Chapter 17 Vocab

law of universal gravitation

Newton's law that all objects are attracted to each other and that the force of attraction is proportional to the object's quantity of matter and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them

secularism

application of science to religion

utilitarianism

greatest good for the greatest number

experimental method

the approach, pioneered by Galileo, that the proper way to explore the workings of the universe was through repeatable experiments rather than speculation

scientific method

mathematical analysis, experimentation, inductive reasoning

empiricism

a theory of inductive reasoning that calls for acquiring evidence through observation and experimentation rather than reason and speculation

natural philosophy

an early modern term for the study of nature and the universe, its purpose, and how it functioned; it encompassed what we would call "science" today

law of inertia

created by Galileo, states that motion is the natural state of an object, and that an object continues to move until stopped by an external force

Enlightenment

the influential intellectual movement of the late 1600's and 1700's that introduced a new worldview based on the use of reason, the scientific method, and progress

cosmology

Ideas and beliefs about the universe as an ordered system, its origin and the place of humans in the universe through which, people in that culture understand the makeup and the workings of all things.

Copernican hypothesis

the idea that the sun was the center of the universe

rationalism

reason is the arbiter of all things

Cartesian dualism

Descartes's view that all of reality could ultimately be reduced to mind and matter

inductive reasoning

specific to general, based on observation and experience