The impact of the scientific revolution: a brief history of the  (Page 4/6)

René Descartes (1596-1650):Descartes disagreed with Galileo’s and Bacon’s experimental methods because he believedthat one could only:

“(1) Accept nothing as true that is not self-evident. (2) Divide problems into their simplest parts. (3)Solve problems by proceeding from simple to complex. (4) Recheck the reasoning.”

Robert Boyle (1627-1691):

Boyle is an interesting case among the 17th century natural philosophers, in that he continued to use medievalteleology as well as 17th century Galilean mechanism and Baconian induction to explain events. Even though he made progress in thefield of chemistry through Baconian experimentation (fact-finding followed by controlled experimentation), he remained drawn toteleological explanations for scientific phenomena. For example, Boyle believed that because “God established rules of motion andthe corporeal order – laws of nature,” phenomena must exist to serve a certain purpose within that established order. Boyle usedthis idea as an explanation for how the “geometrical arrangement of the atoms defined the chemical characteristics of the substance.”

Hooke (1635-1703):

Hooke, the Royal Society’s first Curator of Experiments from 1662-1677, considered science as way of improvingsociety. This was in contrast to medieval thought, where science and philosophy were done for knowledge’s sake alone and ideas weretested just to see if it could be done. An experimentalist who followed the Baconian tradition, Hooke agreed with Bacon’s ideathat “history of nature and the arts” was the basis of science.