History of sciences

The Science, as a Corpus of knowledge but also like manner of approaching and of including/understanding the world, has been constituted in a progressive way for a few millenia. It is indeed at the protohistoric times that started to develop the intellectual speculations aiming at elucidating the mysteries of the Univers. The history of sciences as a discipline studies the progressive movement of transformation of these speculations, and the accumulation of knowledge which accompanies it. We present here some broad outlines of this evolution of the scientific knowledge, which constitutes a history of sciences .

The history of sciences is not the chronicle of a series of scientific discoveries. It is the history of the evolution of a thought, but also of institutions which offer to this thought the means of being spread, and of traditions which come to enrich it.

The history of sciences is not the Histoire of the techniques. The ones and the others are of course bound, but cannot be identified. When the man controls fire, cuts flints or invents agriculture, it does not make work of science. And knowledge which it had accumulated is not traditional scientific knowledge, but artisanal knowledge.

Prehistory

Historically the Technique precedes the Science. By resting on a empirical step, the man invents tools very early and discovers the Feu, it is the period of the Paléolithique (which starts it there has approximately 2,5 million years and is completed towards the thousand-year-old XIe front J. - C.). No science strictly speaking exists at that time.

Science and the magic were during several millenia very related one to the other.

The development of agriculture and the breeding are not either without relationship with the emergence of certain protosciences, calculation and astronomy in particular. It is necessary for example to count the animals, to measure the quantities of grains, which implies a certain art Mathématique, and also to be worried about the seasons for the sowing and harvests, and the birth of the Astronomie is perhaps not foreign with these requirements.

If these great stages of the history of humanity (breeding, agriculture,…) take part in construction of what will become, many centuries later, a scientific thought, it is essential, to include/understand the history of sciences , to hold them not for explanations of the appearance of science, but well for elements of a complex history. In a general way, the history of sciences is neither linear, nor reducible with the simplistic causal diagrams which are found sometimes in certain books of popularization

Antiquity

The man thinks his environment since mists of time, as testifies the prehistoric frescos to them. But they are only a few centuries before the Christian era, at most a millenium, which a true scientific thought started to be formed, with the crossing of various traditions: Greek of course, but also mésopotamienne, Egyptian, even Indian or Chinese.

Prescience mésopotamienne and Babylonian

See also: Sciences mésopotamienne and Babylonian

It is the Sumérien which becomes for the first time a language written, towards 3300 av. J. - C. This writing was used at the beginning for the Commerce. Pictogramme S represented objects and gradually, the need was felt to extend the system. The following stage, which was the beginning of the establishment of a true written language, was to associate the sounds with pictograms and finally to associate them only with sounds, thus offering the written equivalent of a spoken language. The Invention of the writing is a very important thing for the safeguarding and the transmission of the ideas. The support of writing in Mésopotamie was the Argile present in many forms, in shelves of course, but also in form of Cylindre S or prisms.

It is on Babylonian clay shelves that the trace of the first mathematics is found. The four basic Opérations were done using tables and the practices solution to problem using words detailing all the stages. Although these methods were not practical with use, they had the merit to function and make it possible to solve equations going until the third degree. Not more than in Egypt there does not seem to have been theorization of these algorithms. One empirically gave only examples made up, certainly repeated by the pupils and the scribes. For this reason, it is thus about a empirical know-how , transmitted like such, and not of a rational mathematical science. However, this Algèbre will not be extended and it will be necessary to await work of the Moslem mathematicians to develop this aspect of mathematics.

Always for the trade, it was necessary to name the animals and the plants. But they were not limited to a simple enumeration, they classified them and that exceeded the simply commercial field. Thus hundreds of animals and plants are classified in “reigns” (fish, shellfish, snakes, birds or quadrupeds).

Mésopotamiens knew several diseases and had remedies for each one of them. Texts and manual medical had even been written, but it would seem that the experiment of the doctor was most important. The remedies, containing vegetable drugs like roots but also of minerals like the salt, côtoyaient the magic. At that time, one thought for example that certain plants were to be gathered on certain dates, managed a certain number of times (of the Chiffre S like the 3, the 7 and their multiples were very snuffed). The recitation of incantations formed also part of the remedy. All that is very logically explained by the fact why in these times, one thought that the diseases were of divine origin. Thus, if one wished to look after the patient, the gods had to be alleviated.

