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HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE.

REVISION
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY
✓ Philosophy
o Is thinking.
o Is critical thinking.
o Is deep thinking.
o Is the act of thinking
o Is the desire to acquire knowledge
o Is the acquisition of knowledge in order to act right
✓ Philosophy derives from the Greek words “Philo” and “Sophia” which are interpreted as
love for wisdom.
o Man, here is seen involved in seeking for knowledge in order to solve problems
encountered in his day to day living.
o This definition derives from etymology.
✓ Philosophy is the theoretical
o Vision
o Mirror
o Illuminant
o road map
o signpost
that guides a person’s actions.
✓ Philosophy
o the guiding principle that propels every man into action, no matter his field of study
or religion.
o that which motivates a person to ask pertinent questions about life with the intent
to discover the way forward.
o the rigorous rational inquiry into the nature and meaning of reality.
o Is thought after thought or a second order course as it ventures beyond the limit of
other disciplines.
✓ While other subjects are after the “how, where, what, who and when philosophy proceeds
to ask ‘why”.

✓ Conceptions of philosophy
o Etymological Conception:
▪ The oldest and the broadest concept of philosophy is derived from the
etymological analysis of the term
 ▪ Term means love of wisdom or the pursuit of eternal truths.
▪ This conception of philosophy is credited to the Greek Mystic, Philosopher
and Mathematician Pythagoras.
▪ Philosophy, in this sense, is seen as a universal science, which proposes to
provide a true and reasonable explanation of the whole of reality through its
ultimate principles.
• This was the meaning given to philosophy during the ancient,
medieval and modern period of Western philosophy.
• For instance, during ancient period of Greek philosophy, Aristotle
held that philosophy and science meant the same thing.
▪ In more recent times, most philosophers are no longer concerned with the
formulation of complete systems of thought about the whole reality.
▪ They are interested in clarifying and analysing the concepts, theories and
presuppositions of other disciplines.
▪ Philosophy is now seen as a second-order discipline concerned primarily
with helping other disciplines to resolve their conceptual and linguistic
problems.
o The Positivist Conception:
▪ The positivists represented by Bertrand Russell and members of the Vienna
Circle
▪ conceive of philosophy as a collective term for any knowledge claim that is
yet to be empirically verified or confirmed.
▪ This conception has been criticized for its anti metaphysical stance.
o The Existentialist Conception:
▪ According to the existentialist philosophers, the concern of philosophy
transcends normal human reason or mere intellectual activity alone, the
human will and the fantasy also come into play
o The Linguistic Conception:
▪ This is also called the analytic conception of philosophy.
▪ Here analysis of the language of philosophy and other disciplines is seen as
the main business of philosophy.
o The Kantian Conception:
▪ Philosophy studies the nature, sources, and conditions necessary for the
acquisition, scope and limits of human knowledge.
▪ This conception is obviously inadequate because it limits philosophy to the
theory of knowledge or epistemology.
o The Valuational Conception:
▪ Philosophy studies values, that is, it is concerned with what ought to be’, not
‘what is’.
▪ To put it in another way, the philosopher is concerned with values and not
facts, though he might wish to know the meaning of the word “fact” and the
status of factual knowledge.
o The Metaphysical Conception:
▪ Philosophy is concerned with ultimate realities such as God, Mind, Soul,
Spirit, Matter, and so on.
 ▪ It deals with general or fundamental issues that defy scientific verification
such as
• Does God exist?
• What is the relationship between mind and body?
• What is the Soul?
• Which is primary: Spirit or Matter?
o The Logical Conception:
▪ Philosophy is the science of correct reasoning.
▪ Philosophy formulates principles or rules for separating correct reasoning
from incorrect reasoning
o The Scientific Conception:
▪ Philosophy is concerned with the nature of arid claims about scientific
knowledge and the analysis of scientific concepts to make their usage clear.
✓ It must be mentioned that the various conceptions outlined above are associated with the
different objects of philosophy and hence the different branches of philosophy. We have
also seen that philosophy goes after general as opposed to specific questions. “Where the
individual disciplines stop their inquiry, philosophy questions further. For instance, where
the other disciplines formulate laws, philosophy asks, what are laws? Where they claim
knowledge, philosophy asks, what is knowledge” (Bochenski21).

MAIN BRANCHES OF PHILOSOPHY

✓ Metaphysics:
o Means beyond the physical and nature; moves into the supernatural
o the study of reality that is out of reach of the senses.
o The Greek word “meta” means beyond or after while physics is interpreted
physical.
o It is the title that Andronicus gave a collection of Aristotle’s essays
o Parmenides (father)
✓ EPISTEMOLOGY
o Episteme means knowledge
o Branch that focuses on the physical in the acquisition of knowledge
o Is the arm of philosophy that accepts man as the epitome of physical creation.
o It accepts only knowledge derived from nature by man through natural
endowments in man. (intellect, the five senses.)
o epistemology has two schools –
▪ Rationalism
• a tool that upholds reasoning as a source of objective knowledge
(apriori)
• Is the school that insists that nature can be studied objectively
through reasoning only.
• The senses of man proffer limited knowledge they insist.
• Mathematics, Physics and other related subjects fall into this school.
• Rene Descartes Cogito ergo sum – I think therefore I am
▪ Empiricism:
 • The tool that upholds man’s five senses as the true source of
information
• insists that adequate knowledge is filtered from nature through the
five senses of man.
• Ideas are the raw data of experience
• Knowledge gotten through sensation and reflection
• Example of empiricists include Aristotle (father) and Locke.
✓ LOGIC
o The branch that talks about validity
o It is concerned with the formation of laws and principles the guides our search for
true knowledge
o Is the study of valid correct reasoning.
o It exposes fallacies.
o Is the mathematical aspect of philosophy.
o It is the systematic study of facts.
o It is concerned with orderliness and precision.
o It is against wastefulness and approves man being concise, accurate and straight to
the point in writing and speech.
o Makes use of symbols in expression and writing.
✓ ETHICS
o The branch that studies morality
o Morality is concerned with the concepts of good and evill
o Makes use of concepts like ego, altruism, relativism
o It inquiries into actions that “are” against those that “ought to be”.
o Holds the view that there are actions that are universally accepted as good.
o Normative ethics
▪ Good desirable to aim
▪ Norms and standards of human behaviour
o Meta ethics
▪ Meaning of ethical terms
o Descriptive ethics
▪ Moral views of society; universal
▪ Nature of morality
▪ Different expressions and opinions of morality

METHODS OF KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION

✓ The Socratic method:

o is also known as the dialectic method.
o It postulates that man is embedded with innate knowledge
o Socrates is convinced all men know the good as against the evil, right from wrong.
o Due to carelessness and impatience, laziness and ignorance, man falls into error.
o His instruction is “man, know thyself”, dig deep into yourself, think deep and do
the right
o His style “draws out, pulls out or leads out” what is innate in man.
 o Objective
✓ DEDUCTION
o Aristotle is a main proponent insisting that at birth man’s mind is empty of any
knowledge.
o Method that emphasis the past general experiences of men as a pointer to what a
man should experience in future
o It is drawing a particular conclusion based on general evidence
o We move from general principles and begin to come to specific conclusion
✓ INDUCTION
o It moves from particular experiences to general conclusion
o Knowledge is acquired through immediate environment
o Takes cognizance of particular experiences of different men at various places and
draws conclusion.
✓ Existential:
o There is a human (subjective) aspect in the acquisition of knowledge
o Is the view that man the thinker is acquainted with a truth, convinced of its
authenticity before declaring it as truth.
o Man is the source of objective truth declares existentialism.
o Some existentialists include
▪ Kierkegaard (father)
▪ Sartre
▪ Camus.
o Existence before essence
o Truth is subjective
o Scientific truth not more important than subjective truth
✓ Analytic:
o Emphasises the expression, the clarity of terms we use to attempt to communicate
with others
o is that which stresses the clarification of terms used in expressing philosophical
statements.
o Ludwig Wittgenstein
✓ PHENOMENOLOGICAL METHOD
o Everything we gather through our senses are knowledge but that is not the only way
to get knowledge
o Search for the core of a thing. The function of a thing is the true knowledge
o Is the opposite of existentialist method.
o It strives to present an objective concept of knowledge by eliminating the subjective
aspect of man.
o To arrive at true knowledge man must target the essence of the thing, (reality in
itself), be rid of previous knowledge about it.

COMMON CONCEPTS
✓ Concept is applicable to the ideas or principles that guide thoughts and actions of people in
a given society
✓ According to the Cambridge International Dictionary of English a concept is an idea or
principle that is applied in a particular field of study
✓ A concept is applicable to the ideas or principles that guide the actions of the people in a
given society.

