Chapter 16

Law of Inertia

A law formulated by Galileo that states that motion ,not rest, is the natural state of an object, and that an object continues in motion forever unless stopped by some external force

Philosophes

A group of French intellectuals who proclaimed that they were bringing the light of knowledge

Tabula rasa

Locke's argument that all humans entered the world a "blank page"

Copernican Hypothesis

The idea that the sun, not the earth, was the center of the universe

Cameralism

View that monarchy was the best form of government, that all elements of society should serve the monarch, and that, in turn, the state should use its resources and authority to increase the public good

Rationalism

A secular, critical way of thinking in which nothing was to be accepted on faith, and everything was to be submitted to reason

Empiricism

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

Enlightenment

The influential intellectual and cultural movement of the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that introduced a new worldview based on the use of reason, the scientific method, and progress

Public sphere

An idealized intellectual space that emerged in Europe during the Enlightenment, where the public came together to discuss important issues relating to society, economics, and politics

World-view

A motionless Earth is fixed at the center of the universe. Around it are ten separate moving transparent crystal spheres. the first eight spheres contain, in turn, the moon, sun, the five known planets, and the stars. The other two were to account for star movements over the centuries. The sublunar world is made up of four imperfect, changeable elements known as: air, fire, earth, and wind.

Natural philosophy

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

Deism

Belief in distant, noninterventionist deity; common among Enlightenment thinkers

The Public

The public was quite different from the great majority of the population, which was known as the common people, or simply "the people"

Rococo

A popular style in Europe in the eighteenth century, known for it's soft pastels, ornate interiors, sentimental portraits, and starry-eyed lovers protected by hovering cupids

Skepticism

As scientific knowledge spread, more educated people began to question religious truths/values

Progress

Central theme of the enlightenment, view that humans could shape and change their society using reason.

Cartesian Dualism

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

Law of Universal Gravitation

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

Experimental Method

Rather than speculate about what might or should happen, Galileo conducted controlled experiments to find out what actually did happen

Salons

Regular social gathering held by talented and rich Parisians in their homes, where philosophes and their followers met to discuss literature, science, and philosophy

Enlightened Absolutism

Term coined by historians to describe the rule of the eighteenth-century monarchs who, without renouncing their own absolute authority, adopted Enlightenment ideals of rationalism, progress, and tolerance

Haskalah

The Jewish Enlightenment of the second half of the eighteenth century, led by the Prussian philosopher Moses Mendelssohn

Sensationalism

The idea that all human ideas and thoughts are produced as a result of sensory impressions

Separation of Powers

The idea that despotism could be avoided when political power was divided and shared by a variety of classes and legal estates holding unequal rights and privileges