As it occurred in most spheres of the progressing 14th century society, the renaissance in the realm of scientific inquiry was not a process which took hold of the entire population, but rather was the contributions of the select few.

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HSY1020:Assignment 2:Essay

As it occurred in most spheres of the progressing 14th century society, the renaissance in the realm of scientific inquiry was not a process which took hold of the entire population, but rather was the contributions of the select few. Science in itself remained bound with superstition, under the restriction Neoplatonic principles and church doctrinal theology. Those few renaissance men that achieved progress, and are responsible for the renaissance like movement that occurred within this sphere, were those whom embodied the renaissance fervour of discovery, self-accomplishment, and the retention of ultimate knowledge.

While the rebirth of classicism did bring about progress, in its effort to separate knowledge from the dominance of the roman catholic church by giving credit to the philosophy of man, it was those whom worked beyond these principalities that can be credited for the renaissance that did occur in scientific knowledge, and paved the way for the onset of the 16th century Revolution in scientific inquiry, its effort remaining the foundation for modern science today.

For the long centuries of the Middle Ages (500-1350 AD) the canon of scientific knowledge had experienced little change, and the Catholic Church had preserved acceptance of a system of beliefs based on the teachings of the ancient Greeks and Romans, which it had incorporated into religious doctrine . During this period there was little scientific inquiry and experimentation. Rather, students of the sciences simply read the works of the alleged authorities and accepted their word as truth. Literacy levels were extremely low, books were scarce, handwritten, and all education came from the pulpit. However, during the Renaissance this doctrinal passivity began to change. The quest to understand the natural world led to the revival of botany and anatomy by thinkers such as Andreas Vesalius during the later sixteenth century.

  The middle Ages were centuries of stability in the intellectual world. All scientific and philosophical expression was monitored extensively by, and most often produced from within, the Church. During the middle Ages, the Church ruled conclusively on a number of truths about the natural world, which it claimed were undeniable. These alleged truths were produced by Biblical study and the widely accepted Aristotelian system, which became official Church doctrine. The Aristotelian system defined the laws of physics erroneously in many cases. It claimed that the rate of fall of an object was determined by its weight, held that matter was constructed out of four possible elements, with different matter containing different combinations of these four, and described the universe as the Greek astronomer Ptolemy had described it, as a static and finite thing in which the Earth occupied the central position, with the sun and planets in revolution and the distant stars inhabiting its farthest edges. The physicians of the period considered that the human body contained four different kinds of liquid and that illness was caused by the imbalance of these 'humors.' These truths went generally unquestioned for years, backed up by the teachings of the Church and the ‘common teaching of the educational institutions of the era’.

 

Renaissance historian Jacob Burkhart argues that 'the Renaissance was, as an historical event, the transition from medieval times, during which the focus of all life had been religion, to modern times, in which that focus expanded to include learning, rationality, and realism' . During the Renaissance, artists benefited from the patronage of rich merchants and rulers, and were well known during their own times, unlike the anonymous artists who had produced works in guilds during the middle ages .

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Investigation into science at the period of renaissance was not just a matter of intelligence, but of support, environment, authority and patronage. Great fame and influence was conferred upon the great artists of the day, and they were celebrated wherever they travelled.

Like all arts, scientific research needed funding and backing of the cause. While the realms of superstition, astrology and mathematical perception continued to flourish, the artists whom began to push their understanding of the natural world beyond that of the ancients, and of doctrinal popular theology. In a time of scepticism to deviations from the Catholic Church in Italy ...

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