Draft for History of Science upto 1500s

About 7000 BC the prehistoric culture began. Egypt, Mesopotamia, etc. mathematics, astronomy, etc. People interpreted some natural phenomena via mythology. Oral tradition was passed down. From 3000BC, gradually there came the inventing of writings. At about 800 BC, alphabetic writing showed up and at about 5th BC the alphabetic writing began to be popular in Greece. The Great Alexandra stretched out his power to many other places. Leisure class emerged in Greece and some people in Ionia showed up and tried for the first time to give an interpretation to the natural world without resorting to mythology. It is said that the invention and popularization of writing gave people at that time a new way of organizing thoughts and triggering skepticism by comparing written records. Also since Alexandra took the possession of many other cities, a cultural communication was going on among these cities. There was some kind of education in Greece at 5th BC. It was focused on physical education and music and poetry, and was private. Then people like Thales and Pythagoras are the first natural philosophers. Their emergence was contributed by at least three factors: the invention and popularization of writing, the cultural communication and interaction, the prosperity of the society and the emergence of leisure class. But at that time there were also some other fabulous cities co-existing with Greece. They were Egypt, Babylon, and Mesopotamia. However, for some reason the first natural philosophers did not belong to them. According to Lindberg’s book, they had fabulous mathematics, medicine, and technology. But where is natural philosophy? The Greek Pythagorus once traveled to these places to study mathematics and when he got back he put mathematics into metaphysical issues, not practical issue, as what the other places did. Three issues were concerned in natural philosophy: reality, change, and epistemology. Socrates(died in 399 BC) represents a shift from cosmological concerns to political and ethical concerns. Epicurus (341-270) and Stoic's idea that natural philosophy is the tool of pursuing happiness. Plato (427-348/47). His cosmology, his form and material. Aristotle (born in 384). His form and material, his idea about soul, his eternal heaven, his four courses, his idea about experiment, his biology, his idea about motion, his solution to change, his structure of cosmos and the fifth element-aether. Four schools were set up in Greece-Academy, Lyceum, Stoa, Epicurus. No fee for everyone. Libraries were built. The first museum was set up in Alexandria by Ptolemy's invitation of someone from Lyceum, and was public and royal patronized. Lyceum's library contained not only Aristotle's books but also the books of the leaders of Lyceum after Aristotle. Their works were based on Aristotle's and had some variations and extension. At about 300 BC, Rome (not within Alexandra's territory) had gradually become a strong empire. After the Second Macedonian War (200-197) Rome intervened in Greece. Rome took charge of politics and military, but the intellectual world left to Greece. Roman leisure class began to appreciate Greek intellectual work. Lyceum library 遭遇变故 and most of the books were shipped to Rome. There was no language barrier for the Roman to read in Greek because at Alexandra's time, the communication was very common. Also traveling was very frequent and convenient. Greek scholars traveled to Rome or slaved to Rome. And the Roman went to Greek to study. But the Roman seemed to focus more on practical science, such as medicine, logic and rhetoric, ethics in Epicurean and Stoic philosophy. Many commentators and encyclopedias showed up, such as Pliny (23-79). At the of the 2nd AD, decline of Rome. The split of West Latin and East Greece. Some people did translation from Greek to Latin in order to preserve the Greek intellectual work in Latin world, such as Boethius. In the West, Christianity became stronger and finally the state religion. Due to the decline of the empire, the schools also shrank. Thanks to the Christian. They made use of some part of Greek intellectual to support the Bible. Logic, and Platonic philosophy were helpful tools (St. Augustine's view). But the Christian was still using the existing education system in Rome though it was declining because there was no alternative way of education. Thus other parts of natural philosophy and Aristotelian philosophy were also there and the Christian though disliked them, still could not escape them. Then monasticism emerged at 4th AD as an alternative way of education, aimed for educating the monks. It didn't externalize itself but still became one main education tool. For people at that time, if he was interested with intellectual work, he would then go to the monastery. Monasteries preserved and transmitted the classical tradition. After the West-East split of the great Rome empire, the East formed a Byzantine empire. And it was more stable than the West Latin. The Byzantine Christian was divided to two factions because of the debate on Jesus' humanity and divinity. One faction was forced to move to another safer place—Syria, where they set up church education, and thus spread the classical tradition to Syria. This was the eastward diffusion of the Greek heritage into Asia. At Syria, works were translated between Greek and Syria. In the Arabic peninsula, Christianity at first thrived but latter the influence diminished to a modest level. Muhammad was born about 570 and he preached the new religion there called Islam, and formed Koran. After the death of Muhammad, the 政权was handed to a Syrian. Thus, through Syria, the Islamic world (including Spain) got in tough with the Greek intellectual work. There were some famous translators, such as Hunayn, who was bilingual in Arabic and Syriac. Medicine, mathematics, astronomy, logic, [*] were the first things to be translated (The beginning of the translation was at 8th and the crest of translation was at 9th ). But the Islam religion was not as Christian in that the Islamic saw the Koran as the divine science while the Greek science as the foreign science. They did not cooperate them as well as the Christian did, though the latter made science the handmaiden. Koran did not need logic (Bible, trinity needs logic). Even so, they made contribution to mathematical astronomy (Arabic maths was a direct descendent of Greek and Indian maths.). Islamic science lasted as long to the 14th mainly because their religion narrowed down the utility range and left little things to study in science. Then go again to the Western side, at the end of the 8th, Charlemagne enlarged his kingdom to include the Western Europe. And due to the low level of clerical literacy, clerical education was also at its renewal. The set up of schools, and the revival of classical tradition. And Spain became the center of translation among Greek, Latin, and Arabic. And at about 1003 Western Europe was then at its renewal of politics, economics, and became prosperous. The booming of population and the urbanization, plus the huge amount of translation works led to the emergence of universities with high mobility and uniform curriculum. Science began to be more powerful and people tended to put reason into every practice, such as administration. Thus the faith-reason (mainly Aristotelian) debate. Roger Bacon, Thomas Aquinas (1224-74). They tried to Aristotelianize Christianity. And then in Paris, there was a condemnation in 1277. Aristotelian science began to shake, and gave way to an alternative science.