Talk:Scientific Revolution

message: ;The following sources use Scientific Revolution
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;The following sources use scientific revolution
*Encyclopaedia Britannica (2002 CD-ROM and online editions) Finell (Talk) 19:46, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Usage in reliable sources

message: As I suggested in the discussion below, the recent lower casing of the article title may have led to confusion here between the Scientific Revolution as a specific historical period and the general concept of a scientific revolution as discussed by Thomas Kuhn in his Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
I think the capitalization made a useful distinction and should be restored.  --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 19:07, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: This may have been a contributory factor, but I don't see that it can have been a major cause of misunderstanding. Anyone who has read the first sentence of the lead can see that the article is about a specific historic period. just looking at the title, however, it is easy to see how it could be taken as a general term. It is not obvious to me, however, that this would be much less so if the title were capitalised. It seems to me that it the article title were "The scientific revolution" then it would be 100% clear from a first glance that it refers to a specific event. Generally Wikipedia does not use definite articles at the start of article titles, but there is provision for exceptions, and I think there is a case for making one here. WP:THE gives "If a word without a definite article would have a general meaning, while the same word has a specific and identifiable meaning ...", which, it seems to me, clearly applies here. However, it goes on to specify "...if there is justification to have separate articles for both meanings". I think there is such justification, if someone with enough relevant knowledge is prepared to write an article on the general concept. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:17, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: This change may be causing confusion

message: :Any additional comments:
*Could the proposer please specify what change he has in mind.  The article was previously changed from Scientific Revolution to Scientific revolution and there has been previous discussion of the question of capitalization. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 17:16, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: * As this issue has a history, I avoided making a specific proposal. I imagine, though, that "Scientific Revolution", like "Industrial Revolution" is the solution. When I clicked on a link to this article, then saw its (current) name/title, I thought it'd be about what makes a scientific revolution, not the historical period. Sardanaphalus (talk) 18:49, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

text: The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move.  Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.</div>
Belated answer: Probably yes, mostly, but it'll depend on contextual details.  The Cultural Revolution, for example, is something different from the others; it's political sloganeering like the New Deal and other such phrases, when used in a general abstract way in discussing communism (though in some places it was actually pretty much a real, armed revolution, when used in a more specific meaning, in which case it's like the American Revolution or the Glorious Revolution, a capitalized conflict name).  It presently mostly seems borderline conventional to capitalize Agricultural Revolution and Industrial Revolution as general world-changing phases of human cultural shift, but this capitalization isn't universal and certainly isn't necessary.  It's also misleading, because there were multiple agricultural revolutions in different parts of the world, which sometimes had no connection to each other at all.  The AR in the Americas was independent of those in Eureasia and Africa (which are generally thought to be related to each other, starting around the Fertile Crescent and radiating outward over centuries, though in fits and starts, and not in a centralized way, but through piecemeal adoption of techniques and behaviors which varies from place to place and cultural exchange to cultural exchange. And there is still some debate about this diffusing model, especially for eastern Asia and southern Africa).  "Commercial revolution" is clearly not a proper name, and isn't even a very well-used term. It's a descriptive appellation for a vague period, or a series of vaguely connected cultural shifts, in one region's history, which to our modern eyes culminated one kind of shift, toward modern commerce and the ascendancy of the merchant/middle class and of capitalism.  Not a term anyone would have used during or immediately after it (which makes it similar to "agricultural revolution" in being an anachronistic retro-label we've come up with in modern times, while qualitatively different from the industrial revolution, the digital revolution, etc., etc. (even "industrial revolution" was used in the 1800s, while it was still ongoing, and notably the term was introduced in a period when Capitalize Because Its Important was a typical style in English, one which has long since been abandoned except in marketing).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:15, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: Discussion

