacon, Sir
Thomas Browne,
René Descartes, and
Thomas Hobbes. The basics of scientific method were also developed: the new way of thinking emphasized experimentation and reason over traditional considerations.
The Scientific Revolution established science as the preeminent source for the growth of knowledge. During the 19th century, the practice of science became professionalized and institutionalized in ways which would continue through the 20th century, as the role of scientific knowledge grew and became incorporated with many aspects of the functioning of nation-states.
Physics
The Scientific Revolution is a convenient boundary between ancient thought and classical physics.
Nicolaus Copernicus revived the
heliocentric model of the solar system first devised by
Aristarchus of Samos. This was followed by the first known model of planetary motion given by
Kepler in the early 17th century, which proposed that the planets follow
elliptical orbits, with the Sun at one focus of the ellipse. Also,
Galileo pioneered the use of experiment to validate physical theories, a key idea in scientific method.
In 1687,
Isaac Newton published the
Principia Mathematica, detailing two comprehensive and successful physical theories:
Newton's laws of motion, which lead to classical mechanics; and
Newton's Law of Gravitation, which describes the fundamental force of gravity. The behavior of electricity and magnetism was studied by
Faraday,
Ohm, and others during the early 19th century. These studies led to the unification of the two phenomena into a single theory of
electromagnetism, by
Maxwell (known as
Maxwell's equations).
The beginning of the 20th century brought the start of a revolution in physics. The long-held theories of Newton were shown not to be correct in all circumstances. Beginning in 1900,
Max Planck,
Albert Einstein,
Niels Bohr and others developed quantum theories to explain various anomalous experimental results, by introducing discrete energy levels. Not only did quantum mechanics show that the laws of motion did not hold on small scales, but even more disturbingly, the theory of
general relativity, proposed by Einstein in 1915, showed that the fixed background of
spacetime, on which both
Newtonian mechanics and
special relativity depended, could not exist. In 1925,
Werner Heisenberg and
Erwin Schrödinger formulated
quantum mechanics, which explained the preceding quantum theories. The observation by
Edwin Hubble in 1929 that the speed at which galaxies recede positively correlates with their distance, led to the understanding that the universe is expanding, and the formulation of the
Big Bang theory by
George Gamow.
Further developments took place during World War II, which led to the practical application of
radar and the development and use of the
atomic bomb. Though the process had begun with the invention of the
cyclotron by
Ernest O. Lawrence in the 1930s, physics in the postwar period entered into a phase of what historians have called "
Big Science", requiring massive machines, budgets, and laboratories in order to test their theories and move into new frontiers. The primary patron of physics became state governments, who recognized that the support of "basic" research could often lead to technologies useful to both military and industrial applications. Currently, general relativity and quantum mechanics are inconsistent with each other, and efforts are underway to unify the two.
Chemistry
The history of modern chemistry can be taken to begin with the distinction of chemistry from
alchemy by
Robert Boyle in his work
The Sceptical Chymist, in 1661 (although the alchemical tradition continued for some time after this) and the gravimetric experimental practices of medical chemists like
William Cullen,
Joseph Black,
Torbern Bergman and Pierre Macquer. It can also be dated
Antoine Lavoisier's naming of oxygen and the law of
conservation of mass, which refuted
phlogiston theory. Proof that all matter is made of atoms, which are the smallest indestructible part of matter, was provided by
John Dalton in 1803. He also formulated the law of mass relationships. In 1869,
Dmitri Mendeleev composed his
periodic table of elements on the basis of Dalton's discoveries.
The synthesis of
urea by
Friedrich Wöhler opened a new research field,
organic chemistry, and by the end of the 19th century, scientists were able to synthesize hundreds of organic compounds. The later part of the nineteenth century saw the exploitation of the Earth's petrochemicals, after the exhaustion of the oil supply from
whaling. By the twentieth century, systematic production of refined materials provided a ready supply of products which provided not only energy, but also synthetic materials for clothing, medicine, and everyday disposable resources. Application of the techniques of organic chemistry to living organisms resulted in
physiological chemistry, the precursor to
biochemistry. The twentieth century also saw the integration of physics and chemistry, with chemical properties explained as the result of the electronic structure of the atom.
