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The Scientific Revolution also coincided with Europe's "Age of Discovery." Explorers from Columbus to Cook discovered new plants, new animals and even new human beings that challenged traditional assumptions and conceptions of the world. At the same time, extended ocean travel required intense observations and mappings of the heavens. Not surprisingly, Europe's Scientific Revolution began in the field of astronomy.
Many of the discoveries that launched the Scientific Revolution were greeted with great opposition because of their challenge to traditional and religious conceptions of the universe. The traditional belief that the Earth is the center of the universe, which ensured humanity's ultimate significance in the grand scheme of things was a perceived truth that people did not want disrupted. However, as science advanced, one false assumption after the other was scientifically obliterated.
The laws that were once thought to only govern the realms of “space” were relevant to Earth as well. Ground breaking scientists like Copernicus, Galileo and Newton revealed a universe that seemed like a perfectly run machine. Their discoveries were easily understood and the enlightened scientific understanding which emerged as a result of their work change the entire course of science and human understanding.
The Scientific Revolution began during Europe's Renaissance. In this period, a thriving middle class traded in their medieval preoccupations with supernatural forces and began to focus on more secular concerns, such as making money and achieving fame. In the wake of the renaissance and from then on, the “real” sciences turned away from the sociological and spiritual aspects of the world and chose to analyze life and nature solely in terms of their physical and mechanical principles.
Einstein sufficiently challenged the mechanical paradigm with his quantum physics and theory of relativity. But despite Einstein’s revelation that time and space are intrinsically entwined, he also acknowledged that time is, in a sense, like a fourth dimension of space. Astronomy also demonstrates this in, for example the measurement of the distances of the stars. The majority of stars are so far from us that their distances must be quantified in light years (386,000 miles per second). When astronomers view light coming from distant stars, they are viewing light that is a billion years old. They are not only seeing something from a far away place, but from a far away time. So if you think there is not much left to discover, just remember, there was a point in time when information like this seemed as fantastical to scientists as the idea that the earth was round.
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