Geographical charts are also carried out, as that of the town of Nippour (which was even used by the archeologists exploring the vestiges of the city). A chart of the world was even found, placing Babylon in the center and the distances represented by the duration of the voyage and not by the real distances.

Egyptian sciences

See also: Papyrus Rhind

Old Egypt, just like Mésopotamie, are resulting from the remote civilization of the Neolithic . Its existence and its maintenance extend on more: 3000 years. The Egyptian Civilization is related to a single geographical place which entirely founds it: the valley of the Nile. It is the the Nile which, by its rising, brings water and the silt, i.e. the life. The irrigation drainage, sophisticated technology thought on an entire country scale, allows the control of the flood. The existence of an alternation between years the good ones and bad risings requires storage and the redistribution on a country scale, therefore, as of 3000 av. J. - C., the writing. The State is organized starting from many civils servant (scribes, priests, soldiers) trained in schools (the school of elite of the kep provides even a high level teaching). Certain civils servant, in the Houses of Life , are true multi-field researchers, in mathematics, astronomy, medicine. The scribes are not confined with the Empirisme, they proceed to a certain conceptualization of the problems.

In mathematics, the number pi is used, since the Moyen Empire and probably quite front under the Ancient Empire, to calculate the surface of the circle: one allots the value of 4 to him × (8/9) × (8/9), that is to say 3,16, which gives on pi an accuracy of 0,6% (see Quadrature of the circle). The pyramids are directed compared to the race of the Sun (equinox) with a precision of a few minutes of arc. It is with Alexandria, precisely, that will come to train the Greek scientists, and Euclide will pass its life in Egypt, Thalès and Pythagore had come there, Plato also seems it. But the Egyptians develop sciences only from the one practical point of view (architectural construction, administration), and does not engage in an examination " scientifique" world. In addition, it is only with the Greeks that the demonstrations will appear. Certain authors, without calling in question the idea of a clear rupture between Egyptian science and Greek science, stress that one cannot deny with Egyptian sciences any conceptualization without to have made of it the demonstration by the detailed examination of the texts. These theses are recognized still rather little by the community of the historians of sciences. Egyptian engineering reaches an impressive effectiveness: the Égyptiens spend only thirty years to build each large pyramid. The number of workmen necessary, the volume of stones to be brought, transport since the careers, the infrastructure necessary to the realization (slopes), the quantity of food to be brought to the workmen, all is calculated. The precision of the technique of size of the stones, also, is really impressive and one still does not include/understand how them: 20000 workmen of the Pyramide of Khéphren (whom we know from now on by the excavations) managed to make perfectly jointed of the so enormous blocks while assembling them where they are. The temples, the obelisks and the tombs are quite as impressive. The scribes calculated quickly and well, the workmen worked quickly and well. Contrary to a tough belief, slavery did not exist in Egypt: these workmen, holders of an high-tech, are particularly cherished by the Pharaon S.

Because of practice of the Embalming, the Egyptian doctors have a thorough knowledge of the interior of the human body. They identified and described a great number of diseases of which they found the traces thus. They are qualified in medicine cardiologic, gynaecological, of the eyes, the intestinal and urinary ways. They practice operations successfully. They are most famous of their time and one largely calls upon them, including since the foreigner. As for mathematics, they taught their knowledge orally and by means of a certain number of papyri (Papyrus Ebers, Papyrus Edwin Smith , Papyrus Carlsberg ). It is not a chance if the Greek doctors, like their colleagues mathematicians or astronomers, came to be formed in the Maison of Life of the famous library of Alexandria.

Egyptian astronomy, in addition to the cartography of the sky, controls the precise description of the movement of the Sun and the exact calculation of the éphémérides. The zodiac, which we inherited, is not other than the calendar of the Egyptian seasons. 365 days the practical calendar 1/4 is different from 365 days the civil administrative calendar, the most important moment is the heliacal Lever of Sothis (Sirius), which coincides with the beginning of raw of the the Nile (Aquarius). It is indeed astronomy, without any ulterior motive related to the astrology, practical which will be introduced on late by the Greeks.

Egyptian science nourished Greek science with Alexandria. The Egyptians are, via the Greeks, one of the sources of modern science.