✓ Apriorism:
o is associated to rationalism, that true knowledge is that which is achieved through
reasoning.
✓ A posteriori:
o is the opposite of Apriori.
o It is knowledge derived through experience of the empirical school of thought.
✓ SCEPTICISM
o Is the philosophical opinion that it is not possible for man to acquire knowledge.
o It is not possible to know anything and if one thinks he knows something, it is not
possible to pass on such knowledge to another.
o Glorifies everything about doubting
o It maintains the idea that it is not possible for a thing to be known
o Scepticism insists that it is impossible for such knowledge to be transferred to
another
o Pyrrho father of scepticism
o Solipsism
▪ Only myself, thought and ideas exist
▪ Fact that man is a social animal disproves this
✓ Idealism:
o the school of thought that holds that reality is in the world of ideas,
o reality is made up of ideas and can be captured by the mind ONLY
o all in the physical world are appearances or copies of the ideal, the real.
o Not complete knowledge you get from the senses, but from the mind. The mind is
superior to the experiences of man (I’m guessing in relation to the senses)
o Metaphysical
o Plato the father
o Only mind and ideas exist
✓ Realism:
o The school of thought that man’s perspective of the world is all there’s in the world
o The physical world is experienced by man – no hidden meaning, no coded
expression
o is the school that holds that what the five senses and reasoning see in nature is
reality.
o The five senses and intellect are adequate for knowledge acquisition.
o Mind independent existence
o Aristotle the father
o Transcendental realism – things exist in the world of forms - Plato
✓ Relativism:
o The school that maintains that there is no absolute standard that can be used to
judge an action, opinion or position
 o There is always a viewpoint
▪ Perspectives determine opinions the relativist says.
o the view that there is no objective truth, it all depends on the viewpoint of the
person involved.
✓ DUALISM
o School of thought that reality is made up of two entities: Physical and supernatural
o Is the school that holds that there are two types of substances in the world – mind
and body, spirit and matter.
o Rene Descartes – body and mind
o Pythagoras
✓ Monism:
o The metaphysical impression that everything in the world emanates from just one
source or thing
o is the view that reality is one – all things originated from a source and at death
returns there.
o i.e., Thales
✓ Pluralism:
o The metaphysical theory that reality is made of many substances
o There are many sources
o the point of view that reality is many sided, it manifests in various forms.
✓ PANTHEISM
o Everything from the physical world came to life through a supernatural source
o the opinion that God is in nature expressing himself in all ways and avenues.
o is the school of thought that nature and the physical world is an expression of God.
o God is responsible for all events taking place in nature.
o i.e., Spinoza
✓ deism
o God created the world as a huge clock; functioning
o Withdrew not involved
✓ Theism
o The concept that God is responsible for the existence of the world and He is
consciously and unconsciously making it work
✓ Atheism
o Opposite of theism
o The concept that God doesn’t exist neither is He involved in the events taking place
o Atheists think that the creation of the earth can be explained through physical
process only
✓ Pragmatism:
o the school that sees any theory that has practical relevance as good.
o Ability to serve desired purpose
o Ability to be put to practical use
o If it works it is good, if it does not work it is bad
✓ Determinism:
o The viewpoint that man should not be held responsible for the outcome of his life as
he is not in control of his life
 o the school which insists that man is not free, whatever has been programmed to
happen will happen, no matter what I do.
✓ FREEWILLISM
o Is the opposite of determinism.
o It is man at liberty to choose and do as he pleases.
✓ Egoism:
o The philosophical school that recognises selfishness and self-centredness as inherent
in man
o He evaluates his actions as good when beneficial to him, even if it does not favour
the majority or others
o is the selfish, self –centred action that is approved as a good.
o It may not favour others or the majority.
✓ Altruism:
o When an action is defined as good as long as it is beneficial to others or the majority
first of all
o It is a life of sacrifice
o when an action is to the benefit of others (sometimes not the benefit of the one
recommending it) and it is said to be a good action.
✓ Fideism
o the school that holds that though it may not have been proven that God exists, it is
more profitable to believe in him than not to.
✓ Freewilism
o The opposite of determinism
o It is a school of thought that man has will that he exercises as he chooses
o He is liable for the outcome of his choices
o He may have been created without his consent but he free to do with his life as he
deems fit.
✓ Utilitarianism
o Greater good for the greater number
o Ethical theory
o The morality of an act consists in its utility to serve as a means to an end
✓ Anarchism
o Every form of political authority should be abolished
o Man taken to be rational; should have free will
✓ Nihilism
o Social and political structures should be destroyed even if there is nothing better to
take its place
✓ Fidelism
o Things may not exist in certainty; there is sufficient evidence to believe in it
o Immanual Kant

History of Philosophy – Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance eras.

Segments of History of Philosophy
✓ Ancient philosophy
✓ Medieval philosophy
✓ Renaissance philosophy
✓ Modern
✓ Contemporary

✓ ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY
o Is a departure from mysticism(becoming one with God) to nature.
o Understood nature as monistic.
o Was concerned with cosmology, what the world is made off, what is the primary
and ultimate stuff that comprises creation.
o There appears to be changes but there also appears to be no change – things remain
constant it seems.
✓ MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY (11TH – 15TH C.)
o Ruled by the church or Muslims
o Characterized by theologians
▪ St. Augustine
▪ St. Aquinas
▪ St. Bonaventure
▪ Islamic scholar Avicenna
▪ Latin W. Ockham
▪ Jewish Ben Gerson, etc.
o Interpreted philosophy to justify religious proclamations.
o Proves for the existence of God, origin of evil were major concerns.
o Reasoning and faith go together
▪ Philosophy and theology were merged together.
✓ Modern Philosophy
o Is an offshoot of epistemology
▪ comprising of empiricism and rationalism.
▪ Is situated in epistemology
o Is an extension the scientific feats reached during the 2nd World War such as:
▪ trade
▪ economic boom
o Renewed opposition between the Church and thinkers.
▪ tenacious grip on the heliocentric theory against geocentric theory
▪ Knox and other church members questioning policies not to the advantage
of man, etc.
o Is focused on the physical, nature.
o Is the struggle for superiority and objectivity between rationalism and empiricism.
✓ CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY.
o This is the period when western philosophy changed content from concentrating on
holistic world views to particular, topical issues.
o Thinkers in this period desired philosophical speculations that would centre on man.
o They desired a philosophy that would be relevant in the house, office, social circles,
political spheres, economical arena and other spheres of life.
 o The period is characterized by names such as
▪ Schlick
▪ Moore
▪ Popper
▪ Kuhn
▪ Peirce
▪ Dewey
▪ James
▪ Kierkegaard among others.
o Almost all the contemporary philosophers were
▪ Rationalists
▪ Mathematicians
▪ empiricists
▪ and scientists.
o They were avowed antagonists to metaphysics and religion.
▪ Most of the contemporary thinkers
• were scientists
• abhorred metaphysics
• saw no use for ethics
• emphasized the use of mathematics, logic and clarity of language
used

1. WHAT IS SCIENCE
✓ HISTORY
o Collins English Dictionary
▪ Word of past events
o The study of the past in its preserved form
o Merriam-Webster
▪ The interpretation of past events in their sequences
o Study of preserved past
✓ SCIENCE
o The study of nature through its behaviour and characteristics
▪ i.e., cold, hot, night, day, wet, dry
o depends on experience, observation, experimentation leading to conclusion
o targets objective knowledge
o utilizes natural laws to interpret nature
o concise, systematic, accurate
o makes use of five senses and reasoning of man
o no baseless speculation
o knowledge arranged in an organized or orderly manner, especially knowledge
derived from experience, observation and experimentation.
o often claimed that scientific knowledge is proven knowledge.
o Science is based on what we can see, touch, taste, hear and smell.
o Personal opinions, prejudices or preferences, superstitions and speculative
imaginings have no place in science.
 o science is systematic and comprehensive.

o Science is a theoretical explanatory discipline which objectively addresses natural

phenomena within the general constraint that
▪ its theories must be rationally connectable to generally specifiable empirical
phenomena and that
▪ it normally does not leave the natural realm for the concepts employed in its
explanations” (Ratzsch)

✓ GST 311 is anchored mainly on 4 main branches

o Metaphysics (supernatural)
o Epistemology
o Logic
o Ethic
✓ Methodology of Science
o involves various elements such as
▪ observational procedures
▪ patterns of arguments
▪ methods of representation and calculations
▪ the evaluation of the grounds of their validity from the points of view of
formal logic, practical methodology and metaphysics.
o The general procedure generally held to be successful involves five major steps
namely;
▪ Problem Formulation/ Inquisitive: ask questions
▪ Design and Planning of Research/ Formulation of Hypothesises: likely
process of phenomenon on ground
▪ Data collection
▪ Data analysis: involves testing the collected data through actual
experimentations.
▪ Engages implementation
✓ Proven consistency of hypothesis promotes a law
✓ Proven consistency of law changes its status to a theory
✓ Inconsistent theory gives rise to a new hypothesis

✓ TYPES OF SCIENCES
o Theoretical science: that which is concerned with theoretical processes and
principles mainly comprising of
▪ Real science:
• Empirical
• achieves its results through experience, observation and testing of
fact
• within real science are
o the natural sciences
o the social sciences
o the cultural sciences
 • the empirical, the objective and the rational are central to real
science
▪ Formal science:
• abstract/ logic based
• achieves its result through logical reasoning.
• formal science includes
o mathematics
o structural science
o formal logic.
o Applied science: concerned with man
o False/ Pseudo science: creation of the theoretical and applied scientists

✓ Not all disciplines are sciences.

o For instance, engineering is a discipline, yet not a science in the strict sense of the
word.
o engineering is an applied discipline
o the sciences are basically theoretical disciplines dealing essentially with theoretical
processes and principles.

✓ PHILOSOPHY
o Pythagoras sees it as the pursuit of constant, eternal, objective truth
o The search for universal, eternal truth derived through experience in explaining true
and reasonable reality
✓ PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
o The analysis classification in depth reflection of postulation, hypothesis, laws,
environment, …
o Focuses on the what, where, when, how as well as why of scientific findings (the is
and ought)
o Philosophy of science as a separate branch of philosophy is a relatively new
development.
o Before its emergence as a distinct branch of philosophy, philosophy of science was
treated as part of epistemology or the theory of knowledge.
o Philosophy of science is said to have originated from the great debate between
proponents of two epistemological systems in Europe
▪ rationalism
▪ empiricism.
o Rationalists held that reason was the principal source of human knowledge such as
▪ Rene Descartes
▪ Baruch Spinoza
▪ Goltfried Wilhelm Von Leibniz
o Empiricists held that sense experience was the principal source of human knowledge
such as
▪ John Locke,
▪ David Hume
▪ Bishop George Berkeley.
o Immanuel Kant’s attempt to resolve the conflict between the two epistemological
schools (rationalism and empiricism) led him to develop his famous ‘critical
philosophy’.
▪ Kant maintained that the way to critical philosophy was to ask: What and
how much can understanding and reason know apart from sense
experience?
▪ To answer this question, Kant said that though all knowledge begins with
experience (posteriori knowledge), not all knowledge arises out of
experience, (a priori knowledge)
▪ though all our knowledge, consists of a series of impressions derived from
the senses (empiricism), yet we obviously possess a kind of knowledge,
which does not arise from experience (rationalism) even though it begins
with experience.
o Thus, for Kant, there are two sources of knowledge
▪ sensibility
▪ understanding.
o Kant distinguished between
▪ phenomenal reality
• refers to the world as we experience it
• phenomenal reality is the object of scientific investigation
• phenomenal realm supplies us with knowledge of reality external to
us
• increases our knowledge
▪ noumenal reality
• refers to intelligible, nonsensual reality
• noumenal reality is associated with philosophy
• the noumenal realm helps us to organize the raw materials
presented to us by our senses
• reminds us of the limits of our knowledge.
• helps us to tackle the problems that arise from the phenomenal
reality
o With Kant, there was a formal separation between science and philosophy.
▪ Kant maintained that, rather than being opposed to one another, both
realms (phenomena and noumenal) complement one another.

o Standards/ criteria by which scientific knowledge is regulated

▪ Inter-subjectivity or objectivity:
• the scientific enterprise is social in nature
• science is free from personal and cultural bias.
• The objectivity of science is therefore based on the fact that pure or
naked facts form the basis of scientific discoveries and theories.
• The criterion of inter- subjective testability thus differentiates the
scientific from the non-scientific activities
▪ Precision, Specificity and Definiteness:
• science deals with specific or particular observable or identifiable
objects of this world, not some abstract entities
 • This is partly why the empirical sciences are sometimes called 'exact'
science.
▪ Reliability:
• This criterion enables us to differentiate between mere opinion and
knowledge
• opinion is unsubstantiated, knowledge is well substantiated.
▪ Coherence or Systematicity:
• It is in this sense that some have regarded science as organized
common sense.
• In other words, the common methods which the scientist employs
are the same as the ones employed by ordinary person and these
include induction and deduction
• Science seeks not a mere collection of miscellaneous information,
but a well-connected account of the facts.
▪ Comprehensiveness:
• Scientific knowledge differs from common-sense knowledge by its
comprehensiveness or scope of knowledge.
o These criteria are the characteristics of pure (empirical) science.
o The applied sciences (medicine, technologies, etc.) have their different aims
including
▪ practical control
▪ production
▪ guidance
▪ therapy
▪ reform.

