1.
Flammarion engraving
–
The Flammarion engraving is a wood engraving by an unknown artist, so named because its first documented appearance is in Camille Flammarions 1888 book Latmosphère, météorologie populaire. The engraving has often, but erroneously, been referred to as a woodcut, the caption that accompanies the engraving in Flammarions book reads, A missionary of the Middle Ages tells that he had found the point where the sky and the Earth touch. In 1957, astronomer Ernst Zinner claimed that the image dated to the German Renaissance, therefore, it is plausible that Flammarion himself created the image, though the evidence for this remains circumstantial. Like most other illustrations in Flammarions books, the engraving carries no attribution, the decorative border surrounding the engraving is distinctly non-medieval and it was only by cropping it that the confusion about the historical origins of the image became possible. The Greek astronomers represented it as formed of a solid substance, and so recently as Copernicus. The Latin poets placed the divinities of Olympus and the stately mythological court upon this vault, above the planets, the correspondence between the text and the illustration is so close that one would appear to be based on the other. Had Flammarion known of the engraving in 1872, it seems unlikely that he would have left it out of that years edition, the more probable conclusion therefore is that Flammarion commissioned the engraving specifically to illustrate this particular text, though this has not been ascertained conclusively. The idea of the contact of a sky with the earth is one that repeatedly appears in Flammarions earlier works. In his Les mondes imaginaires et les mondes réels, he cites a legend of a Christian saint, Macarius the Roman and this legend includes the story of three monks who wished to discover the point where the sky and the earth touch. Such is the notion of the universe, it is always the terrestrial valley crowned by the canopy of the heavens. In the legend of St. Macarius, the monks do not in fact find the place where earth, in Les mondes imaginaires Flammarion recounts another story, This fact reminds us of the tale which Le Vayer recounts in his Letters. Flammarion also mentioned the story, in nearly the same words, in his Histoire du Ciel, I have in my library, interrupted the deputy. The Letters referred to are a series of essays by François de La Mothe Le Vayer. Le Vayer does not specify who this anchorite was, nor does he provide further details about the story or its sources, the combination of the story of St. Macarius with Le Vayers remarks seems to be due to Flammarion himself. It also appears in his Les terres du ciel, With respect to the bounds, the Flammarion engraving appeared in C. G. Jungs Flying Saucers, A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies. The first color version to be published was made by Roberta Weir and that color image spawned most of the modern variations that have followed since. Donovans 1973 LP, Cosmic Wheels, used an extended black, the image also appeared in The Compleat Astrologer by Derek and Julia Parker in 1971. The Flammarion engraving appeared on the cover of Daniel J. Boorstins bestselling history of science The Discoverers, other books devoted to science that used it as an illustration include The Mathematical Experience by Philip J. Vollmann
2.
Universe
–
The Universe is all of time and space and its contents. It includes planets, moons, minor planets, stars, galaxies, the contents of intergalactic space, the size of the entire Universe is unknown. The earliest scientific models of the Universe were developed by ancient Greek and Indian philosophers and were geocentric, over the centuries, more precise astronomical observations led Nicolaus Copernicus to develop the heliocentric model with the Sun at the center of the Solar System. In developing the law of gravitation, Sir Isaac Newton built upon Copernicuss work as well as observations by Tycho Brahe. Further observational improvements led to the realization that our Solar System is located in the Milky Way galaxy and it is assumed that galaxies are distributed uniformly and the same in all directions, meaning that the Universe has neither an edge nor a center. Discoveries in the early 20th century have suggested that the Universe had a beginning, the majority of mass in the Universe appears to exist in an unknown form called dark matter. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the Universe, under this theory, space and time emerged together 13. 799±0.021 billion years ago with a fixed amount of energy and matter that has become less dense as the Universe has expanded. After the initial expansion, the Universe cooled, allowing the first subatomic particles to form, giant clouds later merged through gravity to form galaxies, stars, and everything else seen today. Some physicists have suggested various multiverse hypotheses, in which the Universe might be one among many universes that likewise exist, the Universe can be defined as everything that exists, everything that has existed, and everything that will exist. According to our current understanding, the Universe consists of spacetime, forms of energy, the Universe encompasses all of life, all of history, and some philosophers and scientists suggest that it even encompasses ideas such as mathematics and logic. The word universe derives from the Old French word univers, which in turn derives from the Latin word universum, the Latin word was used by Cicero and later Latin authors in many of the same senses as the modern English word is used. Another synonym was ὁ κόσμος ho kósmos, synonyms are also found in Latin authors and survive in modern languages, e. g. the German words Das All, Weltall, and Natur for Universe. The same synonyms are found in English, such as everything, the cosmos, the world, the prevailing model for the evolution of the Universe is the Big Bang theory. The Big Bang model states that the earliest state of the Universe was extremely hot and dense, the model is based on general relativity and on simplifying assumptions such as homogeneity and isotropy of space. The Big Bang model accounts for such as the correlation of distance and redshift of galaxies, the ratio of the number of hydrogen to helium atoms. The initial hot, dense state is called the Planck epoch, after the Planck epoch and inflation came the quark, hadron, and lepton epochs. Together, these epochs encompassed less than 10 seconds of time following the Big Bang, the observed abundance of the elements can be explained by combining the overall expansion of space with nuclear and atomic physics. As the Universe expands, the density of electromagnetic radiation decreases more quickly than does that of matter because the energy of a photon decreases with its wavelength
3.
