Scientific Revolution & Enlightenment Multiple Choice Study Guide

The "enlightened" policies of Frederick II of Prussia included all of the following except A) freeing the Prussian serfs. B) abolition of the torture of prisoners. C) permitting scholars wide latitude to publish what they wished. D) promoting schools. E) religious toleration.

A)

Which powers participated in the partitioning of Poland in the late eighteenth century? A) Prussia, Russia, and Austria. B) The Ottoman Empire, Russia, and Prussia. C) Italy, Austria, and Russia. D) Sweden, Prussia, and Russia. E) Sweden, Saxony, and Austria.

A)

__________ reduced all substances to "matter" and "mind." A) René Descartes B) Madame du Châtelet C) David Hume D) Marquis de Condorcet E) Jean-Jacques Rousseau

A)

Before 1500, science was primarily a branch of A) theology. B) rhetoric. C) law. D) medicine. E) astronomy.

A)

____________'s Persian Letters satirized French society. A) Voltaire B) Bayle C) Montesquieu D) Locke E) Descartes

C)

All of the following were important trends of Enlightenment thought except A) methods of natural science should be used to examine and understand all aspects of life. B) everything was to be submitted to rational and critical thinking. C) the scientific method could be used to study the laws of human society as well as the laws of nature. D) religion too could be analyzed using Enlightenment theories, and eventually religious truth could be known. E) is was possible for humans to create better societies and better people.

D) .

According to ________'s theory of inertia, rest is not the natural state of objects. A) Bacon B) Copernicus C) Brahe D) Newton E) Galileo

E)

All of the following were causes of the Scientific Revolution except A) the active support of the papacy. B) the contributions of medieval universities. C) the recovery of classical scholarship during the Renaissance. D) the challenges of navigation during long sea voyages. E) improvements in scientific instruments.

A)

Habsburg Emperor Joseph II abolished serfdom in the Austrian Empire in 1781. What was the outcome of this reform? A) After Joseph II's death in 1790 serfdom was more or less reinstated. B) Some peasants accumulated wealth rapidly and entered the elite of the Empire. C) Many serfs from the Russian empire began fleeing to Austria. D) High-ranking Austrian nobles assassinated Joseph II. E) Serfdom was abolished in Poland at the time of the Third Partition.

A)

Immanuel Kant argued for A) freedom of the press. B) sexual freedom. C) equality of men and women. D) the morality of slavery. E) the viability of direct democracy.

A)

Madame du Châtelet A) believed women's limited contribution to science was the result of unequal education. B) was the first woman admitted into the Royal Academy of Sciences. C) was the powerful mistress of Louis XV. D) inspired Jean-Jacques Rousseau's ideas on education and emotion. E) invented a steam engine.

A)

A striking feature of the salons was that A) clerics were banned. B) philosophes, nobles, and members of the upper middle class intermingled. C) they were often sponsored by the government. D) members of the working classes often attended. E) their main purpose was making marriage matches between poor nobles and wealthy commoners.

B)

Galileo's greatest achievement was his A) synthesis of the new scientific discoveries. B) elaboration and consolidation of the experimental method. C) invention of the telescope. D) postulation of a heliocentric universe. E) discovery of Uranus.

B)

In general, what was Voltaire's attitude toward government? A) He believed in democracy, like most philosophes. B) He believed that a good monarch was the best one could hope for. C) He saw the despot or autocrat as designated by God. D) He believed in enlightened despotism as long as he could be the despot. E) He believed in Enlightened Theocracy.

B)

The Enlightenment reached its highest development in France for all the following reasons except A) French was the international language of the educated classes. B) French scientists and universities were the most preeminent in the Scientific Revolution. C) the level of censorship and repression was somewhat less than that in most of Europe. D) French philosophes asked fundamental questions about the meaning of life, God, human nature, good and evil, and cause and effect. E) French philosophes sought actively to influence the educated public.

