21 APR 2014 by ideonexus
Science was Inconvenient for Religion
Science’s contributions to the spread of disbelief is the least controversial segment of the virtuous cycle for which I am arguing in seventeenth-century Europe. For science’s methods are clearly troublesome for religion. The devout, to begin with, are not wont to view their precepts merely as propositions to be controverted or confirmed. The orthodox, as a rule, are used to arguments being settled by authority, not experiment. The hope belief offers does not always stand up well to obser... 1 
notes
notesAs scientific knowledge grew it revealed knowledge that conflicted with scripture.
24 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
Gedankenexperiment
However, the subject need not be an esoteric one for a gedankenexperiment to be fruitful. My own favorite is Galileo’s proof that, contrary to Aristotle’s view, objects of different mass fall in a vacuum with the same acceleration. One might think that a real experiment needs to be conducted to test that hypothesis, but Galileo simply asked us to consider a large and a small stone tied together by a very light string. If Aristotle was right, the large stone should speed up the smaller one...Folksonomies: thought experiment testability
Folksonomies: thought experiment testability
1 Gino Segre on the importance and validity of "thought-experiments," using Galileo's disproof of objects falling at different rates as an example.
13 OCT 2013 by ideonexus
Galileo and the Altar Lamp Pendulum
IN 1583 Galileo Galilei (1564–1642), a youth of nineteen attending prayers in the baptistery of the Cathedral of Pisa, was, according to tradition, distracted by the swinging of the altar lamp. No matter how wide the swing of the lamp, it seemed that the time it took the lamp to move from one end to the other was the same. Of course Galileo had no watch, but he checked the intervals of the swing by his own pulse. This curious everyday puzzle, he said, enticed him away from the study of medi... 1 notes
notesThe puzzle and the pendulum time piece.
13 OCT 2013 by ideonexus
The Clock as the Mother of All Machines
PRECISELY because the clock did not start as a practical tool shaped for a single purpose, it was destined to be the mother of machines. The clock broke down the walls between kinds of knowledge, ingenuity, and skill, and clockmakers were the first consciously to apply the theories of mechanics and physics to the making of machines. Progress came from the collaboration of scientists—Galileo, Huygens, Hooke, and others—with craftsmen and mechanics. Since clocks were the first modern measur... 1 notes
notesIt required a number of sciences, was based on multiple engineering developments, and contributed itself to science by allowing the measurement of time.
31 JUL 2013 by ideonexus
How Intuition Messed Up the Laws of Motion
A most fundamental problem, for thousands of years
wholly obscured by its complications, is that of motion.
All those motions we observe in nature that of a
stone thrown into the air, a ship sailing the sea, a cart
pushed along the street are in reality very intricate.
To understand these phenomena it is wise to begin
with the simplest possible cases, and proceed gradually
to the more complicated ones. Consider a body at rest,
where there is no motion at all. To change the position
o... 1 notes
notesAnd it took a Newton to determine what was really going on.
19 APR 2013 by ideonexus
Bacon, Galileo, Descartes
The transition from the epoch we have been considering to that which follows, has been distinguished by three extraordinary personages, Bacon, Galileo, and Descartes. Bacon has revealed the true method of studying nature, by employing the three instruments with which she has furnished us for the discovery of her secrets, observation, experiment and calculation. He was desirous that the philosopher, placed in the midst of the universe, should, as a first and necessary step in his career, renou... 1 notes
notesCondorcet considers the last the most important of the era.
18 JAN 2013 by ideonexus
Science is Inherently Political
When speaking about science to scientists, there is one thing that can be said that will almost always raise their indignation, and that is that science is inherently political and that the practice of science is a political act. Science, they will respond, has nothing to do with politics. But is that true?
Let's consider the relationship between knowledge and power. "Knowledge and power go hand in hand," said Francis Bacon, "so that the way to increase in power is to increase in knowledge.... 1 notes
notesKnowledge is power, science creates new knowledge, new knowledge challenges established orders.
07 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Reason Comes After a Plan
When Galileo caused balls, the weights of which he had himself previously determined, to roll down an inclined plane; when Torricelli made the air carry a weight which he had calculated beforehand to be equal to that of a definite volume of water; or in more recent times, when Stahl changed metal into lime, and lime back into metal, by withdrawing something and then restoring it, a light broke upon all students of nature. They learned that reason has insight only into that which it produces a...Folksonomies: experimentation
Folksonomies: experimentation
1 notes
notesThere must be experiments to guide reason, without which reason will make up it's own explanations.
06 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Science is a Relay Race
History of science is a relay race, my painter friend. Copernicus took over his flag from Aristarchus, from Cicero, from Plutarch; and Galileo took that flag over from Copernicus. Being handed off from scientist to scientist.
07 MAY 2012 by ideonexus
Human Space Exploration is Overrated
Perhaps what we should do is genetically engineer new forms of Intelligent life that can survive the stress of space yet still conduct scientific experiments. Actually, such creatures have already been made in the lab. They're called robots. You don't have to feed them, they don't need life support, and they won't get upset if you don't bring them back to Earth. People, on the other hand, generally want to breathe, eat, and eventually come home.
It's probably true that no city has ever held...Folksonomies: space exploration space flight
Folksonomies: space exploration space flight
1 notes
notesWe don't remember most of the astronauts, but we do have favorite space photos taken by all the robots we've sent out into the solar system.
