Western culture

From the late 15th century to the 17th century, Western culture began to spread to other parts of the world through explorers and missionaries during the [[Age of Discovery]], and by [[Imperialism|imperialists]] from the 17th century to the early 20th century. During the [[Great Divergence]], a term coined by [[Samuel P. Huntington|Samuel Huntington]]{{sfn|Frank|2001|p=180}} the Western world overcame pre-modern growth constraints and emerged during the 19th century as the most powerful and wealthy world [[civilization]] of the time, eclipsing [[Qing dynasty|Qing China]], [[Mughal Empire|Mughal India]], [[Tokugawa shogunate|Tokugawa Japan]], and the [[Ottoman Empire]]. The process was accompanied and reinforced by the Age of Discovery and continued into the modern period. Scholars have proposed a [[Great_Divergence#Possible_factors|wide variety of theories to explain why the Great Divergence happened]], including lack of government intervention, high bridging social capital, geography, colonialism, and customary traditions.

From the late 15th century to the 17th century, Western culture began to spread to other parts of the world through explorers and missionaries during the [[Age of Discovery]], and by [[Imperialism|imperialists]] from the 17th century to the early 20th century. During the [[Great Divergence]], a term coined by [[Samuel P. Huntington|Samuel Huntington]]{{sfn|Frank|2001|p=180}} the Western world overcame pre-modern growth constraints and emerged during the 19th century as the most powerful and wealthy world [[civilization]] of the time, eclipsing [[Qing dynasty|Qing China]], [[Mughal Empire|Mughal India]], [[Tokugawa shogunate|Tokugawa Japan]], and the [[Ottoman Empire]]. The process was accompanied and reinforced by the Age of Discovery and continued into the modern period. Scholars have proposed a [[Great_Divergence#Possible_factors|wide variety of theories to explain why the Great Divergence happened]], including lack of government intervention, high bridging social capital, geography, colonialism, and customary traditions.

[[Galileo Galilei]]’s [[Galileo_Galilei#Phases_of_Venus|early 17th-century telescopic observations]] began the transformation of what had been a narrowly technical revision of [[Geocentrism#Ptolemaic_model|classical astronomy]] by Copernicus into an increasingly aggressive challenge to [[Celestial spheres|traditional cosmology]] and the long-standing synthesis of [[Aristotelian physics]] and Christian theology. The upheaval of the [[Scientific Revolution]] ended the medieval view of [[natural philosophy]] as the servant (or "handmaiden") of theology.{{cite book | last= Grant | first = Edward | author-link=Edward Grant | year = 2007 | chapter = The Relations between Natural Philosophy and Theology | title= A History of Natural Philosophy | pages = 241 | quote=...Christians developed the concept that philosophy and science are 'handmaids to theology'... [[Augustine]] strongly urged Christians not to seek secular knowledge for its own sake but to take only what is useful for a better understanding of scripture...The handmaiden theory of secular knowledge also tended to emphasize the role of authorities, from the divine Scriptures themselves to the church fathers who had interpreted Scripture. The handmaiden tradition remained strong in Western Europe up to the eleventh and twelfth centuries, during the period when natural philosophy was relatively weak. | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-052-1-68957-1}}{{cite book |last=Applebaum |first=Wilbur |title=The Scientific Revolution and the Foundations of Modern Science | pages = 7, 113-114 | quote=Natural philosophy had long been perceived as a handmaiden to theology, which was called the "queen of the sciences." It was now coming to be thought as independent of theological constraints, with its own methods, functions, and purposes different from those of religion...Traditional conceptions of natural philosophy as a handmaid to religion were transformed in the course of the seventeenth century. Some challenged the new scientific outlooks for...denying the truth of Scripture. The new natural philosophers answered by denying the validity of [[Sola scriptura|literal interpretations]] of certain passages in the Bible, which were written to appeal to the common understanding of ordinary people...Centuries earlier St. Augustine had said the function of the Bible was not to teach us about nature. Galileo, Kepler, and