Greek sciences

See also: Greek Sciences

Greek sciences inherit the Babylonian knowledge and, directly with Alexandria, the Egyptian scientific knowledge. They are organized around the centers of exchanges which are the big cities of the Greek colonies, which surround the Mediterranean basin then. Greek sciences maintain a close link with the Spéculation Philosophique: the Logique was born from the question of the coherence of the Discours; the Physical of that of the principle of all things.

There is besides no clear border between the Science and the Philosophie. The majority of the scientists are at the same time scientists and philosophers, for the simple reason that the Science is not formalized yet. Just like the Philosophy, it uses the natural Langue exclusively to be expressed. They are only several centuries later with Galileo that the Science will be formalized, and started to be detached from the Philosophie. However, one distinguishes two great movements of thought, generated by two schools whose influences intersect:

• the Monisme, or idea of the unit of the world taken in its totality, historically introduced by Milésiens, proposes a vision of a world being organized starting from a generating principle (some aspects result from this from the thought nuclear physicist and the Matérialisme).
• the Formalism, historically introduced by the school pythagorician, proposes a mathematical vision of a Cosmos ordered by the Nombre S, where the component Mystique is much more explicit since the number is a kind of idea of the God (the atomism would also rise from the pythagorism, since the number becomes a body entity).

The two currents carry in them a very strong attachment to the Expérience. One speaks about “contemplative” science to indicate the ancient attitude of the Greek scientists. The Astronomie is the perfect example.

The Greeks are regarded as the founders of the Mathématiques, because they invented what makes the gasoline of it even: the Demonstration. Thalès is sometimes regarded as the first philosopher who had the idea to reason on the mathematical beings in themselves, without more making use of figures Empirique S. the arrival of the mathematical proof is certainly related on the installation of the Démocratie and the need for showing the veracity of its speech, but it is with Euclide that it seems an intrinsic component of the mathematical thought. It will be also noted that Greek mathematics is above all the Géométrie and of the Arithmétique. On the thirteen books of the Éléments of Euclide, which constitute a sum of the Connaissance S mathematics of third century BC, nine are devoted to the Géométrie and four with the Arithmétique. It is thus essential to understand that, for the Greeks, calculation does not form part of the Mathématiques. It is the business of the accountants - the “logisticians” according to the Greek word - and the Greeks are besides of very poor calculators. Calculation will be with the Algèbre one of the large projections of Arab mathematics.

One can retain among the most known Greek scientists, in the chronological order, Thalès, Pythagore, Hippocrates, Aristote, Euclide and Archimedes.

Chinese sciences

See also: Chinese Sciences

If modern science were born in Europe from the 17th century, good number of inventions and scientific discoveries were made in China and form part of our daily newspaper today.

It is the case for example of the circulation Sang uine, allotted to William Harvey, of the First law of movement redécouverte by Isaac Newton, or of the Imprimerie in mobile matters, reinvented by Johannes Gutenberg. One of the most important scientists of China was Shen Kuo (1031 - 1095), and quite front him Zhang Heng (78 - 139).

Thus, the fruits of almost thirty centuries of Chinese developments technological and scientific, were transmitted the East to the Occident by many ways (like India towards the world arabo-Moslem to come towards Europe). During several years, these discoveries were minimized, amplified with excess. But since the Years 1960, the barrier of the language is crossed and thus makes it possible the Occident to better know the History of China and its scientific evolution.

Hindu sciences

See also: Hindu Sciences

Just like in China, the history of Hindu sciences is badly known.

Astronomy, as for other civilizations, made it possible to define the Calendrier S and to be interested in the Astrologie. But they hardly went further. Thus, contrary to the Greeks and Chinese, they did not chart the sky.

With regard to mathematics, they were initially purely practical. Thus, for the trade, it was necessary to establish identical measuring rods, like those discovered with Mohenjo-daro. It is thus probable that such measuring units were also used by other cities. They developed a series of words to express the very great numbers, up to 10 ¹ ². They controlled the irrational numbers and the squares roots of 2 and 3 with several decimals. They also discovered what one calls the Théorème of Pythagore. But what remains more in the spirits today is the Zero represented by a point. The decimal notation that one usually calls Arab numeral is also their work and was adopted later in the Arab world by Al-Khwarizmi. The principal Hindu mathematicians were Âryabhata which in particular calculated the first four decimals of pi, and Brahmagupta which worked on the series of numbers and the definition of the zero.

