Late-Renaissance Scholarly Agency and the Breakthrough into Modern Science

The breakthrough into modern science is analysed with reference to four elements: (1) The breakthroughs achieved by Kepler and Galileo; (2) the systematic use of the experimental method; (3) the rise of the mechanical philosophy; and (4) the mathematization of nature. In borrowing the Greek tradition, Arabic scholarship displayed a strong realist trend, as embodied in Arabic astronomers’ efforts to make Ptolemy more physically plausible. But Arabic astronomers nonetheless remained within Ptolemy’s ‘saving the phenomenon’ tradition, as did Copernicus as well. Kepler broke away from this by modifying his theoretical model in response to empirical falsification; and Galileo’s breakthroughs in motion theory enabled the overcoming of physical objections to heliocentrism. Kepler’s and Galileo’s achievements could only have occurred in a climate of changed scholarly agency (scholarly values and drives) in the post-1453 era, which came about as unforeseen consequences of a synthesis of contingent external events.