Linus Pauling's book on
The Nature of the Chemical Bond used the principles of quantum mechanics to deduce
bond angles in ever-more complicated molecules. Pauling's work culminated in the physical modelling of
DNA,
the secret of life (in the words of
Francis Crick, 1953). In the same year, the
Miller-Urey experiment demonstrated in a simulation of primordial processes, that basic constituents of proteins, simple
amino acids, could themselves be built up from simpler molecules.
Geology
Chinese polymath
Shen Kua (1031 - 1095) was the first to formulate hypotheses for the process of land formation. Based on his observation of fossils in a geological
stratum in a mountain hundreds of miles from the ocean, he deduced that the land was formed by erosion of the mountains and by
deposition of silt.
Theophrastus' work on rocks
Peri lithĹŤn remained authoritative for millennia: its interpretation of fossils was not overturned until after the Scientific Revolution. During the 1700s
Jean-Etienne Guettard and
Nicolas Desmarest hiked central France and recorded their observations on geological maps; Guettard recorded the first observation of the volcanic origins of this part of France.
James Hutton recorded his
Theory of the Earth in 1788, which would later be referred to as
Uniformitarianism. In 1811,
Georges Cuvier and
Alexandre Brongniart published their explanation of the antiquity of the Earth, inspired by Cuvier's discovery of fossil elephant bones in Paris. They formulated the principle of
stratigraphic succession of the layers of the earth.
Charles Lyell's
Principles of Geology reiterated Hutton's Uniformitarianism, which influenced
Charles Darwin.
In the 20th century, the main development has been the theory of
plate tectonics in the 1960s. Plate tectonic theory (which revolutionized the
Earth sciences) arose out of two separate geological observations:
seafloor spreading and
continental drift. The threat of
nuclear war also drove the emergence of
seismology and drastic improvements in the
Figure of the Earth.
Astronomy
Advances in astronomy and in optical systems in the 19th century resulted in the first observation of an
asteroid (
Ceres) in
1801, and the discovery of
Neptune in
1846.
George Gamow,
Ralph Alpher, and
Robert Hermann had calculated that there should be evidence for a Big Bang in the background temperature of the universe
[Alpher, Herman, and Gamow. Nature 162,774 (1948).]. In 1964,
Arno Penzias and
Robert Wilson[Wilson's 1978 Nobel lecture] discovered a 3 kelvin background hiss in their
Bell Labs radiotelescope, which was evidence for this hypothesis, and formed the basis for a number of results that helped determine the
age of the universe.
Supernova
SN1987A was observed by astronomers on Earth both visually, and in a triumph for
neutrino astronomy, by the solar neutrino detectors at
Kamiokande. But the solar neutrino flux was
a fraction of its theoretically-expected value. This discrepancy forced a change in some values in the
standard model for
particle physics.
Biology, medicine, and genetics
In 1847, Hungarian physician
Ignác Fülöp Semmelweis dramatically reduced the occurrency of
puerperal fever by the simple experiment of requiring physicians to wash their hands before attending to women in childbirth. This discovery predated the
germ theory of disease. However, Semmelweis' findings were not appreciated by his contemporaries and came into use only with discoveries by British surgeon
Joseph Lister, who in 1865 proved the principles of
antisepsis. Lister's work was based on the important findings by French biologist
Louis Pasteur. Pasteur was able to link microorganisms with disease, revolutionizing medicine. He also devised one of the most important methods in
preventive medicine, when in 1880 he produced a
vaccine against
rabies. Pasteur invented the process of
pasteurization, to help prevent the spread of disease through milk and other foods.
