Reformation Europe in the 16th Cent.

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Reformation Europein the 16th Cent.

• The implications of a division in Christian Europe

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• Given the division between Catholics and the many
  Protestant sects, it was not as easy to control
  dogma. That does not mean that both Catholics
  and Protestants did not have dogma, they did
  moreover, religious toleration was not a feature
  of Reformation Europe. What was important here is
  that the monolithic structure of Christianity was
  destroyed, and that ipso facto allowed for
  greater individual freedom to pursue research in
  areas that challenged the status quo.

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On the Catholic Church

• Bear in mind that the Church was not completely
  hostile to science. Consider the work done
  (admittedly to determine the date of Easter) that
  required considerable care and insight, namely
  using cathedrals to measure the sun. The device
  the orb of the sun and the system and how it
  looks .

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On the protestants

• Even tho there is a clear movement among the
  educated still small numerically towardadopting
  a new cosmological perspective, consider this
  comment from Luther in one of his Advent sermons
  . . . said, "The heathen write that the comet may
  arise from natural causes, but God creates not
  one that does not foretoken a sure calamity."
  Again he said, "Whatever moves in the heaven in
  an unusual way is certainly a sign of God's
  wrath." What conclusions do you come to?

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What was different was the following

• The development of national, secular and
  centralized states whose structure was
  legitimized by the appeal to reason (rather than
  religious belief) idea idea of popular
  sovereignty will not come until the
  Enlightenment.
• The growth of commerce and trade empowered a
  bourgeoisie that needed education to run its
  affairs, was more comfortable with "scientific /
  rational / empirical thinking secular
  bureaucrats and entrepreneurs rejected excessive
  intrusions of religious belief and the religious
  establishment.

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The monopoly on knowledge by the priestly caste
was broken

• Governments found they could legitimize
  themselves by supporting high culture. This led
  to the foundation of academies of science (very
  elitist) and eventually (after the French
  Revolution) to the reorganization of universities
  on a more secular basis.
• Reinforced by the discovering of Roman law and of
  the scientific treatises (even of the twit
  Aristotle) of the Greco-Roman period. Such
  materials were secular in character and, by
  virtue of their antiquity provided an alternative
  to church authority.

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Europe did not become "liberal" in our sense of
the word

• Some areas (predominantly those with maritime and
  commercial establishments) were more receptive to
  new ideas than were others (where agriculture
  dominated and feudalism persisted) scholars
  moved to where they were at least tolerated if
  not valued.
• Invention of the printing press gave new meaning
  to "open/public, sustained self-conscious
  reflection.

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Higher Education

• Universities remained very underfunded and very
  much under the control of clerics, both
  protestant and catholic.
• Tho there were some exceptions (Padua had both
  Galileo and Vaselius as professors), they
  remained under the control of theologians of all
  faiths.
• But there was competition.

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The Jesuits, the Counter-reformation and Academies

• Science was then supported primarily in the new
  Jesuit stations (like the Collegio Romano and on
  the square. Note the role of Jesuits in education
  between 1550 and 1615. Wherever the Jesuits went
  both in Europe and to the East, they stressed
  education and astronomy. But the end of the17th
  Cent the court astronomer of China was a Jesuit.