How the West Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity (51 page)

Illusions

So much, then, for the “mystery” of how Muslim culture was somehow lost or left behind. The notion that in the medieval era Islamic culture was advanced well beyond Europe is as much an illusion as recent ones about an “Arab Spring.” The Islamic world was backward then, and so it remains.

15

Science Comes of Age

I
saac Newton (1642–1727) famously remarked, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” Unfortunately, too few who quote this line realize that Newton was not only quite serious but also quite correct. Science did not suddenly erupt in a great intellectual revolution during Newton’s time; this era of superb achievements was the culmination of centuries of sustained, normal scientific progress. After all, Newton’s First Law of Motion
¹
was simply an expansion of William of Ockham’s (1295–1349) insight that once a body is in motion, it will remain so unless some force, such as friction, acts upon it. This was refined by Jean Buridan (1300–1358), who developed the principle of
inertia
(that unless acted upon by an external force, bodies at rest will stay at rest and bodies in motion will stay in motion). Inertia was further refined by Galileo (1564–1642), who, characteristically, claimed more credit than he deserved. Of course, Newton’s First Law was merely the starting point for his magnificent system of physics, but, contrary to claims made on his behalf by the philosophers of the so-called Enlightenment, Newton didn’t have to start from scratch. Rather, as chapter 8 demonstrated, the glorious scientific breakthroughs of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were based on the work of a long line of natural philosophers.

Nevertheless, the notion that a scientific revolution erupted in the sixteenth century is so ingrained in our intellectual culture that the historian of science Steven Shapin began his study with the charming line: “There was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book
about it.”
²
It seems more accurate to identify what occurred in this era as the
coming of age
of Western science. I have written at length on this era in three previous books,
³
but there is little repetition in what follows, for I have discovered important new questions to address.

In particular, I will dispel several widely advocated but spurious claims, each of them a variation on the theme that science could arise only during the “Enlightenment” because by that point the churches, sufficiently weakened, could no longer suppress science. Since this is an obvious falsehood, so too are claims derived from it. The first of these claims is that most of the great scientific stars of this time had freed themselves from the confines of supernaturalism and faith. The second is that the Protestant Reformation had freed England and many parts of the Continent from “the dead hand of the Catholic Church,”
⁴
thereby making real scientific thinking possible—or, in the case of Puritanism, a moral duty. The third claim is that science arose outside the universities because they were controlled by the churches and therefore were inhospitable to new ideas. Finally, all these factors are said to have combined to explain why England was the center of it all.

Overwhelming evidence falsifies each of these claims. Indeed, Christianity was
essential
to the rise of science, which is why science was a purely Western phenomenon.

What Is Science?

Aristotle was not a scientist. It is true that he attempted to explain many natural phenomena. It also is true that his explanations usually took the form of abstract generalizations, as do scientific theories. But none of Aristotle’s work constituted science because his explanations were not linked to systematic observations. It wasn’t merely that he didn’t make the obvious tests of his claims; he failed to recognize that such tests were relevant. He assumed that because his explanations were based on reason, their truth was not in doubt. This was the typical view taken by Greek philosophers—Plato even believed that reality was an inferior representation of the abstract, and hence empirical observations were not to be trusted. In contrast, recall from chapter 8 that Roger Bacon disproved Aristotle’s generalization that hot water freezes faster than does cold water by putting out a container of cold water and one of hot water on a
cold day and
seeing
which froze first. By the same token, had Aristotle been a scientist he would have at least recognized the need to test his assertion in
On the Heavens
that heavy objects fall faster than light ones in the way Galileo claimed to have done (never mind that Galileo probably made up the story about dropping two stones from the Tower of Pisa). Aristotle was not a scientist because he based his “theories” on logic without any concern for testing them through appropriate observations. Consequently, as James Hannam wrote in
The Genesis of Science
, “not even Aristotle’s powers of reason could prevent blunders in his arguments.”
⁵

Science must not be confused with philosophy—big ideas may or may not be scientific. Nor must science be confused with technology. Ancient China had no science despite knowing how to smelt iron, make firecrackers, and manufacture porcelain plates.

Science is best defined as
a method
used in
organized efforts
to formulate
explanations of nature
, always subject to modification and correction through
systematic observations
. Put another way, science consists of two parts:
theory
and
research
. Scientific theories are
abstract statements
about
how
and
why
some portion of nature (including human social life) fits together and works. But not all abstract statements about nature, even those offering explanations, qualify as scientific theories. Rather, abstract statements are scientific
only
if it is possible to deduce from them some definite predictions and prohibitions about what will be observed. And that’s where research comes in. It consists of making those observations that are relevant to the theory’s empirical prohibitions and predictions.

Given the linkage between theory and research, science is limited to statements about natural and material reality—about things that are at least in principle observable. Hence, there are entire realms of discourse that science is unable even to address, including such matters as the existence of God. So much, then, for notions that science refutes religion.