✓ Similarity between Philosophy and Science

o Like science, philosophy is not spontaneous knowledge, belief or historical
knowledge
o Both philosophy and science are based on personal understanding and not on the
authority of another.
o Both deal with certitude because they are capable of providing the reason why a
thing is what it is
o Philosophy and science are similar in their basic aim, which is to understand the
world and use this for man's benefits.
▪ The difference between the two is just a matter of degree.
▪ Philosophizing is a higher level of abstraction
▪ Mathematics ranks higher than the empirical sciences on the level of mental
abstraction, while metaphysics ranks above both mathematics and the
physical sciences.
o Both disciplines try to understand the world through reflective thinking.
▪ They are interested in organized and systematized knowledge.
o Both disciplines complement one another in that where one stops, the other begins.
▪ science provides the raw material (factual information) upon which
philosophy is built.
▪ philosophy of any age is a reflection of the science of that age.
 ▪ Science balances philosophy by helping it to get rid of unscientific ideas.
▪ Uzoma: “philosophy and science complement, support and clarify each
other on the condition that both hold strongly to things and respect each
other”
✓ Differences between Philosophy and Science
o The types of questions which engage the attention of philosophers are different
from those of scientists.
▪ While the philosopher is concerned with a priori questions, the scientist is
interested in empirical investigation of phenomena.
▪ The physicist, for example, sets up experiments in order to test his
hypothesis
▪ The philosopher has no need of experiments in order to determine the
validity of his knowledge claims.
• He relies only on rational argument, reflection and logical analysis.
• Although he may be interested in examining the empirical data of
the sciences, he needs to move beyond the concrete world of
experience if a question regarding the status of knowledge is to be
satisfactorily answered
o The particular sciences deal with limited fields, while philosophy deals with the
whole of experience.
▪ Science is thus exclusive while philosophy is inclusive.
▪ Philosophy is inclusive because it attempts to include in its corpus what is
common to all field and human experience as a whole.
▪ Philosophy is therefore more comprehensive than science.
o Whereas the particular sciences are more analytic and descriptive in their approach,
philosophy is more synthetic or synoptic, dealing with nature or life as a whole.
▪ Science is more interested in analysing the whole into parts, whereas
philosophy attempts to give an interpretative synthesis of things.
o In pursing objectivity, science tends to ignore personal factors and value judgments,
whereas philosophy is interested in all realms of experience.
o Science aims at observing and controlling processes, whereas philosophy aims at
criticizing, evaluating and coordinating ends.
o Areas which are considered 'no go areas' by science are interesting areas of study to
the philosopher.
o Whereas scientific method is essentially experimental, putting hypothesis or theory
to test in terms specific empirical consequences, the philosopher sees experiments
as impracticable in view of the general nature of the problems he raises.
o Whereas the scientist is interested in the particular good for man, the philosopher is
interested in the ultimate good (the summum bonum)

✓ Philosophy's Interest in Science

o Conceptual Analysis:
▪ the attempt to define concepts or clarify problem areas in a way that would
make them amenable to scientific study.
o Examination of Basic Assumptions
▪ concerning the nature of reality which underlie science.
o Synthesis
 ▪ the attempt to fuse the various findings of the various sciences into one
consistent view of reality
o General issues such as
▪ the relation of science to the humanities
▪ the epistemology status of theoretically postulated entities,
▪ the validity of probable inference
▪ the nature of
• space and time
• causality
• organic life
▪ the morality of
• induced abortion
• in-vitro fertilization
• euthanasia
• environmental management and sustenance
▪ the mass production of armaments
▪ the limitations of science as a genuine source of knowledge

2. HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

✓ TIME PERIODS
o Ancient philosophy – 6TH -
o Medieval philosophy
o Renaissance philosophy – 14TH – 17TH
o Modern
o Contemporary

HISTORY OF PRE-ANCIENT SCIENCE.

✓ Science and technology have been in society in every era (through craft or scholarship)
✓ Rational scholarship is an advancement and improvement on spiritual prowess and
craftsmanship.
✓ Philosophy delved into both theoretical and practical thought processes – intellectually.
✓ Two primary sources as the historical roots of science
o the technical tradition perpetuated by the artisans
o the spiritual tradition perpetuated by the priests and the scribes.
✓ These two traditions continued for a long time until the philosophers broke off from the
priests and the scribes

HISTORY OF ANCIENT SCIENCE.

✓ As with philosophy, the beginning of science is traced to Greece in the 6th century.
✓ Natural occurrences were explained from natural processes as observed or speculated.
o i.e., what reality is, transportation, accommodation, planting season, conception,
ageing, medicine, origin of the universe, rains
✓ CHARACTERISTICS OF ANCIENT SCIENCE.
o Systematic reasoning: Treated all subjects and concerns rationally.
 oNo scientific tools, nor procedures except experience and observation.
▪ No laboratories, test tubes, base, acid
o Deductive method: the available and proven method of knowledge acquisition.
▪ From the pre-Socratic period of philosophy to the early part of the 17lh
century A.D/ the process of philosophy was deductive.
▪ deductive method: start with a general conception and rationalize the
particulars to fit in and support the pattern decided
▪ Karl Popper calls the hypothetico-deductive method.
▪ Popper believes that this method is the basic foundation of science
✓ ANCIENT SCIENTISTS
o Socrates
o Aristotle
o Plato
o Thales
o Anaximander
o Heraclitus
o Parmenides
o Pythagoras
o Zeno,
o They speculated on
▪ Reality
▪ Politics
▪ Economics
▪ acquisition of properties
▪ education
▪ ethics
▪ stars
▪ moon
▪ sun
▪ law
▪ medicine, etc

✓ ANCIENT GREECE & SCIENCE.

o The development of science in the Western world is often traced to ancient Greece
said to have begun about the 6"' century B.C
o they began to explain the natural in terms of the natural rather than explain the
natural in terms of the supernatural
o the conscious study and attempted analytical application of science started in
ancient Greece some 3000 years ago

o The age of mythology: preceded the age of actual philosophical and scientific
speculations
o 8th – 5th B.C. centuries: Mythological explanations were given for
▪ mystery about the origin of the earth
▪ source of children
▪ reason for rain
▪ harvest
 o During the age of mythology all happenings in the natural world were attributed to
the behaviour of gods.
o Homel and Hesiod poems represented the spirit of the mythological age.
o Dampier said of the Greek religion
▪ “it...was to interpret nature and its processes in terms which could be
understood to make man feel at home in the world
o Hesiod summarized the spirit of the age
▪ “There is no way to escape the will of Zeus”
o Thales:
▪ the 1st to question the validity of gods making things to happen in nature.

✓ THALES: MILESIAN SCIENCE.

o Thales the representative
o Father of western philosophy
▪ the 1st to question the validity of gods making things to happen in nature.
o born around 624 B.C.
o lived in Miletus, a port city in Ionia on the coast of Asia Minor. {Ionian Greece}

o accurately predicted a bumper harvest of crop of olives, having observed the stars.
o Successfully interpreted the movement of the stars and predicted an eclipse which
took place in 585 B.C.
o Successfully solved the crossing of a river (Halys River) with a dam.
o Postulated that Earth is flat like a disc that floats on water
o THALES THE SCIENTIST.
▪ Divided months into 30 days; year 365 days
• Thales introduced a calendar according to the Egyptian model (in
which the year consisted of 365 days, was divided into 12 months of
30 days, and five days
▪ His invention helped in measuring the distance of a ship at sea from the
shore.
▪ Invented an instrument for the measuring the height of a pyramid.
• Way of measuring Egyptian pyramids using shadow, time of day
▪ He discovered the instrument used for determining the North pole
• he discovered the constellation little Bear which could be used for
determining the direction of the north by sailors
▪ He postulated that water is the ultimate source and essence of all things.
• Water is the common that is present in everything in nature
• It exists in three distinct forms: gaseous, liquid and solid but is
ultimately same substance.

✓ THE PYTHAGOREAN SCHOOL

o Pythagoras of Samos, born about 530 B.C
o Pythagoras differed greatly from the Milesians: he blended philosophy, science and
mysticism into one cup of knowledge
o Pythagoras: Position of dualism

o PYTHAGORAS THE SCIENTIST.

 ▪ Philosophized on music
• length of string of an instrument affects the sound produced
▪ All things in nature is a finite number, an aspect of the infinite world.
• He said everything in this world is a finite aspect from the infinite
• Nature is made up of two infinite groups
• The universe is infinite while particulars are finite expression of the
whole.
▪ He tagged all things as numbers; talked about lines and points
• One is dot
• Two is line
• Three is surface
• Four is solid
▪ Arithmetic developed from the theory of numbers.
▪ Making numerical expressions meaningful. (speed, distance, weight, short,
tall, even, odd)
▪ Pythagoras is credited with deducing the proof for the geometrical theorem
that the square of the hypotenuse of a right- angled triangle is equal to the
sum of the squares on the other two sides.