B)

The key feature of Newton's system was the law of A) planetary motion. B) universal gravitation. C) reciprocity. D) constant acceleration. E) equivalence of mass and energy.

B)

Which of the following was published first? A) The Social Contract B) On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres C) Encyclopedia D) Essay Concerning Human Understanding E) Principia

B)

According to its editor, the fundamental goal of the Encyclopedia was to A) popularize the Scientific Revolution. B) improve the material life of Europeans. C) change the general way of thinking. D) undermine French absolutism. E) overthrow the king.

C)

Copernicus's theory of the universe A) destroyed the distinction between earthly and heavenly worlds. B) was endorsed by John Calvin. C) postulated an sun-centered view of the universe. D) strengthened the Ptolemaic theory of the universe. E) used epicycles to explain planetary motion.

C)

In his Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke claimed that A) sovereign authority rests in the hands of the people. B) all people are born with certain ideas and ways of thinking. C) human development is determined by education and society. D) people are born corrupt and society must reeducate them. E) governments are formed by contracts among free individuals.

C)

Joseph II's conversion of labor obligations to cash payments A) had the support of the nobles. B) transformed a barter economy into a cash one. C) was opposed by both nobles and peasants. D) was the basis for the future evolution of Austrian society. E) followed Russian precedent.

C)

Rousseau's concept of the "general will" asserts that A) enlightened monarchs protect the interests of the entire society and should be relied on for reform. B) only by direct democracy can the people's political wishes be conveyed. C) authentic, long-term needs of the people can be correctly interpreted by a farseeing minority. D) sovereignty resides in the people. E) public opinion polling can be a valuable support to democracy.

C)

All of the following astronomers contributed to the destruction of the Aristotelian view of the universe except A) Nicolaus Copernicus. B) Galileo Galilei. C) Johannes Kepler. D) Bernard de Fontenelle. E) Tycho Brahe.

D)

Catherine the Great of Russia came to power in 1762 through A) inheritance of the throne from her mother Elizabeth. B) an invitation from the Russian Senate to rule. C) Frederick II of Prussia's invasion of Russia. D) a military coup. E) election by the boyars.

D)

In his Spirit of Laws, Montesquieu argued for A) direct democracy. B) enlightened absolutism. C) popular sovereignty. D) the separation of governmental powers. E) cultural relativism.

D)

The accomplishments of Frederick II included all of the following except A) territorial expansion. B) judicial and bureaucratic reform. C) the reconstruction of agriculture and industry. D) restructuring the Prussian social system. E) promotion of education.

D)

The two men generally given credit for creating the modern scientific method were Francis Bacon and A) Johannes Kepler. B) Nicolaus Copernicus. C) John Locke. D) René Descartes. E) Isaac Newton.

D)

To improve the rural economy and lives of the peasants, Empress Maria Theresa A) regulated the church more closely. B) ordered the adoption of scientific farming techniques. C) abolished serfdom. D) reduced nobles' power over their serfs. E) established a bank to make loans to peasants on easy terms.

D)

All of the following played a role in the erosion of French absolutism except the A) political resurgence of the nobility. B) inattentiveness of Louis XV. C) the assertion of the Parlement of Paris that the king needed consent of the Parlement to levy taxes. D) reinstatement of the parlement's right to review royal decrees. E) theories of Charles Montesquieu.

E)

Before the Scientific Revolution, Europeans' view of the universe was based on the ideas of A) Plato. B) medieval scholastics. C) Aristarchus. D) Isaac Newton. E) Aristotle.

E)

Empiricism emphasized A) the use of deductive reasoning. B) reliance on the authority of other scientists. C) the use of scientific instruments. D) greater reliance on mathematical equations. E) the actual observation of phenomena.

E)

The concept of the "reading revolution" refers to A) the masses' acquisition of literacy. B) the spread of literacy among women. C) the invention of the printing press. D) the spread of pornography and scandalmongering broadsheets in Europe. E) the shift from reading out loud texts perceived as authoritative to reading many different texts rapidly, silently, and individually.

E)