message: (1) The first point of concern was what I saw in the lead, unsourced it will not surprise you to learn, which makes the rather grandiose claim that "The completion of the Scientific Revolution is attributed to the "grand synthesis" of Isaac Newton's 1687 Principia." In the Encyclopedia of the Scientific Revolution: From Copernicus to Newton(2000, ed. W. Applebaum, Routledge, NY) I cannot find this phrase or sentiment. It continues "The work formulated the laws of motion and universal gravitation, thereby completing the synthesis of a new cosmology." Most certainly, but does that signify a "grand synthesis" that ended the Scientific Revolution? Perhaps, but I would be very skeptical,
(2) The first paragraph of the introduction proceeds reasonably and without controversy, highlighting how jolting, paradigm-shifting advances in science have often been term "revolutionary" (calling on the authority of conventionally celebrated figures of]the Scientific Revolution such as Alexis Clairauta French mathematician, astronomer, and geophysicist. He was a prominent Newtonian whose work helped to establish the validity of the principles and results that Sir Isaac Newton had outlined in the Principia of 1687 and Antoine Lavoisiera chemist who was central to the 18th-century chemical revolution and who had a large influence on both the history of chemistry and the history of biology... Lavoisier is most noted for his discovery of the role oxygen plays in combustion. He recognized and named oxygen (1778) and hydrogen (1783), and opposed the phlogiston theory. Lavoisier helped construct the metric system, wrote the first extensive list of elements, and helped to reform chemical nomenclature. He predicted the existence of silicon (1787) and discovered that, although matter may change its form or shape, its mass always remains the same.. However, the article then goes on to quote the English theologian and poet William Whewell... using a quote from him to  say "this gave rise" to the "common view of the Scientific Revolution today", as elucidated by the Encyclopedia Britannica
(3) The next paragraph appears to me as a travesty of Original Research. Repeating my edit summary "the author of this paragraph seems to be making a lineal causal link from Copernicus to Newton to Bacon to Galileo as the "Beginning, Middle, and End" of the Scientific Revolution. Such a claim would require exquisite referencing to overcome its presumed extreme reductionism/oversimplification."
(4) In the section Significance we a treated to a conventional summation of the SR effects by one Joseph Ben-David. Followed by a 1611 poem from English religious writer John Donne (seriously!), some commentary from mid-20th-century English historian Herbert Butterfield and then we here from Australian gentleman called Peter Harrison, who largely focuses on religion and works at a 5th-rate University in Australia, who tells the reader that Christianity was a major contributor to the Scientific Revolution. 
(5) In the section Empiricism, seven individuals are mentioned, all of them British, except for Descartes who is aligned against the empiricists as a rationalist (although this is not fully explained for the reader). 
(6) In the section Baconian Science (what?), we are told "The philosophical underpinnings of the Scientific Revolution were laid out by Francis Bacon, who has been called the father of empiricism." Even Bacon himself acknowledged Italian philosopher Bernardino Telesio, who had influenced Pierre Gassendi long before Bacon came on the scene. Instead we are only told of Hume, Berkeley, Hobbes, and William Gilbert. As if [[[Condillac]], Alhazen, Didorot, Helvétius, Moritz Schlick and Rudolf Carnap never existed. Also the reader would have no idea that the extreme empiricist philosophy of Berkeley for instance, would not only be intolerable to contemporary scientific minds but his theories of optics have been decisively disproven by modern medical, technological, and scientific advances.
I could go on, but I'm running out of steam. Time fae ma bed. EnlightenmentNow1792 (talk) 08:31, 5 November 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  A quite comical - but nevertheless peculiar and damaging to Wikipedia's reputation - Anglocentrism in the composition of this article. 

message: In the Wikipedia article on the "Scientific Revolution", the photo associated with the "Renaissance" hyperlink i.e. found ion the line "...The Scientific Revolution took place in Europe starting towards the second half of the Renaissance period" and the term "Scientific Renaissance" seems inappropriate, perhaps a deliberate lampoon. I would suggest another photo, perhaps of Isaac Newton. 2601:603:4C7E:4C10:1531:83E2:2047:ACE8 (talk) 23:15, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. The person who loves reading (talk) 23:18, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 31 March 2023