✓ DEMOCRITUS OF ABDERA: ATOMISM

o combined monism and dualism: postulated pluralism.

o The whole of nature made up of atoms

▪ The word ‘Atom’ is derived from the Greek word ‘atome’, which means
‘uncut’
▪ ‘a’ means ‘un’ ' and ‘tom’ means cut
o Atoms is the smallest unit of matter which is infinite, indestructible, always in
motion
▪ if a piece of matter were to be divided continually, a point would be reached
where further division is impossible
o When this atom has worn out, the person is dead
o Reality has a core that cannot be destroyed.
o Atomism postulated the theory of creation and extinction.
o Postulated the impossibility of a vacuum.
o it combined logic with evidence
o Other Atomists
▪ Gassendi, the first of the modem atomists
▪ Epicurus
▪ Newton
▪ John Dalton
o NATURE OF ATOMS
▪ All things in nature are atoms bonded together.
▪ Atoms are in constant motion, indestructible, various sizes, different shapes,
indivisible, eternal.
✓ OTHER EARLY SCIENTISTS
o Anaximander
▪ Speculated that everything that is present is complex, an infinite thing
▪ postulated the primary stuff in existence as uncommon, enduring,
boundless, infinite and neutral (the Aperion) (the indeterminable
boundless).
▪ For him, the eternal motion of this substance (the Aperion) brought the
various specific elements in the world into existence through the process of
‘separating off’.
▪ Disagreed with Thales
▪ He says it is not water.
▪ But speculated that all life originated from water (evolutionary view)
▪ Anaximander postulated that the world is cylindrical in shape and drew a
map.
o Anaximenes [585-528 BXT]
▪ of family tie with Thales and Anaximander, rejected theirs and postulated
that the primary/ultimate stuff in creation is air.
▪ Without air, we cannot breathe. Anything that dies becomes air again and
circulate
▪ The earth is round he said like a round table and air encompasses
everything.
▪ First to hit upon of refraction and condensation as the specific forms of
motion, which lead to describable changes in air
o Heraclitus of Ephesus
▪ He said that there is a diversity or dualism and not a monism
▪ Primary element is fire
▪ hypothesized that fire is the primary source of all things and at death all
things return to fire in one form or another.
▪ He says nature is in constant change, it is ephemeral.
• Constant ordered change in motion – (unity in diversity).
▪ Things are always in a flow; nothing is static
▪ The constant thing in life is change
o Empedocles:
▪ took interest in studying human anatomy.
▪ First to pose natural selection: Paid attention to evolution and natural
selection.
▪ Contemporary optometry is a follow up of his postulations on the workings
of the eye.
• formulated a consistent theory of the eye and the mechanism of
visual sensation.
▪ He postulated on the source of the moon.
• maintained that the moon was formed as a result of air
condensation.
▪ He speculated on the speed of light.
▪ Love and hate: forces that operate the universe
o PLATO/ ARISTOTLE THE SCIENTISTS.
▪ Theorized on
• Mathematics
• Physics
• parts of animals
• biology
• theory of causality…
▪ PLATO
• He was a student of Socrates, being prepared for politics, wrote all
that is credited to the latter.
• He changed from politics to be a tutor and established the first
European university
• He postulated the popular “Philosopher King” theory.
• Plato is regarded as the earliest philosopher who was a
propagandist for mathematics.
• His approach, to the subject was basically theoretical.
• His moral philosophy holds happiness as the ultimate of human life.
• To be happy, man must live a virtuous life.
• True and objective knowledge is acquired through reason and is not
in the physical world.
• Universals such as honour, equality, beauty, goodness, evil are
known innately.
• 4 levels of knowledge
o Imagining
o Belief
o Thinking
o Perfect intelligence
• First European university; the academy
• Book; the republic
• Equality of sex
• World of form; everything unstable and in constant change are
opinions
▪ ARISTOTLE
• A former student and later critic of Plato.
• He established a university; lyceum
• The approach of Aristotle to science was both theoretical and
practical.
• All branches of science as we have today found expressions in the
works of Aristotle.
• Among his works on natural science are:
o Physics
o Parts of Animals and
o Meteorologic.
 • through accurate observations and disciplined theorizing, Aristotle
created a biological science and taxonomy much like those in use
today.
• In the field of physics, Aristotle theorized that a body could only
remain in motion if there is an abiding contact between it and a
mover operating continuously.
• His theory - of causation or causality identified four major types of
causes
o formal cause- what a thing is (e.g. a chair)
o material cause- that out of which a thing is made (in the
case of a chair, wood)
o efficient cause- by which or whom a thing is made [in the
case of the chair, a carpenter.]
o final cause- the end for which a thing is made [in the case of
a chair, for sitting].
• The word of realism
• Started talking about the physical world
• He is the father of empiricism
• He taught that matter and form are intertwined.
• An action that results in happiness is that which is moral.
• Purpose of mortality is happiness
• Philosophy; the first and last science
• Inventor of deductive (syllogistic)

HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN AFRICA

✓ Elements in African Societies
o the beliefs and practices of the people.
o Belief in one supreme deity and divinities, good and evil spirits, and ancestors
o Craft and sculpture

✓ Ancient Egypt had these common elements that constitute the bedrock of African science
more than any other African culture.
✓ Ancient Egypt is often regarded as the cradle of civilization
o as far back as 1000 years before the emergence of ancient Greek science, scientific
elements were to be found in Egypt
o there is no direct historical record confirming this fact so Egyptian science has been
denied the debt modem science owed to it.
✓ the Greeks acknowledged a heavy debt for the elements of their mathematical knowledge to
the civilization of the Nile in Egypt (Farrington Benjamin)
✓ Ancient Egyptian science was more of technique than theory.
o This means that the Egyptians were more versed in practical technology than in
theoretical science
✓ ancient Egyptians achieved a Jot in the fields of
o agriculture
o architecture and
o medicine.
✓ they
o invented a practical system of geometry to fix property lines
o developed a calendar
o studied the stars
o invented astronomy
o named the constellations
o discovered an alphabet
o introduced the art of writing
o learned physiology and surgery while embalming their dead

HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN EASTERN WORLD

✓ Ancient Babylonians were able to
o develop a calendar
o a system of measurement and a system of numbering.
o develop astrology - the art of observing the different positions of stars and planets in
the belief that they influence human affairs.

✓ China
o The ancient Chinese civilization came a little after Egyptian and Babylonian
civilization had developed. But they did not influence science in the western world.
o The Chinese were able to
▪ develop a system of writing and mathematics.
▪ Make appreciable advances in the fields of
• Chemistry
• Medicine
• astronomy.

✓ India
o The World Book Encyclopaedia observes that a scientific movement whose writings
consisted of numerous treatises, commentaries, manuals and technical dictionary,
originated in India and spread widely.
o When these writings were translated, they gave rise to new movements in other
parts of the Eastern world.
▪ In the West, it influenced and was in turn influenced by the traditions of
western Asia and Greece.
o It was not based on mere speculations, but on rational principles.
▪ This is based on the fact that it sought to provide natural explanations for
observed phenomena.
o It was also based on a theoretical logic against which, ideas were tested.
o However, it did not emphasize experiments, except in the field of psychology where
it recorded its greatest progress because of its celebrated techniques of body and
mind control.
o Apart from psychology, Indian science also made some achievements in the fields of
astronomy and physiology.
o It also recorded some progress in plant knowledge and later in chemistry.
o It neglected important areas of science such as physics, geography, geometry,
zoology and geology
▪ [Britannica, Vol.20,7].
 HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN THE AMERICAS
✓ the Aztec, Inca and Maya Indians of America made some contributions to science.
✓ The Aztec developed a number system and a calendar.
✓ The Inca invented their own number system.
✓ The Maya had both a number system and a highly accurate calendar

3. SCIENTIFIC ENDEAVOURS IN MEDIEVAL & RENAISSANCE PERIODS.

HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL SCIENCE.
✓ The contribution of the medieval thinkers to science is infinitesimal (small).
✓ The medieval period is often called the dark ages because it was a period or intellectual
darkness in Europe.
✓ S. F. Mason regards it as
o “a somewhat barren period in the history of European civilization”.
✓ With the destruction of the political might of the Roman Empire in A.D. 476 by the
Barbarians, learning came almost to a standstill. Virtually the whole body of ancient
literature was lost.
✓ Philosophy at this time was kept alive by Christian Scholars.
✓ Their exaltation of faith over reason meant for them that faith preceded reason or that
theology super- ordinated philosophy.
✓ there is not much to write about natural philosophy (science) at this period

✓ Medieval philosophy was attributed with:

o man’s return to the supreme God.
o The interpretation of nature with the supernatural as the origin.
o Political leadership changed from the Romans to the Barbarians.
✓ MEDIEVAL ERA (FEATURES)
o The Roman Catholic Church (divine priesthood, confessions, convents, monasteries)
came to the fore.
o Building of cathedrals was significant.
o Aggressive evangelism and conversion were common.
o Establishment of schools. (Higher institutions between 11th and 13th centuries).
o Appreciable quantities of bibles were printed.
o scientific postulations not the focus.

✓ INVENTIONS
o there were fundamental innovations in the field of technology and the craft
tradition, which made life more comfortable, materially for the majority of men of
this period than in classical antiquity
o The victorious barbarians brought with them numerous things, some of which are:
▪ Horse propelled plough – for planting / harvest of crops.
▪ Water wheel – grinding of corn.
▪ Spinning wheel (textile production).
▪ improved methods of felt making
▪ the making of barrels and tubs.
 ▪ Water power for draining of mines and sawmills.
▪ Water power was used to blast the bellows of iron furnaces giving birth to
increase in the temperature of the furnace thus resulting in melting of iron.