Defining science as an
organized effort
is to note that science is not random discovery but involves intentional and sustained actions and that it seldom, if ever, is pursued in solitude. Granted, some scientists have worked alone, but not in isolation. From earliest days, scientists have constituted networks and have been very communicative. As noted in chapter 8, that was true even in medieval times, and by the sixteenth century communication among scientists was well organized. Although there were no journals to publish and circulate scientific findings, scientists were active correspondents. The University of Paris initiated a private
mail system as early as the thirteenth century. Early in the seventeenth century the French friar and brilliant mathematician Marin Mersenne (1588–1648) sustained a large network of correspondence for the specific purpose of informing scientists of one another’s work; among his correspondents were René Descartes and Galileo. Scientists also formed learned societies to meet regularly and share knowledge: the Royal Society of London began gathering in about 1645 and the Parisian Académie Royale in 1666.

Consistent with the views of most contemporary historians of science, the above definition of science excludes the efforts through most of human history to explain and control the material world, even those efforts not involving supernatural means. That is because until recent times “technical progress—sometimes considerable—was mere empiricism,” as the historian Marc Bloch put it.
⁶
In other words, progress was the product of observation and trial and error but was lacking in explanations, in theorizing. Unlike Aristotle and his Greek colleagues, many ancients knew that under normal conditions cold water froze faster than hot water, but they had no theories about why anything froze. Their achievements are better described as techniques, crafts, technologies, lore, skills, wisdom, engineering, or even knowledge. But not as science.

It is now the consensus among historians, philosophers, and even sociologists of science that real science arose only once: in Europe. In this regard it is instructive that China, Islam, India, and ancient Greece and Rome had a highly developed alchemy, but only in Europe did alchemy develop into chemistry. By the same token, many societies developed elaborate systems of astrology, but only in Europe did astrology lead to astronomy.

Scientific Stars: 1543–1680

Historians often are misled (and mislead) by relying on atypical examples. This problem can be solved by proper use of quantitative methods. Rather than citing examples of famous early scientists who were Protestants, or irreligious, or ordained clergy, or affiliated with a university, we can achieve far more trustworthy results based on analysis of
all
the famous scientists of this era.

Hence, I identified all the significant scientific stars of the era beginning
with the publication of Copernicus’s
De revolutionibus
in 1543 and including all born prior to 1680. I based my selections on study of the rosters provided in a number of specialized encyclopedias and biographical dictionaries, among which Isaac Asimov’s
Encyclopedia of Science and Technology
(1982) was especially useful and reliable. I limited my selections to
active scientists
, thereby excluding some well-known intellectual figures of the day, such as Francis Bacon and Joseph Scaliger. Having assembled a list, I then consulted various sources, including individual biographies, to determine the facts I wished to code for each case. In the end I had a data set consisting of fifty-two scientists:
⁷

1. Brayer, Johann (1572–1625)

2. Borelli, Giovanni (1608–1679)

3. Boyle, Robert (1627–1691)

4. Brahe, Tycho (1546–1601)

5. Briggs, Henry (1561–1630)

6. Cassini, Giovanni (1625–1712)

7. Copernicus, Nicolaus (1473–1543)

8. Descartes, René (1596–1650)

9. Fabricius, Hieronymus (1537–1619)

10. Fallopius, Gabriel (1523–1562)

11. Fermat, Pierre (1601–1665)

12. Flamsteed, John (1646–1719)

13. Galilei, Galileo (1564–1642)

14. Gassendi, Pierre (1592–1655)

15. Gellibrand, Henry (1597–ca. 1637)

16. Gilbert, William (1544–1603)

17. Glauber, Johann (1604–1668)

18. Graaf, Regnier de (1641–1673)

19. Grew, Nehemiah (1641–1712)

20. Grimaldi, Francesco (1618–1663)

21. Guericke, Otto (1602–1686)

22. Halley, Edmond (1656–1742)

23. Harvey, William (1578–1657)

24. Helmont, Jan Baptista van (1579/80–1644)

25. Hevelius, Johannes (1611–1687)

26. Hooke, Robert (1635–1703)

27. Horrocks, Jeremiah (1619–1641)

28. Huygens, Christiaan (1629–1695)

29. Kepler, Johannes (1571–1630)

30. Kircher, Athanasius (1601–1680)

31. Leeuwenhoek, Anton (1632–1723)

32. Leibniz, Gottfried (1646–1716)

33. Malpighi, Marcello (1628–1694)

34. Mariotte, Edme (1620–1684)

35. Mersenne, Marin (1588–1648)

36. Napier, John (1550–1617)

37. Newton, Isaac (1642–1727)

38. Oughtred, William (1574–1660)

39. Papin, Denis (1647–1712)

40. Pascal, Blaise (1623–1662)

41. Picard, Jean (1620–1682)

42. Ray, John (1628–1705)

43. Redi, Francesco (1626–1697)

44. Riccioli, Giovanni (1598–1671)

45. Roemer, Olaus (1644–1710)