In chemistry they completed remarkable work in the fusion of the Fer. What in particular enabled them to melt of large objects like the Pilier of iron of Delhi, which measure more than seven meters in height for a weight of more than six tons. The characteristic of this pillar is that it does not present any deterioration or traces rust. It has was necessary to wait until 2002 and work of the professor R. Balasubramanian to know the origin of it.

In medicine, they discovered that certain diseases were due to changes in the environment (change of Saison S, bad hygiene, etc), but they did not seek to classify the diseases. The Basic Treaty of Hindu medicine is the Ayurveda. This last explained why the diseases are due to an imbalance and that thus to cure a patient it is necessary to replace the harmful elements by those which are harmonious. Explanations on various surgical operations are also present.

The Middle Ages

Arab sciences

See also: Islamic Sciences and technology

With the the Middle Ages, Greek and Indian sciences are preserved, in particular by the translation in Arabic of many books, present in the Bibliothèque of Alexandria. These sciences then are enriched and diffused by the civilization arabo-Moslem woman which then saw a golden age (Al-Khwarizmi, Avicenne, Averroès).

One owes him in particular of many work in Astronomie, in Géographie, Optique, Médecine, but also in mathematics (Algèbre, combinative Analyze and Trigonométrie mainly).

Sciences of Latin medieval Europe

See also: Science of the Middle Ages

In the top the Middle Ages, sciences are structured around the Liberal arts, of which the scientific part is consisted the Quadrivium, defined by Boèce in the 6th century. Bède Worthy the took it again (with the Comput), then Alcuin, principal adviser of Charlemagne, introduced it into the school S of the Carolingian empire.

After the invasions Vikings, Arabic, and Hungarian women, the Occident Médiéval (Latin) adapts then the Greek and Arab heritage. Towards the Year millet, Gerbert d' Aurillac (which will become the pope Sylvestre {{II}}) brings back Spain the decimal system with its zero and reintroduced the Quadrivium in the schools of occident.

At the 12th century, of 1120 with 1190 approximately, a systematic work of translation of works of the scientists and Greek and Arab philosophers is carried out with Tolède and in four cities in Italy (Rome, Pisa, Venice, Palermo, to see for example Al Idrissi in this last city), being also based on the Greek philosophical writings (Plato, Aristote), them so transmitted by the arabo-Moslems (except Plato who had not been lost).

The progressive diffusion of this knowledge at the 12th century in all the Occident leads to their integration by Albert Large the in the Université S then in creation: Bologna, Paris (Sorbonne), Oxford, Salamanque, etc, with the disciplines of the right (see Rebirth of the {{S|XII|E}}).

On the 13th century, the Theology of Thomas d' Aquin, on the University of Paris, is based on the writings of Aristote which a long time will make authority as regards scientific and philosophical method (one did not make really the difference between these two fields). Paris acquires a great prestige for its very famous Université, and becomes a kind of capital of the Occident.

One at that time notes some critical on the books of Physique of Aristote (on behalf of Roger Bacon in particular), which however do not relate in any manner to the method Philosophique.

The Grand plague which devastates the occident (1347 - 1351, which is repeated then by successive waves) then the Guerre One hundred Year old in France stop this Rebirth, which nevertheless begins again rather quickly in Italy and with Avignon. The late Moyen-âge announces already, to, the Renaissance, and brings still much of Connaissance S in Géographie and Cartographie, disciplines where the Occident had accumulated a great delay. Pierre d' Ailly, with the turning of the writing the Imago mundi (1410), which will be used for some Christophe Colomb, and FRA Mauro feeds in knowledge Cartographique S the first Portuguese navigators in the middle of the 15th century. They prepared the Grandes discoveries by the navigators Européen S of the Renaissance.

Sciences of South America

August 1st

Rebirth

See also: Sciences in Europe during the Rebirth

The Rebirth in Europe (which started in Italy), was one period which ended in a true scientific revolution. Completely new theories appeared, calling into question the way in which the man saw the world and its place in this last.

