History is full of intertwined events and revolutions and movements that would not have happened if not for a preceding defining event. Philosophical, technical, and scientific advances do not occur in a vacuum and are bound to affect future movements. This post will argue that the Enlightenment would not have been possible without the Scientific Revolution and that the latter set the stage for the former.
The Enlightenment was one of the most important movements of the 17th and 18th centuries. It can be defined as a philosophical movement that concerned itself with applying rational thought to all aspects of human experience (Brooks, 2019). The movement postulated that logic and reason could and should be used not only in mathematical sciences but also in philosophy, morality, and society (Brooks, 2019). Furthermore, it aimed to “determine the limits of reason and metaphysics,” seeking to relate scientific principles with fundamental beliefs about reality and existence (Peters, 2018, p. 886). The movement would not have taken place without the Scientific Revolution questioning society’s view on natural order and the place of God in it. The revolution led to new learning methods about the world emerging, shifting from the previous principal method of description to discovery and experimentation (Brooks, 2019). The Scientific Revolution provided the Enlightenment with basic methodologies that could be applied to a broader scope of disciplines.
Overall, the Enlightenment would not have occurred without the Scientific Revolution. The latter showed scientists that the description and reliance on the works of previous thinkers are not the sole methods of discovering the world around them. It promoted new methodologies and provided philosophers with new rational reasoning that could be applied to challenge the Church, the beliefs about human existence, and the place of God in the known universe.
References
Brooks, C. (2019). Western civilization: A concise history. Open Textbooks.
Peters, M. A. (2018). The Enlightenment and its critics.Educational Philosophy and Theory, 51(9), 886–894.