The Rise of the Power of Reason and its Influence on Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment
The power of reason puts logical thought and deductions above all dogmas and faith based religious beliefs and superstitions. It tries to explain everything in terms of causes and results that are possible to weigh, measure, experience or replicate. The rise of this power of reason is owed to humanism whose flow in time can be traced back to Greece, Rome and Europe (especially Italy)-respectively. Perhaps the first person that could be termed as a humanist was Protagoras- a teacher and philosopher that lived during the 5th century BCE in Greece. He made humanity the central point of consideration for values through his famous statement that man was indeed the measure of all things. Greek classical humanism is characterized by a materialistic nature which seeks answers for questions on the happenings in the natural, human world. It also placed humans at the centre of all social and moral concerns as well as fostered imaginative speculation of new possibilities and a value for free inquisition. As humanism grew and progressed, it seemed to pose challenges to Christian beliefs and dogma. This led to the question whether people should belief what they experience and see practically or rather what the faith and religious writings and teachings dictated.
The rise of reasoning in the early modern period
The Romans took up the Greek classical humanism due to their practical approach to life and implemented much of the ideas in their lives. Through the inspiration obtained from the political, artistic and philosophical Roman writings the European renaissance humanists were able steer away from the otherworldly religious philosophy to a more this-worldly concern. This happened during the European renaissance (13th– 14th century). Aristotle a humanist and former student to Plato can be credited alongside Plato as the father of modern thinking and inventor of logic. Aristotle also came up with empiricism that emphasized knowledge acquisition through experience rather than beliefs (McGrath, 2004). The church (Roman Catholic) that was taking the sting from such philosophy took up empiricism and made a scholastic approach of thought that tried to explain their faith in a more logical context. In thus doing, the church opened the doors to critical, logical thought and analysis of experience as a basis for knowledge acquisition and propagation. This hange in thought drastically differed with the middle age European beliefs that all truth was centered on God and indulgence in the concerns of the material world would derail ones cause and make them lose their soul. They also distrusted the perception of human beings because they thought it was faulty and variable whereas the world was deceptive.
Additionally, they thought that the world was in place to derail the human destiny and sense of direction. This is evidenced by Galilei’s letter to the duchess of Tuscany concerning people’s disbelief on his observations on heavenly, solar bodies (Galilei, 1615). The value of reason and open and free inquiry plus the belief in the existence of answers to causes of events in the natural, human world became the drive in research, in all fields of study and sciences. Early scientists changed their attitude and believed that the workings of this world could be analyzed in a naturalistic manner to obtain answers. They claimed that these workings should not be considered as actions of gods. This enlightenment is mostly linked to the 18th Century where people began believing that reason could do away with superstition, ignorance and tyrannical leadership. These perceptions and thoughts were furthered by logical scientific inquisition in to nature; starting with Leonardo da Vinci, Roger Bacon (the inventor of gun powder and the trial and error method of research), Copernicus, Brahe, Kepler (the universe movements), Galileo(Heavenly bodies observation) to one of the greatest-Isaac Newton.
Isaac echoed the same line of thought in his Principia Mathematica: wherein he stated that one does not need to look for answers to explain any physical phenomena of the universe by religion or superstition (Hooker, 1999). Isaac developed the mechanistic universe view termed as classical mechanics. This focused on the concept of motion. It offered solutions to many earlier posed scientific queries. Based on this concept of the universe humans sought to understand other principles that they thought would follow a similar outlook. These included economics, politics, history and ethics. They later came to know that the mechanical universe was subject manipulation. They therefore, drew an analogy that they too could manipulate these other parts of concern as a science. This is exemplified by Rousseau’s definition of a social contact using a logical reasoning format (1763). As a result modern sciences were born including the science of politics, economy and many others. Later, Isaac adopted the idea that there was an un-movable mover who is the cause of all the motion in the classical mechanical universe. This he attributed to God. The idea is furthered in Deism with the philosophical deduction that if the world was God created and rational the God must be a rational being.
Conclusion
Conclusively, with all this documented advances in reason, science and enlightenment the power of reason and its start should be credited for all human advancement. This was all possible due to the belief in the capability of human reason in deciphering truth through experience.
References
Brians, P. (2000). The Enlightenment. Retrieved from, http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/hum_303/enlightenment.html, on 5th May 2010.
Galilei, G. (1615). Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina of Tuscany, 1615: Internet modern history source book. Retrieved from, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/galileo-tuscany.html, on 5th May 2010.
Hooker, R. (1999). The European Enlightenment: The scientific revolution. World civilization: An internet classroom anthology. Retrieved from, http://wsu.edu/~dee/ENLIGHT/SCIREV.HTM, on 5th May 2010.
McGrath, E. (2004). The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation: Humanism and the culture of renaissance. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing.
Rousseau, J. J. (1763). The Social Contract, 1763: Internet modern history source book. Retrieved from, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/Rousseau-soccon.html, on 5thMay 2010.
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