▪ Weapons of war – changed from crude tools to better products. (gun

powder, canon, firearms).
▪ Crops: the introduction of the cultivation of
• rye
• oats
• spelt
• hops
▪ Food production improved.
• the use of butter instead of olive oil
▪ Transportation
• improved – use of horses.
• the ski
▪ Dressing changed – trouser instead of toga.
▪ Less stress for man –manual labour.
• the use of stirrup for riding horses
▪ the heavy wheeled plough that provided the means for the development of
the three-field system on which the life of the medieval manor was based

HISTORY OF RENAISSANCE SCIENCE

✓ The renaissance period is called that because it was
o a time when classical learning was revived as a result of the discovery of ancient
Greek and Roman literature
o a period of discovery and emancipation.
✓ According to Stumpf,
o “Natural science was now to be born in its modem form with its stress upon
observation and mathematics, an approach employed, chiefly by Copernicus, Kepler
and Galileo.
✓ RENAISSANCE OF MAN.
o Man, the restless being resurfaces.
o The bridge between the passive and active man.
o Discovery of lost classical literature (Greek and Roman collections).
o New worlds were discovered
▪ new scientific methods were formulated
▪ New method of scientific knowledge acquisition was recommended.
o Road to modern science.
o Return to study on nature,
o search for objective knowledge,
o relegation of man’s presence in nature.
o pursued questions principally about the physical world
o Unlike medieval thinkers who took traditional texts as final authority, the early
modern (renaissance) scientists shifted emphasis to observation and the formation
of hypotheses
✓ During this period
o Christopher Columbus
▪ discovered a new continent
▪ discarded the theory of the world being flat
o Giotto
▪ invented paintings
▪ the father of European painting and the first of the great Italian masters.
▪ the earliest artist to paint more realistic figures
o Dante’s
▪ literature facilitated the transition from medieval symbolism to the
exaltation of nature.
o Leonardo de Vinci
▪ the universal genius
▪ looked behind beauty with care to the more minute ingredients of plan’s
anatomy, a mode of curiosity that eventually led Harvey to discover the
circulation of the blood (Mason 215).
o Galileo
▪ discovered the moons around Jupiter
o Leeuwenhoek (1633-1723)
▪ discovered spermatozoa, protozoa, and bacteria.
o Copernicus (1463 - 1543)
▪ formed new hypothesis of the rotation of the earth around the sun.
o Harvey (1578 -1657)
▪ discovered the circulation of the blood.
o Gilbert (1540 - 1603)
▪ wrote a major work on the magnet
o Boyle (1627 - 1691)
▪ the father of chemistry, formulated his famous law concerning the relation
of temperature, volume and pressure of gases.

o Sir Isaac Newton

▪ one of the greatest mathematicians, physicists, and most influential
scientists of all time.
▪ formulation of the three laws of motion—the basic principles of modern
physics
▪ Invented infinitesimal calculus - the hallmarks of modern science
o Leibniz (Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz)
▪ Invented differential and integral calculus - the hallmarks of modern science
o Calculus (the new science) had two important consequences on philosophy.
▪ the hypothesis that the processes of nature can be explained and described
in observable and mathematical terms triggered off the philosophical
assumption that everything was subject to the laws of motion or mechanical
laws.
▪ the rejection of the medieval assumption that the earth was the centre of
the universe and that man was the crown of creation
o Nicolaus Copernicus
▪ new refined heliocentric conception/theory of the universe placed the sun
at the centre of the universe.
 ▪ The earth attended by the moon now became one of the planets that
revolved around the sun.
▪ Scholars supported this new theory (but with slight modifications)
• Tycho Brahe (1546 -1601)
• Johannes Kepler (1571 -1603)
• Galileo
• Isaac Newton.
o Bacon
▪ F. Bacon postulated induction against deduction for knowledge acquisition
▪ devised a new Method for assembling and explaining facts.
▪ He believed that this method would uncover the secrets of nature.
▪ He considered the mind as having been distorted by
• passions of traditional learning which he called idols
• errors of traditional learning which he called distempers of learning.
▪ These elements prevented the mind from reflecting truth accurately.
▪ he advocated that to discover scientific knowledge the mind must be
cleansed of the obscuring elements.
▪ This led him to advocate the method of induction by simple enumeration.
• This is the method of deriving laws from the observation of
particulars (facts) and their series and order
o Thomas Hobbes
▪ Advocated deduction
▪ Empiricist
▪ Book; leviathan
▪ Hobbes’ greatest achievement in science is the addition of mathematical
and deductive reasoning to scientific philosophy.
▪ Hobbes fell in love with geometry when he came across Euclid’s book titled
Elements.
▪ He later joined a small pool of thinkers of his day who believed that
geometry was the key to the study of nature.
o Rene Descartes
▪ followed Bacon and Hobbes that general principles must be the basis for
deduction.
▪ His great interest in mathematics led him to the belief that mathematical
reasoning provided the best method for discovering true knowledge.
▪ He hoped to generalize the use of the mathematical method for use in
understanding the operations of nature.
▪ Both Newton and Galileo agreed with Descartes that mathematical
deductions should be based upon general principles.
• Descartes urged that the general principles in question are
intuitively given,
• Newton and Galileo urged that the principles are experimentally
given.

4. MODERN SCIENCE – 18TH TO 20TH A.C.

✓ MODERN SCIENCE.
 o Is a derivative of the renaissance period.
o Is anchored on epistemology.
o Deduction as the best method of knowledge acquisition was disapproved.
o Classified man as equal to nothing more than a thing in nature.
o Deliberate attempt to discover nature was engaged on.
o Scientists scrutinized traditional ideas by observing and postulating hypothesis.
o Instruments and tools were invented to test proposed hypothesis-existence of other
planets, rotation of the earth, ….

SCIENCE IN THE 18TH CENTURY

✓ the discovery of chemical like
o chlorine
o oxygen
o hydrogen
o carbon dioxide.
✓ Antoine Lavoisier of France
o In 1777, discovered the true nature of combustion.
▪ He demonstrated that burning is the result of rapid union of oxygen and the
burning material.
o discovered the method of describing chemical reactions by equations
✓ Carolus Linnaeus
o a Swedish scientist
o credited with development of the first successful method for naming animals and
plants.
✓ Albrecht Von Heller
o organized all the findings of biologists about the nervous system, the circulation of
blood, respiration and embryology into a systematic physiology
✓ Joseph Sanveur (1653-1716)
o Discovered sound
✓ Aloisio Galvani (1737-1778)
o Discovered electricity current or ‘galvanism’
✓ Charles A. Coulomb (1736-1806)
o proof of the law of inverse squares
✓ Pieter van Musschenbroek
o Electric Sparks and invention of the Leyden jar.
✓ Joseph Black (1728-1799)
o measurement of heat
✓ Thomas Newcomer
o development of the steam engine by
✓ Chester Moore Hall
o Invention of the achromatic lens.

SCIENCE IN THE 19TH CENTURY

✓ It is often regarded as the golden age of modern science
✓ James P. Joule
o discovered that heat is a form of energy
o Law of Conservation of Energy is credited to him.
 ▪ This law states that energy can only undergo a change in form, but can
neither be created nor destroyed.
✓ Michael Faraday
o In 1931, discovered that a moving magnet is capable of inducing an electric current.
✓ H. C. Maxwell
o described Faraday's work on electricity and magnetism mathematically.
o He also showed that light and other energy waves are fundamentally the same.
✓ Dmitri Mendeleev of Russia
o simplified and systematized the description of chemical reactions.
o This is shown in the periodic table of elements published by him in 1869.
o In this table, elements are grouped according to their atomic weights and chemical
properties
✓ Charles Lyell
o a British geologist, put forth a proof to show that the development of the earth
surface has been a very slow and gradual process through millions of years.
o Other geologists theorized that the earth reached its present shape through violent
changes known as cataclysms.
✓ Charles R. Darwin
o in 1858, put forward an evolutionary theory of the origin of plants and animals.
o He theorized that plants and animals evolved through ages through an orderly,
gradual process of evolution.
o His explanation of how this process might take place led him to the idea of natural
selection through competition and the survival of the fittest.
✓ Gregor Mendel
o an Austrian Monk, laid the foundation of the science of genetics when he discovered
the basic laws of heredity in 1800’s.
✓ Louis Pasteur
o founded modern microbiology with his studies of fermentation and disease.
✓ Wilhelm Wundt
o In Leipzig, Germany, founded the first laboratory of experimental psychology in
1879.

SCIENCE IN THE 20TH CENTURY

✓ Max Planck of Germany
o quantum theory to explain certain properties of heat.
✓ Albert Einstein
o Albert Einstein (a Jew) applied quantum theory in the study of light energy in 1905.
o Einstein published his theory of relativity in 1905.
✓ During the Second World War - Further study of atom resulted in the invention of atomic
weapons.
✓ After the war, scientists directed effort towards perfecting atomic energy as a source of
power and producing more deadly weapons.
✓ In chemistry - the manufacturing of plastics, synthetic fibres, and drugs.
✓ In the field of Earth Science, development of Geophysics
o Geophysics is the science of exploration for natural resources such as minerals, oil,
salt, gas, coal, and so on.
✓ In healthcare, the combined forces of world organizations as
o World Health Organization (WHO)
 o United Nations Children Education Fund (UNICEF)
o Public Opinion and Governments
have resulted in biological researches which have led to break-through against diseases as
o Tuberculosis
o Malaria
o Polio
o whooping cough, and so on.
✓ Fleming (1881-1955)
o The discovery and development of natural antibiotics (Penicillin)
✓ Ehrlich (1854-1915)
o The discovery and development of synthetic antibiotics
✓ Marie Curie (1867- 1934)
o notable female scientist
o discovered of radiotherapy used in treating cancer.
✓ Christian Barnard
o pioneered heart transplantation.
✓ In the field of aviation,
o the flight success of the Wright brothers
o The discovery of modern rocket system
o The United States of America and the former Soviet Union successfully launched
lunar and planetary probes and even the Sputniks.
▪ Sputnik 1 was the first artificial Earth satellite.
▪ It was launched into an elliptical low Earth orbit by the USSR on 4 October
1957
▪ It orbited for three weeks before its batteries ran out
o Major Yuri Gagarin of Russia became the first to successfully orbit the earth in 1961

✓ Chapter 12.

5. HISTORY OF MEDICINE
✓ HISTORY (PERIODS) OF WESTERN MEDICINE
o Pre-ancient medicine
o Ancient medicine
o Medieval medicine
o Renaissance medicine
o Modern medicine
o Contemporary medicine.
✓ AIM OF HISTORY OF MEDICINE
o documentation of historical records in medicine will ensure continuity
o historical documentation will foster research.
✓ HISTORY OF MEDICINE
o Minor wounds, major ailments, diseases, discomforts, pains, etc resulted in care/
cure.
o Evidence of medicine existed in Egypt
o Records are not available –writing never existed, started later, phased out

ANCIENT MEDICINE.
 ✓ Ancient Babylonia (4000 B.C.)
o About 2000 B.C., the Babylonians recognised rabies in dogs.
o Uroscopy: the practice of diagnosing diseases simply by examining the patient’s
urine was discovered
▪ Scrutiny of human urine to determine ailment was decided. The postulation
that the urine of a person is an embodiment of his bodily function was
reached.