others held that the Book of Nature was not designed to prepare us for salvation. They urged that natural philosophy and theology should be seen as distinct areas with their own methods and criteria, and that their practitioners should not intervene in one another's provinces. |publisher=Greenwood Press |year=2005 |series=Greenwood Guides to Historic Events, 1500–1900 |location=Westport, CT |isbn=978-0-313-32314-0}} As natural philosophy continued to grow in power, self-confidence and independence during the 17th century, European society around it began to undergo a tectonic shift in intellectual attitude — from ''[[fides quaerens intellectum]]'' to a new mode of understanding that was, increasingly, completely uncoupled from religion.{{Cite book |last=Wootton |first=David |title=The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution |date=2015 |pages=6-11|publisher=HarperCollins Publishers |isbn=978-0-06-175952-9 |location=New York |quote=...let us take for a moment a typical well-educated European in 1600...He believes in witchcraft...He believes [[Circe]] really did turn [[Odysseus]]'s crew into pigs. He believes [[Spontaneous_generation#Aristotle|mice are spontaneously generated in piles of straw]]...He believes that [[Horror_vacui_(philosophy)|nature abhors a vacuum]]. He believes the rainbow is a sign from God and that comets portend evil...He believes, of course, that the earth stands still and the sun and stars turn around the earth once every twenty-four hours...But now let us jump far ahead [to 1733]...He does not know anyone (or at least not anyone educated and reasonably sophisticated) who believes in witches, magic, alchemy or astrology; he thinks the ''Odyssey'' is fiction, not fact....He knows that the rainbow is produced by refracted light and that comets have no significance for our lives on earth. He believes that the future cannot be predicted. He knows that the heart is a pump...He believes that science is going to transform the world and that the moderns have outstripped the ancients in every possible respect. He has trouble believing in miracles, even the ones in the Bible...Between 1600 and 1733...the intellectual world of the educated elite changed more rapidly than at any time in previous history...The only name we have for this great transformation is 'the Scientific Revolution'.}} The "New Science" that ultimately emerged by the end of the century broke sharply with the natural philosophy that had preceded it,{{Cite journal |last=Küskü |first=Elif Aslan |date=2022 |title=Examination of Scientific Revolution Medicine on the Human Body / Bilimsel Devrim Tıbbını İnsan Bedeni Üzerinden İncelemek |url=https://www.academia.edu/87500649 |journal=The Legends: Journal of European History Studies |access-date=28 September 2022 |archive-date=12 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230112202215/https://www.academia.edu/87500649 |url-status=live }}{{cite journal |last=Hendrix |first=Scott E. |title=Natural Philosophy or Science in Premodern Epistemic Regimes? The Case of the Astrology of Albert the Great and Galileo Galilei |journal=Teorie Vědy / Theory of Science |year=2011 |volume=33 |issue=1 |pages=111–132 |doi=10.46938/tv.2011.72 |s2cid=258069710 |url=http://teorievedy.flu.cas.cz/index.php/tv/issue/view/10 |access-date=20 February 2012 |archive-date=18 November 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121118024030/http://teorievedy.flu.cas.cz/index.php/tv/issue/view/10 |url-status=live |doi-access=free }}{{cite book | last= Principe | first= Lawrence M. | year = 2011 | chapter = Introduction | title = Scientific Revolution: A Very Short Introduction | pages = 1–3 | location = New York| publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn= 978-0-199-56741-6}} departed from previous Greek conceptions and traditions,{{cite book | last= Lindberg | first= David C. | year = 1990 | chapter = Conceptions of the Scientific Revolution from Baker to Butterfield: A preliminary sketch | title=Reappraisals of the Scientific Revolution | editor-first1 = David C. | editor-last1 = Lindberg | editor-first2 = Robert S. | editor-last2 = Westman | pages = 1–26 | edition = First | location = Chicago | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-0-521-34262-9}}{{cite book | last= Lindberg | first= David C. | year = 2007 | chapter = The legacy of ancient and medieval science | title= The Beginnings of Western Science| pages= 357–368| edition = 2nd | location = Chicago | publisher = University of Chicago Press | isbn= 978-0-226-48205-7}}{{Cite book|url= https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2016/entries/natphil-ren/|title= The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|last= Del Soldato|first= Eva|date= 2016|publisher= Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University|editor-last= Zalta|editor-first= Edward N.