Isaac Newton. Sir Isaac Newton PRS MP (/ˈnjuːtən/;[8] 25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/7[1]) was an English physicist and mathematician (described in his own day as a "natural philosopher") who is widely recognised as one of the most influential scientists of all time and as a key figure in the scientific revolution. His book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica ("Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy"), first published in 1687, laid the foundations for classical mechanics. Newton made seminal contributions to optics, and he shares credit with Gottfried Leibniz for the development of calculus. Newton built the first practical reflecting telescope and developed a theory of colour based on the observation that a prism decomposes white light into the many colours of the visible spectrum.
He formulated an empirical law of cooling, studied the speed of sound, and introduced the notion of a Newtonian fluid. Life Early life Isaac Newton (Bolton, Sarah K. Middle years Mathematics Optics. Pierre Bayle. Pierre Bayle (French: [bɛl]; 18 November 1647 – 28 December 1706) was a French philosopher and writer best known for his seminal work the Historical and Critical Dictionary, published beginning in 1695.
Bayle was a self-pronounced Protestant, and as a fideist he advocated a separation between the spheres of faith and reason, on the grounds of God being incomprehensible to man. As a forerunner of the Encyclopedists and an advocate of the principle of the toleration of divergent beliefs, his works subsequently influenced the development of the Enlightenment. Biography[edit] Bayle was born at Carla-le-Comte (later renamed Carla-Bayle in his honour), near Pamiers, Ariège, France. He was educated by his father, a Calvinist minister, and at an academy at Puylaurens.
There he became acquainted with the teachings of René Descartes. Bayle remained in Rotterdam until his death on 28 December 1706. Legacy and honors[edit] Works[edit] Views on toleration[edit] Scepticism[edit] Editions[edit] Baruch Spinoza. Biography[edit] Family and community origins[edit] Spinoza's ancestors were of Sephardic Jewish descent, and were a part of the community of Portuguese Jews that had settled in the city of Amsterdam in the wake of the Alhambra Decree in Spain (1492) and the Portuguese Inquisition (1536), which had resulted in forced conversions and expulsions from the Iberian peninsula.[11] Attracted by the Decree of Toleration issued in 1579 by the Union of Utrecht, Portuguese "conversos" first sailed to Amsterdam in 1593 and promptly reconverted to Judaism.[12] In 1598 permission was granted to build a synagogue, and in 1615 an ordinance for the admission and government of the Jews was passed.[13] As a community of exiles, the Portuguese Jews of Amsterdam were highly proud of their identity.[13] Spinoza's father, Miguel (Michael), and his uncle, Manuel, then moved to Amsterdam where they resumed the practice of Judaism. 17th-century Holland[edit] Early life[edit] Expulsion from the Jewish community[edit]
Thomas Hobbes. Though on rational grounds a champion of absolutism for the sovereign, Hobbes also developed some of the fundamentals of European liberal thought: the right of the individual; the natural equality of all men; the artificial character of the political order (which led to the later distinction between civil society and the state); the view that all legitimate political power must be "representative" and based on the consent of the people; and a liberal interpretation of law which leaves people free to do whatever the law does not explicitly forbid.[3] He was one of the founders of modern political philosophy and political science.[4][5] His understanding of humans as being matter and motion, obeying the same physical laws as other matter and motion, remains influential; and his account of human nature as self-interested cooperation, and of political communities as being based upon a "social contract" remains one of the major topics of political philosophy.
Early life and education[edit] René Descartes. Descartes laid the foundation for 17th-century continental rationalism, later advocated by Baruch Spinoza and Gottfried Leibniz, and opposed by the empiricist school of thought consisting of Hobbes, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Leibniz, Spinoza and Descartes were all well versed in mathematics as well as philosophy, and Descartes and Leibniz contributed greatly to science as well. His best known philosophical statement is "Cogito ergo sum" (French: Je pense, donc je suis; I think, therefore I am), found in part IV of Discourse on the Method (1637 – written in French but with inclusion of "Cogito ergo sum") and §7 of part I of Principles of Philosophy (1644 – written in Latin). Early life[edit] Descartes was born in La Haye en Touraine (now Descartes), Indre-et-Loire, France. When he was one year old, his mother Jeanne Brochard died. His father Joachim was a member of the Parlement of Brittany at Rennes.[10] René lived with his grandmother and with his great-uncle.