Perhaps the most prominent and far-reaching theory in all of science has been the theory of
evolution by
natural selection put forward by the British naturalist
Charles Darwin in his
On the Origin of Species in 1859. Darwin's theory proposed that all differences in animals were formed by natural processes over long periods of time, and that even
humans were simply evolved organisms. Implications of evolution on fields outside of pure science have led to both
opposition and support from different parts of society, and profoundly influenced the popular understanding of "man's place in the universe". In the early 20th century, the study of heredity became a major investigation after the rediscovery in 1900 of the laws of inheritance developed by the Austrian monk
Gregor Mendel in 1866. Mendel's laws provided the beginnings of the study of
genetics, which became a major field of research for both scientific and industrial research. By 1953,
James Watson and
Francis Crick clarified the basic structure of DNA, the
genetic material for expressing life in all its forms
[James D. Watson and Francis H. Crick. "Letters to Nature: Molecular structure of Nucleic Acid." Nature 171, 737â€"738 (1953).]. In the late 20th century, the possibilities of
genetic engineering became practical for the first time, and a massive international effort began in 1990 to map out an entire human
genome (the
Human Genome Project) has been touted as potentially having large medical benefits.
Ecology
The discipline of
ecology typically traces its origin to the synthesis of
Darwinian evolution and
Humboldtian biogeography, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Equally important in the rise of ecology, however, were
microbiology and
soil science—particularly the
cycle of life concept, prominent in the work
Louis Pasteur and
Ferdinand Cohn. The word
ecology was coined by
Ernst Haeckel, whose particularly holistic view of nature in general (and Darwin's theory in particular) was important in the spread of ecological thinking. In the 1930's,
Arthur Tansley and others began developing the field of
ecosystem ecology, which combined experimental soil science with physiological concepts of energy and the techniques of
field biology. The history of ecology in the 20th century is closely tied to that of
environmentalism; the
Gaia hypothesis in the 1960s and more recently the scientific-religious movement of
Deep Ecology have brought the two closer together.
Successful use of the scientific method in the physical sciences led to the same methodology being adapted to better understand the many fields of human endeavor. From this effort the social sciences have been developed.
Political science
Main article: History of political science
One of the basic requirements for a scientific community is the existence and approval of a political sponsor; in England, the
Royal Society operates under the aegis of the
monarchy; in the US, the
National Academy of Sciences was founded by Act of Congress; etc. Otherwise, when the basic elements of knowledge were being formulated, the political rulers of the respective communities could choose to arbitrarily either support or disallow the nascent scientific communities. For example,
Alhazen had to feign madness to avoid execution. The polymath
Shen Kuo lost political support, and could not continue his studies until he came up with discoveries that showed his worth to the political rulers. The admiral
Zheng He could not continue his voyages of exploration after the emperors withdrew their support. Another famous example was the suppression of the work of Galileo, and before him,
Giordano Bruno, burned at the stake, for his statements on
cosmology; by the twentieth century, Galileo would be pardoned.
Linguistics
Historical linguistics emerged as an independent field of study at the end of the 18th century.
Sir William Jones proposed that
Sanskrit,
Persian,
Greek,
Latin,
Gothic, and
Celtic languages all shared a common base. After Jones, an effort to catalog all languages of the world was made throughout the 19th century and into the 20th century. Publication of
Ferdinand de Saussure's
Cours de linguistique générale spawned the development of
descriptive linguistics. Descriptive linguistics, and the related
structuralism movement caused linguistics to focus on how language changes over time, instead of just describing the differences between languages.
Noam Chomsky further diversified linguistics with the development of
generative linguistics in the 1950s. His effort is based upon a mathematical model of language that allows for the description and prediction of valid
semantics. Additional specialties such as
sociolinguistics,
cognitive linguistics, and
computational linguistics have emerged from collaboration between linguistics and other disciplines.
Economics
The basis for
classical economics forms
Adam Smith's
An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, published in 1776. Smith criticized
mercantilism, advocating a system of free trade with
division of labour. He postulated an "
Invisible Hand" that large economic systems could be self-regulating through a process of enlightened self-interest.
