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Scientific Revolution—Before and After

|Before Scientific Revolution |After Scientific Revolution |

|Geocentric Cosmic Picture |Heliocentric Solar System |

|Celestial and Terrestrial Bodies/Matter Sharply Distinguished |All matter is subject to the same fundamental set of laws |

|Terrestrial beings are primarily knowable in terms of their |All physical beings and how they function are knowable (ultimately) in|

|Qualitative features |terms of mathematics, i.e., Quantitative Relationships. The Bk of |

| |Nature is written in mathematical characters (Galileo). |

|All beings, including natural ones, have internal purposes (final |Either we cannot know the final causes of natural beings (Des-cartes) |

|causes). |or it makes no sense to attribute purposes to non-thinking natural |

| |beings (Hobbes, Spinoza) |

|All of nondivine reality points upward to the Good/God/Unmoved Mover |God may be understood as a divine mechanic, creating and sustaining a |

| |perfectly functioning natural machine. |

|Multiple levels of being |Diverse views, but two of the most influential are |

| |Cartesian dualism (tri-alism if you count God) and materialism (all is|

| |body) |

|Non-reductionistic. Does not deny differences but rank-orders them. |Reductionistic: Tendency to explain wholes entirely in terms of parts.|

| |Atomism in physics, individualism in political theory. |

30 April 2011

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