MEDIEVAL MEDICINE (from 5th Century)

✓ Ancient Greece
o the Greeks laid the foundations of organized medical practice.
o “The priest-doctors of Eastern civilization carried out numerous experiments whose
results reached Greece. These provided the basis for the Greek schools of medicine
which together gave rise to the so-called Hippocratic medicine”
▪ (Korubo -Owiye 106)
o Hippocratic Age (From 5 Century B.C.)
▪ Hippocrates is the father of western medicine.
▪ marked a new age in the practice of medicine because it was characterized
by accurate observation and description of diseases.
• Main problem: accurate description of disease could not be
matched with accurate treatment.
▪ Hippocratic writings were the earliest of Greek medical works, dating from
the 4th century
• These writings were the product of a school though Hippocrates
(460-377 B.C.) was an outstanding figure.
▪ Supernatural source of ailment debunked. Hippocrates (460 – 377 B.C.)
postulated that all ailments have natural sources.
▪ Man’s natural body is capable of repairing itself if in a state of disrepair said
Hippocrates.
▪ He developed series of processes that assisted in accurate observation and
description of ailments.
• He was the first to describe the method of systematic diagnostic
investigation, based on observation and reasoning.
▪ He is regarded as the founder of medical ethics
• Medical ethics – rules and regulations guiding its practice
• he drafted the Hippocratic oath, sworn to by medical practitioners
till date.
▪ He was the 1st to document observation from and analysis of same from
urine.
• the first to document Uroscopy.
• Although Hippocrates is credited with being the original uroscopist,
urine diagnosis is believed to pre-date Hippocrates.
• Sumerian and Babylonian physicians of 4000 BC recorded their
assessment of urine on clay tablets.

✓ Roman Period
 omedical science was obliviated by the fall of Greek political power and the rise of
Roman Empire.
o The Romans were so pre-occupied with warfare that they had no time for medicine.
o The practice of medicine was left to educated slaves.
o It was not until the reign of Julius Caesar that foreign doctors were granted Roman
citizenship.
✓ The Arabic Periods (From 622 A.D.)
o The Arabs were opposed to examination of urine. They approved the use of herbs
and chanting of incantations.
o main contribution to medicine came from two notable physicians,
▪ Avicenna
▪ Averroes.
o The Arabs translated all Greek literature to Arabic thereby extending knowledge
beyond the shores of Greece.
▪ It is said that Islamic medicine was a product of Greek culture, which was
passed from Asian scholars to Arabic scholars who in turn translated all
Greek literature to Arabic.
o They are said to have contributed to medical ethics.
o The Arabs established hospitals and medical schools for training medical
practitioners.

PRE-RENAISSANCE AND RENAISSANCE PERIOD (11TH - 14TH CENTURY MEDICINE)

✓ At pre – Renaissance and Renaissance times Christians represented by the church fathers
based in Italy, the Salermita school insisted: on the care for sick persons.
o the Salermita School in Italy (11300 AD) was the centre of learning in the Christian
world.
✓ The church founded hospitals.
o church fathers stressed the need to care for the sick, and this gave rise to the
establishment of hospitals.
✓ Herbs were intentionally cultivated and used for treatment of ailments.
✓ Johannes Actuarius produced an active medical practice based on Uroscopy in the 13th
century.
✓ The invention of the graduated uroscopy flask of ‘Matula’
✓ Uroscopy practice was so lucrative that quacks impersonated medical personnel, resulting in
breakout of epidemy in the 1300’s.
✓ The bubonic plague of the mid 1300’s was so devastating that many hospitals were built and
new sanitary measures were introduced
o More hospitals were built.
o New sanitation laws were introduced.
o Doctors received special public fees for their services
▪ Fees were charged for medical services.

✓ The renaissance period marked the beginning of modern science

✓ Practice of clinical medicine (observation of a patient and accurate diagnosis of an ailment
based on observed symptoms) was revived.
o Consequently, Uroscopy nose-dived.
 ✓ In 1315, Mondino de Luzzi, carried out the first official Anatomy dissection at Bologna
University.

16TH – 18TH CENTURY (MODERN MEDICINE)

✓ Leonardo de Vinci (1452- 1570) studied the structure of beings by dissection.

o In 1500 de Vinci postulated that animals (like candles) cannot survive except their
food intake is burnt up in them.
✓ Girolamo Fracastoro (1484- 1553), an Italian physician and atomist
o postulated that diseases are like seeds. Like seedlings they reproduce their like.
o He upheld that a disease is spread by physical contact or air. (This is the germ theory
in a crude/vague form)
✓ Paracelsus (1493- 1541), Swiss physician
o Tried to bring into being a new science of medical-chemistry, or Iatrochemistry as it
was called, by unifying medicine with alchemy.
▪ He defined alchemy as a science concerned with the transformation of the
raw materials of nature into the finished products useful to humanity.
o postulated that man’s body (chemical system) is made up three principles of the
alchemists
▪ Mercury
▪ Sulphur
▪ salt.
o Ailments arise due to imbalance among the three elements in man.
o He postulated the doctrine that diseases were highly specific in their action and
hence each disease needed a specific chemical cure
▪ He kicked against the use of one medication as cure for all ailments.
o Refutation against one medication for all cure resulted in the study and treatment of
particular ailments.
✓ John Baptist van Helmont (1580- 1644) An indigene of Brussels
o wrote an article “On the Development of Medicine”, published in 1648 after his
death.
o He postulated that each organ in the human body is alive and controlled by a vital
force.
o For him, disease was a foreign guest, which entered the body, settled in a particular
organ and monopolized its vital processes
o a disease was to be treated by its specific remedy- a simple inorganic or plant
substance, not the old cure-all medicaments.
o For him, ancient physicians had confused diseases with their symptoms, and in their
attempt to effect a cure had tried to remove the symptoms instead of the occasional
cause
✓ Galileo in 1595 invented the 1st temperature measuring instrument.
o In 1610, he effected a transition from telescope to microscope to observe small,
close objects
✓ Marcello Malphighi (1628 – 1694) the physician to Pope Innocent XII
o studied the blood circulation theory of Harvey side by side respiratory problems.
o Malphighi viewed the capillaries of a frog which connects its veins and arteries in its
lungs through a microscope in 1660.
o He classified living things with plants at the bottom and higher animals, that is man
at the top.
 ▪ He attempted classifying all living creatures into a vertical scale
▪ At the end of the investigation, he placed
• plants at the bottom of the scale because they were found to be
filled with air tubules
• next the insects because they had numerous air passages
• then fishes because they had smaller, though complex, gill system
• finally, man and higher animals, at the top of the scale because they
had only a pair of lungs which were small compared to the size of
their other organs
✓ In 1628, William Harvey gave the final definitive description of the circulation of the blood.
o Before him, other scientists had made useful contributions like
▪ Spaniard Michele Servitus
▪ Italian Andrea Gesalpino
✓ In 1665, Robert Hooke (1635-1703) discovered that living tissue was made up of basic
microscopic units called cells.
o He, together with
▪ Boyle
▪ Richard Lower
▪ John Mayow,
o tried to show that
▪ the change from dark red venous blood to bright red, arterial blood in the
lungs was a result of the uptake of part of the air
▪ the air played a function in the body similar to that of chemical combustion.
o The work of Boyle, Hooke, and Lower was summarized and expanded by Mayow in
his Five Medico- Physical Treatises, published in 1674.
✓ Antony Van Leeuwenhoek (1674- 1683) a Dutchman who perfected the microscope.
o The Dutchman viewed the circulation of blood in the tail of a tadpole and foot of a
frog.
✓ Giovanni Battista Morgagni laid the foundation of pathology. (Cause and effect of ailments).
✓ William Hunter (1752-1783) suggested that the seat of disease was not at the organ level,
but tissue level.
✓ Reamure and Spallanzani hypothesized that digestion was a chemical process.
✓ Spallanzani laid the foundation of experimental physiology.
✓ 1750 to 1875 Studies indicated that imbalance in diet results in particular ailments.
✓ Edward Jenner in 1798 discovered Smallpox vaccine.
o in the 1880’s, inoculation of man with cowpox as cure for smallpox was discovered.
✓ In 863, Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895) showed that a micro-organism caused the fermentation
(souring) of wine
o he demonstrated that warming the wine to 55°C could kill the microorganism.
o Louis Pasteur successfully treated a patient afflicted with rabies in 1885.
✓ In 1876, Robert Koch (1843- 1910)
o discovered that the micro-organisms responsible for cattle anthrax could be grown
outside the animal body in a culture medium made up of meat broth jelly.
o he was able to discover and isolate the bacteria responsible for tuberculosis (TB) in
1882
o he was able to isolate the cholera micro-organism in 1883
✓ Filippo Pacini discovered cholera and its cause during an outbreak in Florence, Italy, in 1854.
✓ In 1861, Gregor Mendel (1822 - 1884) published his principle of inheritance.
 ✓ In 1864, Lord Joseph Lister (1827 - 1912) introduced the practice of antiseptics in surgery.
✓ From 1880-1890, Alexander Fleming and others
o elucidated the essential facts of cell division and emphasized the importance of
equality of chromosome distribution to daughter cells.
✓ Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882)
o In 1859, brought out his great work On the Origin of the Species by Means of
Natural Selection.
o In 1871, Darwin published The Descent of Man.
✓ In 1898, Marie Curie (1867 - 1934) and Pierre Curie discovered a radioactive element -
Radium

20TH CENTURY (CONTEMPORARY MEDICINE)

✓ In 1901, Wilhelm Roentgen received the Nobel Prize for the discovery of X-rays.
✓ In 1908, Paul Ehrlich, a German, and Noguchi, a Japanese, developed the first
chemotherapeutic agent, the 1st agent used for chemotherapy, laying the foundation for
modern chemotherapy. (Treatment for cancer).
✓ In 1921 Banting and Best discovered insulin.
✓ In 1929, Alexander Fleming discovered Penicillin.
✓ Albert Sabin discovered Polio vaccine.
✓ Sigmund Freud opened the field of psychiatry with his psychoanalysis theory.