Karl Marx developed an alternative economical system, called
Marxian economics. Marxian economics is based on the
labor theory of value and assumes the value of good to be based on the amount of labor required to produce it. Under this assumption,
capitalism was based on employeers not paying the full value of workers labor to create profit. The
Austrian school responded to Marxian economics by viewing
entrepreneurship as driving force of economic development. This replaced the labor theory of value by a system of
supply and demand.
In the 1920s,
John Maynard Keynes prompted a division between
microeconomics and
macroeconomics. Under
Keynesian economics macroeconomic trends can overwhelm economic choices made by individuals. Governments should promote
aggregate demand for goods as a means to encourage economic expansion. Following World War II,
Milton Friedman created the concept of
monetarism. Monetarism focuses on using the supply and demand of money as a method for controlling economic activity. In the 1970s, monetarism has adapted into
supply-side economics which advocates reducing taxes as a means to increase the amount of money available for economic expansion.
Other modern schools of economic thought are
New Classical economics and
New Keynesian economics. New Classical economics was developed in the 1970s, emphasizing solid microeconomics as the basis for macroeconomic growth. New Keynesian economics was created partially in response to New Classical economics, and deals with how inefficiencies in the market create a need for control by a central bank or government.
Psychology
The end of the 19th century marks the start of psychology as a scientific enterprise. The year 1879 is commonly seen as the start of psychology as an independent field of study. In that year
Wilhelm Wundt founded the first laboratory dedicated exclusively to psychological research (in
Leipzig). Other important early contributors to the field include
Hermann Ebbinghaus (a pioneer in memory studies),
Ivan Pavlov (who discovered
classical conditioning), and
Sigmund Freud. Freud's influence has been enormous, though more as cultural icon than a force in scientific psychology. Freud's basic theories postulated the existence in humans of various unconscious and instinctive "drives", and that the "self" existed as a perpetual battle between the desires and demands of the internal
id, ego, and superego.
The 20th century saw a rejection of Freud's theories as being too unscientific, and a reaction against
Edward Titchener's atomistic approach of the mind. This led to the formulation of
behaviorism by
John B. Watson, which was popularized by
B.F. Skinner. Behaviorism proposed
epistemologically limiting psychological study to overt behavior, since that could be reliably measured. Scientific knowledge of the "mind" was considered too metaphysical, hence impossible to achieve. The final decades of the 20th century have seen the rise of a new interdisciplinary approach to studying human psychology, known collectively as
cognitive science. Cognitive science again considers the mind as a subject for investigation, using the tools of
evolutionary psychology,
linguistics,
computer science,
philosophy, and
neurobiology. This new form of investigation has proposed that a wide understanding of the human mind is possible, and that such an understanding may be applied to other research domains, such as
artificial intelligence.
Sociology
Ibn Khaldun is regarded as the founder of modern sociology. As a scientific discipline, sociology emerged in the early 19th century as the academic response to the modernization of the world. Among many early sociologists (e.g.,
Émile Durkheim), the aim of sociology was in
structuralism, understanding the cohesion of social groups, and developing an "antidote" to social disintegration.
Max Weber was concerned with the modernization of society through the concept of
rationalization, which he believed would trap individuals in an "iron cage" of rational thought. Some sociologists, including
Georg Simmel and
W. E. B. Du Bois, utilized more
microsociological, qualitative analyses. This microlevel approach played an important role in American sociology, with the theories of
George Herbert Mead and his student
Herbert Blumer resulting in the creation of the
symbolic interactionism approach to sociology.
American sociology in the 1940s and 1950s was dominated largely by
Talcott Parsons, who argued that aspects of society that promoted structural integration were therefore "functional". This
structural functionalism approach was questioned in the 1960s, when sociologists came to see this approach as merely a justification for inequalities present in the status quo. In reaction,
conflict theory was developed, which was based in part on the philosophies of
Karl Marx. Conflict theorists saw society as an arena in which different groups compete for control over resources. Symbolic interactionism also came to be regarded as central to sociological thinking.
