“Once upon a time, the notion of the scientific method—updating beliefs based on experimental evidence—was a philosophical notion.”
“But back in Galileo’s era, it was solely vague verbal arguments that said you should try to produce numerical predictions of experimental results, rather than consulting the Bible or Aristotle.”
As far as I know, the first hints of the scientific method (testing theories by experiment) appear in the writings of Roger Bacon (who liven a few hundred years before the Francis Bacon people seem to confuse him with). He argued that when interpreting Aristotle, instead of arguing what the modern translation of an obscure Greek word was, you should use experiments to try out the alternative meanings. Experiment was conceived as a method of consulting Aristotle.
“Once upon a time, the notion of the scientific method—updating beliefs based on experimental evidence—was a philosophical notion.”
“But back in Galileo’s era, it was solely vague verbal arguments that said you should try to produce numerical predictions of experimental results, rather than consulting the Bible or Aristotle.”
As far as I know, the first hints of the scientific method (testing theories by experiment) appear in the writings of Roger Bacon (who liven a few hundred years before the Francis Bacon people seem to confuse him with). He argued that when interpreting Aristotle, instead of arguing what the modern translation of an obscure Greek word was, you should use experiments to try out the alternative meanings. Experiment was conceived as a method of consulting Aristotle.
Humble beginnings.