BLACK AFRICA AND NIGERIA

✓ There are accounts of successful Caesarean section operation and other medical ‘feats’ in
many parts of Black Africa
✓ In the area of orthodox medicine, Korubo - Owiye has identified as possible sources the
o Eastern Arabic influence (which came across the Sahara to Western Sudan and then
to Northern Nigeria)
o Western influence (which came through the trading missions of various Western
powers to the Niger Delta region and later through the Portuguese)
o Slave trade (with slave ships normally bringing-along, medical doctors)
o Early explorers (with some of the expeditions being led by doctors)
o Missionaries ( some of who established hospitals in the costal area)
✓ In a more recent sense, the origin of public health services in Nigeria can be traced to the
British Army Medical Services.
✓ After the Second World War medical services were extended to civil servants.
o Further efforts by government and religious bodies led to the extension of medical
services to the local population.
✓ The first known Nigerian doctors were trained in mid-19th century first at Fourah Bay
Institute in Sierra Leone, and then in United Kingdom to qualify for practice.
✓ On return to Nigeria, they first served in Army hospitals before going into private practice.
o These included
▪ Dr J. A. B. Horton (1858)s
▪ Dr Obadiah Johnson (1886)
▪ Dr John Randle (1888)
▪ Dr S. A. Legh - Sodipe (1892)
 ▪ Dr Oguntola Sapara (1895)

6. Mathematics
✓ WHAT IS MATHEMATICS
o Mathematics can be roughly defined as the deductive study of numbers, geometry
and various abstract constructs.
o Its main branches include
▪ Foundations
▪ Algebra
▪ Analysis
▪ Geometry
▪ applied mathematics.
o Study of physical world.
o Anchored on nature and its laws.
o Dependent on human characteristics.

HISTORY OF MATHEMATICS.

✓ The beginning of present-day mathematics is traceable to the act of counting. (Seasons,

market days, generations, incidences, …).
✓ EARLY CIVILIZATIONS
o Traces of deliberate counting activities are obvious from activities in
▪ Egypt (pyramids, flooding of Nile, …)
▪ Babylon (diagnosis, …)
▪ India and China between 5th,4th,3rd,2nd Cents.
✓ GREECE
o The Greeks improved Egyptian and Babylonian arithmetic talking about infinite and
irrational numbers.
o The Greeks also made major contributions in the fields of
▪ Trigonometry
▪ Astronomy
▪ Mechanics
▪ Optics
▪ Geography
▪ Hydrostatics
o Thales developed logical geometry.
o Zeno of Elea paradoxes led to the atomic theory of Democritus,
o Euclid developed Euclidean geometry.
▪ His major work Elements stipulates the laws of space and of figures in space
▪ Euclid- based his geometry on five postulates or assumptions
▪ Euclid’s Optics and Catoptrica (theory of mirrors) are the oldest systematic
treatments.
o Apollonius studied parabola, ellipse and hyperbola.
▪ Apollonius, a native of Pergamum in Asia Minor
▪ studied mathematics in Alexandria.
▪ His classic work Conic Sections
 o Archimedes focused on the calculation of volumes and complex areas – foundation
of calculus.
▪ He postulated on floating bodies in water – hydraulics.
• In hydrostatics, Archimedes’ work On Floating Bodies contains the
famous Archimedes principle, which states that a body immersed in
water is buoyed up by a force equal to the weight of the water
displaced by the body.
o Hipparchus started trigonometry.
o Ptolemy gave a complete and authoritative version of trigonometry.
▪ Ptolemy’s major work is the Almagest (i.e., The Mathematical Composition)
▪ ventured into astronomy – study of space and planetary bodies.
o Eratosthenes of Cyrene calculated the circumference of the earth and is accepted as
accurate till date.
▪ made numerous calculations of distances between significant places of the
earth known to the Greeks
o Aristotle postulated that mathematical calculation is more appropriate to use in
studying the design of the universe.
✓ INDIA AND ARABIA
o The Indians developed the numerical system – still in use today.
o The Hindus and Arabs updated the principles guiding
• addition (+)
• subtraction (-)
• multiplication (*)
• division (/) of irrational numbers.
▪ They also introduced the concepts of whole numbers and fractions.
o the work in these countries did not match the progress made by the Greeks, it
preserved Greek mathematics to some extent.
o After the conquest of Egypt, most Greek scholars migrated to Constantinople (now
Istanbul), which had become the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire at that time.
▪ This increased the body of knowledge that eventually reached Europe about
800 years later
✓ 16TH CENTURY
o In the 16th C. algebra was used in solving cubic and quartic equations
▪ the algebraic solution of cubic and quartic equations was provided by
• Ferrari
• Piccioli
• Cardan
• Tartaglia
o Copernicus and Galileo studied the earth (universe) making use of mathematical
principles.
o The major contributors were
▪ Francois Vieta
▪ Thomas Harriot
▪ Albert Girard
▪ Pierre de Ferment
▪ Rene Descartes
▪ Isaac Newton.
✓ 17TH CENTURY
o The major contributors were
▪ Napier,
▪ Briggs
▪ Blaise
▪ Pascal
▪ Fermat
▪ Galileo and
▪ Kepler.
o The development of decimal fractions and logarithms started in the 17th century.
o Pascal and Fermat initiated the study of probability.
o Newton furthered the study and use of calculus under the influence of earlier
mathematicians and his former teacher Barrow.
o Leibniz also independently developed Calculus
o Descartes developed analytical geometry.
✓ 18TH CENTURY
o The 18th century initiated the development of the calculus applied to physical and
spatial situations.
o Euler invented two new branches of mathematics –
• calculus of variations
• differential geometry
▪ Euler derived the equations for the motion of compressible fluids.
o Lagrange began a rigorous theory of functions and of mechanics.
o Newton postulated his theories of gravitation and light.
o Leibniz furthered the application of calculus in variety of ways.
o In the 18th century mathematics was applied to physics creating Fluid Dynamics.
▪ This is concerned with the study of the flow of fluids and motion of bodies in
fluids
▪ Daniel Bernoulli suggested that the theory might be used in describing the
flow of blood in human veins and arteries,

✓ 19TH CENTURY
o Carl Gauss (most prominent figure) made notable contribution to
▪ Algebra
▪ Geometry
▪ number theory
▪ arithmetic
▪ analysis
o the invention of non-Euclidean geometry independently by
▪ Nikolas Lobachevsky
▪ Bolyai
▪ and in another form, G.F.B. Riemann
o Cantor postulated set theory.
o Bertrand Russell furthered paradoxes.

✓ 20TH CENTURY
 o Philosophy of mathematics initiated distinguishing abstract and concrete situations
and application of mathematics. (Study of astronomy, celestial bodies, politics,
population, …)
o Researchers such as Hibert, Russell, Whitehead, Godel, Newmann and Wiener
among others.
o 20th century mathematicians formed one of four groups in proffering the problem
of completeness that was identified. These are:
▪ Logic
• the foundation of mathematics,
• The logistic school
o spearheaded by Russell and his friend Whitehead.
o This school founded mathematics on logic.
▪ Intuition
• the foundation of mathematics,
• The intuitionist school
o initiated by the Dutchman I. E. J. Brouwer.
o This school relied solely on concepts and theorems
acceptable to human minds
▪ Formalist
• logic and mathematical axioms
• The formalist school
o initiated by David Hibert.
o This school built mathematics on logical and mathematical
axioms
o proposed a mathematical programme to prove the
consistency of mathematics
▪ Set theory
• solve all mathematical inconsistencies.
• The set theoretic school
o founded by Ernst Zermelo
o modified by Abraham A. Fraenkel.
o This school built mathematics on axioms of sets so carefully
chosen that presumably the deduction of contradictions is
impossible
o Kurt Godel of the University of Vienna published a paper in 1931 which dealt a
devastating blow to mathematics.

SCIENCE FROM THE START – ARISTOTLE, COPERNICUS, GALILEO, DESCARTES,

NEWTON, EINSTEIN
ARISTOTELIAN SCIENCE
✓ Biographical Sketch
o He lived between 384 and 322 B.C.
o He was born in Stagira, a small town in Thrace.
o His father was a medical practitioner.
▪ His father was the personal physician to the Macedonian King
o Aristotle got interested in science (especially biology) at an early age.
o He became a student at age 17 in Plato’s Academy university in Athens for 20 years.
 oHe established a university the Lyceum after parting from Plato.
oSubjects such as philosophy, mathematics, biology were studied.
oHis books include subjects including
▪ Logic
▪ Physics
▪ Metaphysics
▪ Politics
▪ Biology
▪ Psychology
▪ Aesthetics
o He is reputed to be the first to develop logic as a science or as an academic
discipline.
o He became the teacher of Alexander the Great in 343/342 B.
o He left the lyceum and went to Chalcis where he reportedly died in 322 B.C. of a
longstanding digestive ailment.
✓ ARISTOTELIAN SCIENCE
o Aristotle marks a turning point in the history of Greek Science, for he was the first to
embark upon extensive empirical inquiries.
o He speculated on the nature of heavenly bodies.
o His study of biology was based on experience, observation and conclusion.
o His astronomy postulated the fixed position of planets despite their constant
movement.
o In physics Aristotle postulated that all things emanated from prime matter which is a
combination of air, water, fire and earth.
▪ Prime Matter, which meant the bedrock of things that was capable of
becoming other things or assuming new forms
▪ the processes of nature involved the continuous transformation of matter
from one form to another
▪ nature made things from what he called ‘simple bodies’
• air
• water
• fire
• earth
▪ Fire tends to rise to become air. water to fall and become earth, the solid to
become liquid, and the wet to become dry.
▪ The 4 items perform vertical and horizontal motions successfully and
constantly.
o Aristotle postulated that matter exists everywhere in the universe hence there is no
vacuum or empty space.
▪ Denying the existence of empty space, which the atomists believed to exist
▪ For instance, when a stone is thrown it is maintained in motion by the air
which streams behind it to prevent the formation of vacuum
o His concept of causality states that all items undergo 4 processes (4 main types of
causality):
▪ material cause
• the primary item from which all objects are created.
▪ formal cause
 • the designs, forms, patterns that are stamped on the object.
(Microphone, bread, mango, Cat, Tiger, …).
▪ efficient cause
• the mechanism that makes the object to perform. (Wire
connections, oven/baking pan, blood thirsty, …).
▪ final cause
• the purpose for which an object is designed. (Amplification of voice,
food, satisfaction, …).
o He postulated that matter and all its manifestations carry potential life while
form/soul is the source of actual life.
▪ The soul accounts for the transition from inorganic to organic forms.
▪ soul and body are not two separate entities but are rather matter [body]
and form [soul] of a single unity.
▪ From this, it follows that the soul cannot be separated from the body.