|edition= Fall 2016|access-date= 1 June 2018|archive-date= 11 December 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20191211205744/https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2016/entries/natphil-ren/|url-status= live}}{{cite book | last= Grant | first = Edward | year = 2007 | chapter = Transformation of medieval natural philosophy from the early period modern period to the end of the nineteenth century | title= A History of Natural Philosophy | url= https://archive.org/details/historynaturalph00gran | url-access= limited | pages = [https://archive.org/details/historynaturalph00gran/page/n289 274]–322 | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-052-1-68957-1}} was more mechanistic in its worldview and more integrated with mathematics,{{cite book | last= Gal | first = Ofer | year = 2021 | chapter = The New Science | title = The Origins of Modern Science | pages = 308–349 | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-1316649701}}{{cite book | last1 = Bowler | first1 = Peter J. | last2 = Morus | first2 = Iwan Rhys | year = 2020 | chapter = The scientific revolution | title = Making Modern Science | pages = 25–57 | edition = 2nd | location = Chicago | publisher = University of Chicago Press | isbn= 978-0226365763}} and was obsessed with the acquisition and interpretation of new evidence. Wootton, David. ''The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution'' (Penguin, 2015). p.136. {{ISBN|0-06-175952-X}}

[[Galileo Galilei]]’s [[Galileo_Galilei#Phases_of_Venus|early 17th-century telescopic observations]] began the transformation of what had been a narrowly technical revision of [[Geocentrism#Ptolemaic_model|classical astronomy]] by [[Nicolaus Copernicus]] into an increasingly aggressive challenge to [[Celestial spheres|traditional cosmology]] and the long-standing synthesis of [[Aristotelian physics]] and Christian theology. The upheaval of the [[Scientific Revolution]] ended the medieval view of [[natural philosophy]] as the servant (or "handmaiden") of theology.{{cite book | last= Grant | first = Edward | author-link=Edward Grant | year = 2007 | chapter = The Relations between Natural Philosophy and Theology | title= A History of Natural Philosophy | pages = 241 | quote=...Christians developed the concept that philosophy and science are 'handmaids to theology'... [[Augustine]] strongly urged Christians not to seek secular knowledge for its own sake but to take only what is useful for a better understanding of scripture...The handmaiden theory of secular knowledge also tended to emphasize the role of authorities, from the divine Scriptures themselves to the church fathers who had interpreted Scripture. The handmaiden tradition remained strong in Western Europe up to the eleventh and twelfth centuries, during the period when natural philosophy was relatively weak. | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-052-1-68957-1}}{{cite book |last=Applebaum |first=Wilbur |title=The Scientific Revolution and the Foundations of Modern Science | pages = 7, 113-114 | quote=Natural philosophy had long been perceived as a handmaiden to theology, which was called the "queen of the sciences." It was now coming to be thought as independent of theological constraints, with its own methods, functions, and purposes different from those of religion...Traditional conceptions of natural philosophy as a handmaid to religion were transformed in the course of the seventeenth century. Some challenged the new scientific outlooks for...denying the truth of Scripture. The new natural philosophers answered by denying the validity of [[Sola scriptura|literal interpretations]] of certain passages in the Bible, which were written to appeal to the common understanding of ordinary people...Centuries earlier St. Augustine had said the function of the Bible was not to teach us about nature. Galileo, Kepler, and others held that the Book of Nature was not designed to prepare us for salvation. They urged that natural philosophy and theology should be seen as distinct areas with their own methods and criteria, and that their practitioners should not intervene in one another's provinces. |publisher=Greenwood Press |year=2005 |series=Greenwood Guides to Historic Events, 1500–1900 |location=Westport, CT |isbn=978-0-313-32314-0}} As natural philosophy continued to grow in power, self-confidence and independence during the 17th century, European society around it began to undergo a tectonic shift in intellectual attitude — from ''[[fides quaerens intellectum]]'' to a new mode of understanding that was, increasingly, completely uncoupled from religion.