In fact, which one usually calls the Renaissance started much earlier in Italy and with Avignon, which in the remainder of the Europe (this word only started to be spread), and especially in France, which remained a long time affected by the sudden starts of the Guerre One hundred Year old. As of the 14th century (Trecento), one saw hearths of Renaissance appearing with Venice, His, Florence, Rome and still more at the 15th century (Bruges and Flemish cities, the Rhineland, Alsace, Burgundy, Portugal, Castille, Bourges, etc).

The reasons of this Renaissance are multiple, like:

• the redécouverte as of the 12th century of the old texts (Aristote) preserved and enriched by the Arabs (see Rebirth of the {{S|XII|especially E}}),
• the invention of the Paper (imported China),
• the invention of the Printing works (1453) (also imported and improved by Gutenberg) which made it possible to diffuse in greater number of the books (the copies on Manuscrit took time) and to publish books in vernacular languages in the place of the Latin , therefore to propagate the Culture,
• progress in Géographie and Cartographie (Pierre d' Ailly and the Imago mundi of 1410, charts of FRA Mauro in 1457),
• technological advances around navigation (caravel) and of positioning (Boussole, Sextant, etc),
• the expansion of maritime exploration around the African continent (Portuguese), then towards the New world,
• the birth of the Protestantism and the Hermetism which forced the Roman Catholic church to be called into question, amorçant what will be a separation of science and religion.

Copernic lived during the Rebirth, but the possibilities of diffusion of the Information were not yet such as its ideas, always so badly not accepted at the beginning, could be diffused widely. One cannot speak about Révolution copernician with the clean direction for the Renaissance (it was a little posterior). However, there was well a radical change of vision of the world, which related more to the catch of Conscience by the greatest number of the rotundity of the Earth (one knew it since the 12th century at least in the cultivated mediums), as of the moment that the navigators had crossed the Atlantique. In particular, the voyages of Christophe Colomb had a considerable repercussion.

Scientific progresses and techniques of the Rebirth, as well as the revival in the other fields (art) were one of the causes of the extraordinary period of explorations by the navigators European, initially Portuguese, and Italian, then Spanish and French, qualified Grandes discoveries, which made it possible Europe to secure supremacy Mondiale.

Modern time

17th century

See also: Sciences at the XVIIe century

In Antiquity and until the 18th century, science is indissociable philosophy besides (one named science, natural philosophy) and narrowly controlled by the religions. Under the pressure of the knowledge which accumulates, it unceasingly comes to run up against the religious dogmas. The control of the religion on sciences gradually will decrease with the appearance of the Astronomie and the Physique modern, making sciences an autonomous and independent field.

The transition between the medieval Sciences and the Renaissance is often confused with the Révolution copernician. In Reality, the Revolution copernician, to the clean direction, corresponds rather to the transition between the Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment, because it was necessary a certain amount of time so that the discovery of the Héliocentrisme is shared and accepted.

From the scientific point of view, it is indeed the Astronomie which starts the change at that time. After Copernic which lived before the Guerre Thirty Year old (the year 1543 corresponds to the publication of its principal treaty), other astronomers took again the observations Astronomique S: Tycho Brahé, then Kepler, which carried out a considerable work on the observation of planets of the Solar system, and stated the three laws on the movement of the planets (Lois of Kepler).

See the article: Revolution copernician

One had spoken for a few decades about the Héliocentrisme, but one sought to reconcile it with the old theory.

However, it still missed with Kepler the instrument, the glasses, which, invented in Holland in 1608 at ends of telescope simple, and improved by Galileo in 1609 for Usage S in Astronomie, made it possible this last to carry out Observation S which confirmed once more that the theory Géocentrique was Réfutable. The contribution of Galileo was also very important in sciences (Cinématique, Observation S Astronomique S, etc). It was less related to the Scolastique, and considered that, from an epistemological point of view, it was necessary to explain in what the Héliocentrisme explained the world best why the theory of old (Dialog on the two great systems of the world, 1633). It had cases of Conscience about the interpretation of the Bible (letter with Christine of Lorraine). Its treaty of 1633 was worth to him the famous lawsuit with the religious authorities (June 1633), which accepted the theory badly, considered to be incompatible with the text of the Bible. Condemned to death, his/her friend Urbain {{VIII}} commuted his sorrow to house arrest.