Visions[edit] Work[edit] Francis Bacon. Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St. Alban,[a] QC (/ˈbeɪkən/; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, orator, essayist, and author. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. After his death, he remained extremely influential through his works, especially as philosophical advocate and practitioner of the scientific method during the scientific revolution. Bacon has been called the father of empiricism.[4] His works established and popularised inductive methodologies for scientific inquiry, often called the Baconian method, or simply the scientific method. Bacon was knighted in 1603, and created Baron Verulam in 1618 and Viscount St. Biography[edit] Early life[edit] The 18-year-old Francis Bacon. His studies brought him to the belief that the methods and results of science as then practised were erroneous. The Italianate York Water Gate – the entry to York House, built about 1626, the year of Bacon's death.
Galileo Galilei. Galileo Galilei (Italian pronunciation: [ɡaliˈlɛːo ɡaliˈlɛi]; 15 February 1564[3] – 8 January 1642), often known mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian physicist, mathematician, engineer, astronomer, and philosopher who played a major role in the scientific revolution during the Renaissance. His achievements include improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations and support for Copernicanism. Galileo has been called the "father of modern observational astronomy",[4] the "father of modern physics",[5][6] the "father of science",[6][7] and "the father of modern science".[8] Early life Galileo was born in Pisa (then part of the Duchy of Florence), Italy, in 1564,[15] the first of six children of Vincenzo Galilei, a famous lutenist, composer, and music theorist, and Giulia Ammannati.
Although a genuinely pious Roman Catholic,[17] Galileo fathered three children out of wedlock with Marina Gamba. Career as a scientist Galileo, Kepler and theories of tides. Desiderius Erasmus. Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (27 October[1] 1466 – 12 July 1536), known as Erasmus of Rotterdam, or simply Erasmus, was a Dutch Renaissance humanist, Catholic priest, social critic, teacher, and theologian. Erasmus was a classical scholar who wrote in a pure Latin style.
Amongst humanists, he enjoyed the sobriquet "Prince of the Humanists"; he has been called "the crowning glory of the Christian humanists".[2] Using humanist techniques for working on texts, he prepared important new Latin and Greek editions of the New Testament. These raised questions that would be influential in the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation.
He also wrote On Free Will,[3] The Praise of Folly, Handbook of a Christian Knight, On Civility in Children, Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style, Julius Exclusus, and many other works. Erasmus was his baptismal name, given after St. Early life[edit] Ordination and monastic experience[edit] Education and scholarship[edit] Thomas Moore.
Early life[edit] Thomas Moore was born at 12 Aungier-street in Dublin, Ireland, on 28 May 1779.[1] over his father's grocery shop, his father being from the Kerry Gaeltacht and his mother, Anastasia Codd, from Wexford. He had two younger sisters, Kate and Ellen. First success[edit] The soldier and politician Lord Moira was a major early patron of Moore. For many years Moore hoped his connection with him would lead to public office but he was ultimately disappointed. In 1799 he travelled to London to study law at the Middle Temple. North America[edit] From Norfolk he travelled across the United States and Canada in a Grand Tour. Duel and marriage[edit] Lord Jeffrey whom Moore nearly fought in a duel in 1806 after a bad review of his work.
It was after this trip that he published his book, Epistles, Odes, and Other Poems, which featured a paean to the historic Cohoes Falls called Lines Written at the Cohos [sic], or Falls of the Mohawk River, among other famous verses. Irish Melodies[edit] Niccolò Machiavelli. Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli (Italian: [nikkoˈlɔ makjaˈvɛlli]; 3 May 1469 – 21 June 1527) was an Italian historian, politician, diplomat, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence during the Renaissance.
He was for many years an official in the Florentine Republic, with responsibilities in diplomatic and military affairs. He was a founder of modern political science, and more specifically political ethics. He also wrote comedies, carnival songs, and poetry. His personal correspondence is renowned in the Italian language. "Machiavellianism" is a widely used negative term to characterize unscrupulous politicians of the sort Machiavelli described in The Prince. Life[edit] Machiavelli was born in a tumultuous era—popes waged acquisitive wars against Italian city-states, and people and cities often fell from power.
Machiavelli was taught grammar, rhetoric, and Latin. Between 1503 and 1506, Machiavelli was responsible for the Florentine militia. Works[edit] The Prince[edit]