{{Cite book |last=Wootton |first=David |title=The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution |date=2015 |pages=6-11|publisher=HarperCollins Publishers |isbn=978-0-06-175952-9 |location=New York |quote=...let us take for a moment a typical well-educated European in 1600...He believes in witchcraft...He believes [[Circe]] really did turn [[Odysseus]]'s crew into pigs. He believes [[Spontaneous_generation#Aristotle|mice are spontaneously generated in piles of straw]]...He believes that [[Horror_vacui_(philosophy)|nature abhors a vacuum]]. He believes the rainbow is a sign from God and that comets portend evil...He believes, of course, that the earth stands still and the sun and stars turn around the earth once every twenty-four hours...But now let us jump far ahead [to 1733]...He does not know anyone (or at least not anyone educated and reasonably sophisticated) who believes in witches, magic, alchemy or astrology; he thinks the ''Odyssey'' is fiction, not fact....He knows that the rainbow is produced by refracted light and that comets have no significance for our lives on earth. He believes that the future cannot be predicted. He knows that the heart is a pump...He believes that science is going to transform the world and that the moderns have outstripped the ancients in every possible respect. He has trouble believing in miracles, even the ones in the Bible...Between 1600 and 1733...the intellectual world of the educated elite changed more rapidly than at any time in previous history...The only name we have for this great transformation is 'the Scientific Revolution'.}} The "New Science" that ultimately emerged by the end of the century broke sharply with the natural philosophy that had preceded it,{{Cite journal |last=Küskü |first=Elif Aslan |date=2022 |title=Examination of Scientific Revolution Medicine on the Human Body / Bilimsel Devrim Tıbbını İnsan Bedeni Üzerinden İncelemek |url=https://www.academia.edu/87500649 |journal=The Legends: Journal of European History Studies |access-date=28 September 2022 |archive-date=12 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230112202215/https://www.academia.edu/87500649 |url-status=live }}{{cite journal |last=Hendrix |first=Scott E. |title=Natural Philosophy or Science in Premodern Epistemic Regimes? The Case of the Astrology of Albert the Great and Galileo Galilei |journal=Teorie Vědy / Theory of Science |year=2011 |volume=33 |issue=1 |pages=111–132 |doi=10.46938/tv.2011.72 |s2cid=258069710 |url=http://teorievedy.flu.cas.cz/index.php/tv/issue/view/10 |access-date=20 February 2012 |archive-date=18 November 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121118024030/http://teorievedy.flu.cas.cz/index.php/tv/issue/view/10 |url-status=live |doi-access=free }}{{cite book | last= Principe | first= Lawrence M. | year = 2011 | chapter = Introduction | title = Scientific Revolution: A Very Short Introduction | pages = 1–3 | location = New York| publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn= 978-0-199-56741-6}} departed from previous Greek conceptions and traditions,{{cite book | last= Lindberg | first= David C. | year = 1990 | chapter = Conceptions of the Scientific Revolution from Baker to Butterfield: A preliminary sketch | title=Reappraisals of the Scientific Revolution | editor-first1 = David C. | editor-last1 = Lindberg | editor-first2 = Robert S. | editor-last2 = Westman | pages = 1–26 | edition = First | location = Chicago | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-0-521-34262-9}}{{cite book | last= Lindberg | first= David C. | year = 2007 | chapter = The legacy of ancient and medieval science | title= The Beginnings of Western Science| pages= 357–368| edition = 2nd | location = Chicago | publisher = University of Chicago Press | isbn= 978-0-226-48205-7}}{{Cite book|url= https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2016/entries/natphil-ren/|title= The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|last= Del Soldato|first= Eva|date= 2016|publisher= Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University|editor-last= Zalta|editor-first= Edward N.