Rene Descartes made initially a career of scientist (work in Analyze, Géométrie, Optique). Learning the exit from the lawsuit of Galileo (November 1633), it renonça to publish a Treated world and light (1634), and launched out in the philosophical career which one knows ( Discourse on Method , 1637), seeking to define a method allowing to acquire a science right and exact, its basic principle being the doubt and the Cogito. Criticizing the Scholastic, it pushed thereafter the doubt until calling into question the same bases of the Philosophie of its time ( Méditations on philosophy first , 1641).

The Héliocentrisme was confirmed by the mathematical models of Newton (1687), and other observations finally made it accept by the Catholic church (Benoît {{XIV}}) in 1714 and 1741, written (Galileo withdrawn from the Index).

Blaise Pascal made discoveries in mathematics (Probabilité S), and in Mécanique of the fluids (experiments on the atmosphere).

Other scientists marked this time: Leibniz is considered, with Newton, like the inventor of the Infinitesimal calculus and integral, which founds the traditional Mécanique.

Francis Bacon is considered, with the Irish physicist and chemist Robert Boyle, like the founder of the Experimental method. Moreover, Robert Boyle is regarded as the founder of the Philosophie of nature (see anglophone Wikipedia: ). Though Empirical, the Experimental method is extremely important to validate theories, it constitutes one of the bases of the scientific Méthode modern.

18th century

See also: Sciences at the XVIIIe century

At the 18th century, the Life sciences and ground experienced also a great development following the voyages in Africa and in the Pacifique: one must quote Georges Louis Leclerc, count de Buffon (1707 - 1788), Carl von Linné (1707 - 1778), Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744 - 1829).

19th century

See also: Sciences at the XIXe century

At the 19th century, science continues to develop at an intensive pace:

• the modern Optique is born with work of Augustin Fresnel (polytechnician illustrates);
• the electricity and the Magnétisme are unified within the electromagnetism by James Maxwell;
• the principle of the steam engines, which are in the middle of the Industrial revolution, is explained with the birth of the Thermodynamique by Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot.

The Biologie also knows deep upheavals with the birth of the Génétique, continuation with work of Gregor Mendel, the development of the Physiologie, the abandonment of the Vitalisme following the synthesis of the Urée which shows that the organic compounds obey the same laws physicochemical as the inorganic compounds. And finally, the opposition between science and religion appear once again with the publication of the Origin of the species in 1859 of Charles Darwin.

Always in biology, work of Ernst Haeckel sees the birth of the ecology, with the study of the bonds between the living beings and their environment.

On a Philosophical level purely , Auguste Count (which never exerted as a scientist), in his doctrines positivist, formula the Loi of the three states which, according to him, makes pass the humanity of the theological age (religious knowledge ), at the age Métaphysique, then at the positive age (scientific knowledge). In the second part of its philosophical career, its thought is transformed into a kind of religiosity.

Teaching

Teaching has a capital share in the significant development that knows science, as well as the techniques, as from this time. The States which democratized teaching, provided him a context and means favorable to the scientific research were thus with the avant-garde during several years. The example of France is rather emblematic, which following the Révolution makes science one of the pillars of teaching and where a true policy of science is born with the development of existing institutions (Collège de France, national Muséum of natural history, etc) or the creation of news (Polytechnic school, Conservatoire national of arts and trades, etc). Whereas teaching was mainly given by the Church, the development of the teaching dealt with by the State was also used to laicize the country and accentuates of this fact even more separation of the Church and science. This separation of the Church and teaching will be also present in other countries as at the the United Kingdom, but a few decades later.

Professionalisation

It is at the 19th century that science professionnalise truly. The institutions (universities, academies or museums), although existing before, become the only scientific centers and marginalize the contributions of the amateurs. The cabinets of curiosities disappear with the profit from the museums and the exchanges which were current between scientists, curious amateurs and simple become increasingly rare.

However, there remain quite certain fields where work of the amateurs is important for science. It is the case of several Natural science, like the Botanique, the Ornithologie or the Entomologie, with the publication of articles in reviews of references in these fields. The Astronomie is also a field where the amateurs have a certain role and thus discovered Comet S as Hauls-Bopp or Hyakutake.

20th century

See also: Sciences at the XXe century

Just like the 19th century, the 20th century knows an important acceleration of the scientific discoveries. One can quote several reasons with that:

• improvement of the precision of the instrument S, in particular thanks to the application of some discovered;
• the universalization of the exchanges, thus involving a pooling (as much intellectual than financial) of the scientific efforts. Science becomes thus less and less a business of man alone and more and more a team work;
• the fast development of the Data-processing starting from the Years 1950 (in the United States), with a shift in Europe due to the rebuilding (years 1960) which allows a better treatment of a mass of Information S increasingly more important.