Erving Goffman saw social interactions as a stage performance, with individuals preparing "backstage" and attempting to control their audience through
impression management. While these theories are currently the prominent in sociological thought, other approaches exist, including
feminist theory,
post-structuralism,
rational choice theory, and
postmodernism.
Anthropology
Anthropology can best be understood as an outgrowth of the
Age of Enlightenment. It was during this period that Europeans attempted systematically to study human behaviour. Traditions of jurisprudence, history, philology and sociology developed during this time and informed the development of the social sciences of which anthropology was a part. At the same time, the romantic reaction to the Enlightenment produced thinkers such as
Johann Gottfried Herder and later
Wilhelm Dilthey whose work formed the basis for the
culture concept which is central to the discipline. Traditionally, much of the history of the subject was based on
colonial encounters between Europe and the rest of the world, and much of 18th- and 19th-century anthropology is now classed as forms of
scientific racism. During the late 19th-century, battles over the "study of man" took place between those of an "anthropological" persuasion (relying on
anthropometrical techniques) and those of an "ethnological" persuasion (looking at cultures and traditions), and these distinctions became part of the later divide between
physical anthropology and
cultural anthropology, the latter ushered in by the students of
Franz Boas. In the mid-20th century, much of the methodologies of earlier anthropological and ethnographical study were reevaluated with an eye towards research ethics, while at the same time the scope of investigation has broadened far beyond the traditional study of "primitive cultures" (scientific practice itself is often an arena of anthropological study).
Emerging disciplines
During the 20th century, a number of interdisciplinary scientific fields have emerged. Three examples will be given here:
Communication studies combines
animal communication,
information theory,
marketing,
public relations,
telecommunications and other forms of communication.
Computer science, built upon a foundation of
theoretical linguistics,
discrete mathematics, and
electrical engineering, studies the nature and limits of computation. Subfields include
computability,
computational complexity,
database design,
computer networking,
artificial intelligence, and the design of
computer hardware. Computer science provides much of the theoretical basis for
software engineering.
Materials science has its roots in
metallurgy,
minerology, and
crystallography. It combines chemistry, physics, and several engineering disciplines. The field studies metals, ceramics, plastics,
semiconductors, and
composite materials.
*
History of science and technology (academic field of study)
*
Philosophy and
Logic*
Epistemology (branch of philosophy concerning the nature, origin and scope of knowledge)
*
Historiography*
Indian science*
Military funding of science*
Obsolete scientific theory*
Science studies*
List of famous experiments*
List of scientists*
List of Nobel laureates*
List of years in science*
Philosophy of science**
Imre Lakatos**
NaĂŻve empiricism*
Thomas S. Kuhn (1996).
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (3rd ed.).
University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0226458075
* Howard Margolis (2002).
It Started with Copernicus. New York:
McGraw-Hill. ISBN 0-07-138507-X
*
Joseph Needham.
Science and Civilisation in China. Multiple volumes (1954–2004).
*
Bertrand Russell (1945).
A History of Western Philosophy: And Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present Day. New York:
Simon and Schuster.
*
Leonard C. Bruno (1989),
The Landmarks of Science. ISBN 0-8160-2137-6
* John L. Heilbron, ed.,
The Oxford companion to the history of modern science (New York:
Oxford University Press, 2003).
* George Rousseau and Roy Porter, eds.,
The Ferment of Knowledge: Studies in the Historiography of Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980). ISBN 0-52122599
* Caroline L. Herzenberg. 1986.
Women Scientists from Antiquity to the Present Locust Hill Press ISBN 0-933951-01-9
*
A History of Science, Vols 1–4, online text
*
MIT STS.002 – Toward the Scientific Revolution. From MIT OpenCourseWare, class materials for the history of science up to and including
Isaac Newton.
*
MIT STS.042 – Einstein, Oppenheimer, Feynman: Physics in the 20th Century. Class materials for the history of physics in the 20th century.
*
Contributions of 20th century Women to Physics ("CWP")*
The official site of the Nobel Foundation. Features biographies and info on Nobel laureates
*
The Institute and Museum of the History of Science in Florence, Italy