|edition= Fall 2016|access-date= 1 June 2018|archive-date= 11 December 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20191211205744/https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2016/entries/natphil-ren/|url-status= live}}{{cite book | last= Grant | first = Edward | year = 2007 | chapter = Transformation of medieval natural philosophy from the early period modern period to the end of the nineteenth century | title= A History of Natural Philosophy | url= https://archive.org/details/historynaturalph00gran | url-access= limited | pages = [https://archive.org/details/historynaturalph00gran/page/n289 274]–322 | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-052-1-68957-1}} was more mechanistic in its worldview and more integrated with mathematics,{{cite book | last= Gal | first = Ofer | year = 2021 | chapter = The New Science | title = The Origins of Modern Science | pages = 308–349 | location = New York | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn= 978-1316649701}}{{cite book | last1 = Bowler | first1 = Peter J. | last2 = Morus | first2 = Iwan Rhys | year = 2020 | chapter = The scientific revolution | title = Making Modern Science | pages = 25–57 | edition = 2nd | location = Chicago | publisher = University of Chicago Press | isbn= 978-0226365763}} and was obsessed with the acquisition and interpretation of new evidence. Wootton, David. ''The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution'' (Penguin, 2015). p.136. {{ISBN|0-06-175952-X}}

During the [[Age of Enlightenment]] of the 18th century, cultural and intellectual forces in European society emphasized reason, analysis, and individualism rather than traditional lines of authority. It challenged the authority of institutions that were deeply rooted in society, such as the Catholic Church; there was much talk of ways to reform society with toleration, science and [[skepticism]]. Philosophers of the Enlightenment included [[Francis Bacon]], [[René Descartes]], [[John Locke]], [[Baruch Spinoza]], [[Voltaire]] (1694–1778), [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]], [[David Hume]], and [[Immanuel Kant]],Sootin, Harry. "Isaac Newton." New York, Messner (1955) who influenced society by publishing widely read works. Upon learning about enlightened views, some rulers met with intellectuals and tried to apply their reforms, such as allowing for toleration, or accepting multiple religions, in what became known as [[enlightened absolutism]]. New ideas and beliefs spread around Europe and were fostered by an increase in literacy due to a departure from solely religious texts. Publications include ''[[Encyclopédie]]'' (1751–72) that was edited by [[Denis Diderot]] and [[Jean le Rond d'Alembert]]. The ''[[Dictionnaire philosophique]]'' (Philosophical Dictionary, 1764) and ''[[Letters on the English]]'' (1733) written by [[Voltaire]] spread the ideals of the Enlightenment.

During the [[Age of Enlightenment]] of the 18th century, cultural and intellectual forces in European society emphasized reason, analysis, and individualism rather than traditional lines of authority. It challenged the authority of institutions that were deeply rooted in society, such as the Catholic Church; there was much talk of ways to reform society with toleration, science and [[skepticism]]. Philosophers of the Enlightenment included [[Francis Bacon]], [[René Descartes]], [[John Locke]], [[Baruch Spinoza]], [[Voltaire]] (1694–1778), [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]], [[David Hume]], and [[Immanuel Kant]],Sootin, Harry. "Isaac Newton." New York, Messner (1955) who influenced society by publishing widely read works. Upon learning about enlightened views, some rulers met with intellectuals and tried to apply their reforms, such as allowing for toleration, or accepting multiple religions, in what became known as [[enlightened absolutism]]. New ideas and beliefs spread around Europe and were fostered by an increase in literacy due to a departure from solely religious texts. Publications include ''[[Encyclopédie]]'' (1751–72) that was edited by [[Denis Diderot]] and [[Jean le Rond d'Alembert]]. The ''[[Dictionnaire philosophique]]'' (Philosophical Dictionary, 1764) and ''[[Letters on the English]]'' (1733) written by [[Voltaire]] spread the ideals of the Enlightenment.