THE COPERNICAN REVOLUTION

✓ Biographical Sketch
o Nicolas Copernicus (1473-1543)
o the son of a prosperous merchant and municipal official of the old Hansa town of
Thorn on the Vistula.
▪ His father was a rich business man, a government official.
o He lost his father at age 10, was adopted by his uncle.
o His uncle Lucas Watzelrode, who became Bishop of Ermland in 1489,
o He schooled at Italy (1496-1506) and became a canon at the demise of his uncle.
o Subject areas of interest to him include
▪ Finance
▪ medicine
▪ politics.
o Copernicus wrote a small work titled the Commentariolus
▪ His revolutionary theory was handwritten and circulated in 1530.
▪ It was 1st printed in 1540.
o Copernicus published his main work titled Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres in
1543
✓ The Copernican System
o Copernicus is regarded as
▪ the first great modem astronomer and
▪ founder of a new system of the celestial orbs
o His postulation worked with Aristotle’s astronomy in mind.
o Copernicus assumed that the earth rotates on its axis daily and revolves round the
sun in an annual orbit.
o Copernican system threw the facts of astronomy into a simpler and more
harmonious mathematical order
o In the Copernican system all
▪ the planets (including the earth) moved in the same direction with speeds
that decreased with distance from the sun
▪ The sun and the fixed stars are at rest at the centre and the periphery of the
universe respectively.
 ✓ Science of:
o Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Einstein, Quantum Mechanics.

READ

✓ chapters 36 & 37 of text. (newer diseases, preventive health practices).

✓ Quantum Mechanics. (chap. 15)

A SUMMARY OF THE HISTORY OF WESTERN SCIENCE

ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL SCIENCE (6TH CENTURY B.C.-14TH CENTURY A. D)

✓ 600-500 B.C.
o Thales, Pythagoras, Euclid and others had perfected geometry.
o Thales
▪ credited with the knowledge that amber, when rubbed will attract light
bodies, and that lead stone or magnet possesses the power of attracting
iron.
✓ 400 B. C.
o Hippocrates
▪ regarded as the father of Medicine
▪ taught that diseases have natural rather than supernatural causes and that
the human body possessed the power to repair itself.
✓ 300’s B.C.
o Aristotle’s studies in logic and classification contributed to the foundations of
science.
✓ 371 - 286 B.C.
o Theophrastus of Eresus wrote a book on Winds and Weather Signs.
o Aratus of Soli also wrote a book of progrostics, giving predictions of the weather
from observation of astronomical phenomena, and various accounts of the effect of
weather on animals.
✓ 300 B.C
o Euclid formulated basic postulates of deductive geometry
✓ 2OO’s B.C.
o At a time when most Greek Scholars were interested mainly in metaphysics,
Archimedes performed experiments and discovered basic physical principles.
✓ A.D. 100’s
o Galen laid the foundation for the study of anatomy and physiology.
o Ptolemy
▪ developed the geocentric theory: the theory that the earth is the centre of
the universe.
▪ He measured angles of incidence and refraction and discovered they were
proportional, which is almost true in the case of small angles.
✓ 1200’s Scholars who were mainly theologians saw no need for direct observation of nature.
o Writings of Aristotle, Galen and Ptolemy were considered apodictic truth.
 o However, some scholars were interested in alchemy, a mixture of magic and
rudimentary chemistry.
o Roger Bacon criticized the deductive method of obtaining knowledge and saw the
need for experiments, measurement and mathematics.
✓ 1232 -1370
o Mechanical clocks appeared.
o The construction of 39 clocks recorded.
✓ 1276 -1337
o Griotto invented paintings.

RENAISSANCE AND MODERN SCIENCE (15TH -17TH CENTURY)

✓ 1400’s
o Many men developed interest in nature, but most of them turned to Greek writings,
rather than trying to add new knowledge.
o Few' questioned the authority of Aristotle and Ptolemy.
✓ 1500
o Leonardo da Vinci recognized the importance of observation and experimentation in
learning.
▪ He used experiments to make many discoveries.
✓ 1543
o Nicolaus Copernicus’ publication of two books changed man’s ideas about his world
and about the world.
▪ He developed the heliocentric theory that the sun is the centre of the
universe and the earth and other planets move around it.
✓ 1500’s
o Tycho Brahe made accurate observations about the planets.
✓ 1590
o The first compound microscope was created.
o Galileo’s pupil Torricelli discovered the principle of the barometer.
✓ 1640 -1608
o Gilbert wrote a major work on the magnet.
✓ 1600’s
o Francis Bacon summarized the theory of the experimental method, urging the use of
the inductive method of reasoning.
✓ 1600
o Galileo emphasized the mathematical interpretation of experiment in science.
▪ He discovered many important physical laws.
▪ also discovered the moons around Jupiter.
✓ 1608
o Tippershey (actually Hans Lipperhey), a Dutchman, invented the telescope,
although Galileo was the first to make dramatic use of it.
✓ 1602 -1686
o Guericke invented the air pump, which was so important in creating a vacuum for
the experiment that proved that all bodies regardless of their weight or size fall at
the same rate when there is no air resistance.
✓ 1609
o Johannes Kepler established astronomy as an exact Science.
✓ 1628
 o William Harvey published his theory on the circulation of blood.
✓ 1660’s
o Robert Boyle applied the scientific method to chemistry.
▪ He formulated his famous- law concerning the relation of temperature,
volume and pressure of gasses.
✓ 1687
o Sir Isaac Newton published the PRINCIPIA. which ' summarized basic laws of
mechanics
✓ 1632-1723
o Leeuwenhoek discovered spermatozoa, protozoa and Bacteria.

18TH CENTURY SCIENCE

✓ 1730
o Carolus Linnaeus founded the method of classification of plants and animals.
✓ 1774
o Joseph Priestly discovered oxygen.
✓ 1776
o Adam Smith published the first systematic formulation of classical economics
✓ 1777
o Antoine Lavoisier explained that when an object bums, it unites with oxygen.
▪ His research laid the foundation for modern chemistry.
✓ 1781
o William Herschel identified the planet Uranus about 2880 kilometres from the
earth.
✓ 1724
o Stephen Hales, employing his mercurial gauge, carried out a brilliant experiment on
transpiration.
✓ 1767
o Casper Friedrick Wolf discovered that all parts of the plant except the stem are
merely modified leaves.
o Johann Wolfgang confirmed this in 1790.
✓ 1731 -1802
o Erasmus Darwin published two works
• ‘Loves of the Plants’ (1789)
• ‘Zoonomia’ (1794).
▪ These two works stressed the gradualistic theory of evolution, which states
that complex organisms gradually evolved from simpler primordial forms.
✓ 1749
o P. J. Macquer became the first to make a discussion of affinity the focal point of
interest in chemical theory.
✓ 1756
o Black discovered carbon dioxide.
✓ 1792
o Rutherford discovered Nitrogen.
✓ 1708-1788
o G. L. Leclerc - Comte de Buffon reached the conclusion that the earth was 74,832
years old after conducting series of experiments.
▪ He even went further to divide this period into 7 geological periods.
 ✓ 1726-1797
o James Hutton proposed the volcanic theory, which stated that rock strata were
caused by volcanic eruptions.
✓ 1770’s
o Hyder Ali, an Indian adventurer, became the first to develop war rockets using
hammered iron cylinders as container for the gunpowder.
✓ 1783
o Marquis de Jouffroy d’Abbans launched his Steamboat in Lyon.
✓ 1796
o Edward Jenner discovered a method of vaccination against smallpox.
✓ 1803 Interest was revived in medical ethics and a code of ethics was published.

SCIENCE IN THE 19TH CENTURY

✓ 1803
o John Dalton announced his atomic theory.
✓ 1830
o Charles Lyell founded modern geology.
o August Comte started the study of sociology
✓ 1831
o Michael Faraday induced an electric current with a moving magnet.
✓ 1839
o Matthias Schleiden and Theodor Schwann theorized that all living things are
composed of cells.
✓ 1858
o Charles Darwin advanced his theory of evolution of plants and animals.
✓ 1860’s
o James Clerk Maxwell developed his electromagnetic theory.
✓ 1866
o Gregor Mendel published his discovery of the laws of heredity.
✓ 1869
o Dmitri Mendeleev developed the Period Table, classifying elements by their atomic
weights and properties.
✓ 1876
o Louis Pasteur found that micro-organisms cause fermentation and disease
✓ 1879
o Wilhelm Wundt founded the first laboratory of experimental psychology.
✓ 1882
o Robert Koch discovered bacteria that causes tuberculosis
✓ 1895
o Wilhelm R. Roentgen discovered X-rays
✓ 1898
o Marie and Pierre Curie isolated the element radium
✓ 1900
o Max Planck advanced the quantum theory.
✓ C.1900
o Paul Ehrlich originated ‘chemotherapy’, the treatment of disease with chemicals.
o Sigmund Freud developed psychoanalysis.
✓ 1852 -1903
 o Becquerel, a French physicist, discovered what is today known as radioactivity.

SCIENCE IN THE 20TH CENTURY

✓ 1905
o Albert Einstein
▪ presented his Special Theory of Relativity.
▪ In 1916, he presented His General Theory of Relativity.
✓ 1911
o Ernest Rutherford put forth a theory of Atomic Structure.
▪ He recognized that the mass of the atom is located in a nucleus.
✓ 1847-1922
o Alexander Graham Bell designed and developed the telephone.
✓ 1925
o John Baird became the first to make possible live television transmission.
✓ 1928
o Alexander Fleming discovered Penicillin.
✓ 1932
o Chadwick discovered the neutron
✓ 1938
o Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann found lightweight atoms after bombarding uranium
with neutrons.
✓ 1942
o Enrico Fermi and his associates achieved the first successful nuclear chain reaction.
✓ 1945
o The first atomic bomb was dropped at Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Japan).
✓ 1953
o Jonas Salk produced the first effective vaccine against polio.
▪ It was released for use in 1955,
✓ 1957
o Russia launched the first artificial satellite.
o Arthur Kornberg grew DNA, the basic chemical of the gene in a test tube.
✓ 1958
o U.S.A, sent up its first artificial satellite.
✓ 1961
o Major Yuri Gagari of Russia and Alan B. Shepard, Jr., of the United States became the
first men to fly in space.
✓ 1969
o Neil A. Armstrong and Edwin E. Aldrin Jr., landed on the moon and brought moon
rocks and dust back to earth for scientific study.