Of share the lack of retreat, it is difficult to see science at the 20th historical century of manner . It is thus delicate to determine the discoveries hinges, but one can all the same note several theories and discovered importances:

• the Physique is a field which knew large projections, in particular with the atomic physical discovering the structure of the Atomic nucleus, the Theory of relativity which made it possible to pose the bases of the physics of the objects of very great dimensions and the development of several theories explaining the Quantum physics which is that of the world on an atomic scale. One of the main objectives currently is the development of a theory unifying the four fundamental interactions, which would make it possible to explain within the same theory, the world of the infinitely great and that of the infinitely small;

• all that touches with the Biologie also knew the spectacular ones advanced. A better comprehension of the life cycle of the cells, the role of the Gene S and other basic elements of the Vie allowed large projections and opened completely new prospects. The discovery of the structure in the shape of double helix of DNA is one of the most famous examples;

• astronomy knew large projections: thanks in particular to the new discoveries in fundamental physics, and to the revolution in the instruments of observation: the Radio telescope S built in the Years 1950 - 1960 made it possible to widen the spectrum of the observable electromagnetic radiations, data processing treating the great masses of data. That leads to new cosmological theories, the theory of the Expansion of the universe being currently generally retained in the scientific Communauté. The developments Astronautique S also contributed to send in the space of true laboratories of observations and experiments;

• the Life sciences and the ground have known, for a few decades (in fact since the 19th century), a significant development, because of the attention paid to the phenomena Naturel S, with in particular the part played by Rene Dubos.

Interactions and specializations

The more sciences advance in the comprehension of the world which surrounds us, the more they tend “to nourish” from/to each other. Thus, for example, the Biologie calls upon the Chimie and the Physique, while the latter uses astronomy to confirm or cancel its theories, involving with the passage a better comprehension of the Universe. And mathematics, a scientific body more or less with share, becomes the common “language” of many branches of contemporary science.

The sum of knowledge becomes such as it is impossible for a scientist to know perfectly several branches of science. Thus they specialize more and more and to counterbalance that, team work becomes the standard. This complexification makes science increasingly abstract for those which do not take part in the scientific discoveries. As Rene Taton underlines it, the latter live it only through technological advance, thus causing a satisfying with respect to certain branches of science which do not provide a concrete application in the short run.

Epistemology

See also: Epistemology, Philosophy of sciences

The 20th century knew several philosophical and scientists who wanted to define with precision what is the science and how it evolves/moves. Thus was born epistemology.

One can quote two philosophers of sciences, which marked of their print this field:

• first is Karl Popper, which in particular declared that so that a theory is scientist, it is necessary that it is refutable by the experiment. But it also specified that the inductive step , which is the base of the validation of a scientific theory, does not guarantee of anything the veracity of a theory. It does not confirm it that within the framework of the experiment. Thus, more the number of experiments validating a theory in various cases is important, more the degree of confidence in this theory is high, but never ultimate.
• second is Thomas Kuhn, which explained why the evolution of science is punctuated calm long periods (called normal science), where a commonly allowed theory by the Scientific community established Paradigme S founders which cannot be contradicted without carrying out a revolution. These scientific revolutions appear when the observations contradict the paradigms in force too systematically. Thomas Kuhn in particular took the example in his book the structure of the scientific revolutions , of the passage of the Newtonian Mécanique with that of the General relativity. However, recent history of the physics, pulled about between two incompatible theories between them (general relativity and quantum mechanics), watch that such a bursting is perfectly compatible with an increasingly fast progress of the scientific knowledge. The philosophical doubt at all does not sully the scientific certainty of what is true and of what is false, the limits with validity of each calculation being perfectly known. This increasingly fast progress of knowledge would not be possible without this certainty.

Quotations

• Satisfy you to say to us how one goes to the sky, and leave it to us to say how the sky is. Galileo (addressing itself to its religious interlocutors of the 17th century)

• With the wire of time is held cosmic gestation. At each second, the universe prepares something. It assembles the steps of complexity slowly. Hubert Reeves

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