Chaos (cosmogony)
–
Chaos refers to the formless or void state preceding the creation of the universe or cosmos in the Greek creation myths, or to the initial gap created by the original separation of heaven and earth. Greek χάος means emptiness, vast void, chasm, abyss, from the verb χαίνω, gape, be open, etc. from Proto-Indo-European *ǵheh2n, cognate to Old English geanian, to gape. It may also mean space, the expanse of air, pherecydes of Syros interpretes chaos as water, like something formless which can be differentiated. Hesiod and the Pre-Socratics use the Greek term in the context of cosmogony, Hesiods chaos has been interpreted as a moving, formless mass from which the cosmos and the gods originated. In Hesiods opinion the origin should be indefinite and indeterminate, and it represents disorder, Chaos has been linked with the term tohu wa-bohu of Genesis 1,2. The term may refer to a state of non-being prior to creation or to a formless state, in the Book of Genesis, the spirit of God is moving upon the face of the waters, and the earliest state of the universe is like a watery chaos. The Septuagint makes no use of χάος in the context of creation, instead using the term for גיא, chasm, cleft, in Micah 1,6, a parallel can be found in the Genesis. In the beginning God creates the earth and the sky, the earth is formless and void, and later God divides the waters under the firmament from the waters over the firmament, and calls the firmament heaven. In both cases, chaos referring to a notion of a primordial state contains the cosmos in potentia and this model of a primordial state of matter has been opposed by the Church Fathers from the 2nd century, who posited a creation ex nihilo by an omnipotent God. In modern biblical studies, the chaos is commonly used in the context of the Torah. Parallels between the Hebrew Genesis and the Babylonian Enuma Elish were established by Hermann Gunkel in 1910, besides Genesis, other books of the Old Testament, especially a number of Psalms, some passages in Isaiah and Jeremiah and the Book of Job are relevant. Use of chaos in the sense of complete disorder or confusion first appears in Elizabethan Early Modern English. The motif of Chaoskampf is ubiquitous in myth and legend, depicting a battle of a culture hero deity with a chaos monster, often in the shape of a serpent or dragon. The same term has also extended to parallel concepts in the religions of the Ancient Near East, such as the abstract conflict of ideas in the Egyptian duality of Maat. Early work by German academics such as Gunkel and Bousset in comparative mythology popularized translating the mythological sea serpent as a dragon. Indo-European examples of this mythic trope include Thor vs. Jörmungandr, Tarhunt vs. Illuyanka, Indra vs. Vritra, Fereydun vs. Aži Dahāka, and Zeus vs. Typhon among others. In the Theogony of Hesiod, Chaos is a divine primordial condition, which is the origin of the gods and it seems that in Hesiods opinion, the origin should be indefinite and indeterminate, and it may represent infinite space, or formless matter. The notion of the temporal infinity was familiar to the Greek mind from remote antiquity in the conception of immortality
4.
Cosmology
–
Cosmology is the study of the origin, evolution, and eventual fate of the universe. The term cosmology was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blounts Glossographia, religious or mythological cosmology is a body of beliefs based on mythological, religious, and esoteric literature and traditions of creation and eschatology. Physical cosmology is studied by scientists, such as astronomers and physicists, as well as philosophers, such as metaphysicians, philosophers of physics, and philosophers of space and time. Because of this scope with philosophy, theories in physical cosmology may include both scientific and non-scientific propositions, and may depend upon assumptions that can not be tested. Cosmology differs from astronomy in that the former is concerned with the Universe as a whole while the latter deals with individual celestial objects. Theoretical astrophysicist David N. Spergel has described cosmology as a science because when we look out in space. Physics and astrophysics have played a role in shaping the understanding of the universe through scientific observation. Physical cosmology was shaped through both mathematics and observation in an analysis of the whole universe, cosmogony studies the origin of the Universe, and cosmography maps the features of the Universe. In Diderots Encyclopédie, cosmology is broken down into uranology, aerology, geology, metaphysical cosmology has also been described as the placing of man in the universe in relationship to all other entities. Physical cosmology is the branch of physics and astrophysics that deals with the study of the physical origins and it also includes the study of the nature of the Universe on a large scale. In its earliest form, it was what is now known as celestial mechanics, greek philosophers Aristarchus of Samos, Aristotle, and Ptolemy proposed different cosmological theories. The geocentric Ptolemaic system was the theory until the 16th century when Nicolaus Copernicus. This is one of the most famous examples of epistemological rupture in physical cosmology, when Isaac Newton published the Principia Mathematica in 1687, he finally figured out how the heavens moved. A fundamental difference between Newtons cosmology and those preceding it was the Copernican principle—that the bodies on earth obey the same laws as all the celestial bodies. This was a crucial advance in physical cosmology. Physicists began changing the assumption that the Universe was static and unchanging, in 1922 Alexander Friedmann introduced the idea of an expanding universe that contained moving matter. In parallel to this approach to cosmology, one long-standing debate about the structure of the cosmos was coming to a climax. This difference of ideas came to a climax with the organization of the Great Debate on 26 April 1920 at the meeting of the U. S. National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D. C
5.
Philosopher
–
A philosopher is someone who practices philosophy, which involves rational inquiry into areas that are outside of either theology or science. The term philosopher comes from the Ancient Greek φιλόσοφος meaning lover of wisdom, the coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek thinker Pythagoras. Typically, these brands of philosophy are Hellenistic ones and those who most arduously commit themselves to this lifestyle may be considered philosophers. The separation of philosophy and science from theology began in Greece during the 6th century BC, thales, an astronomer and mathematician, was considered by Aristotle to be the first philosopher of the Greek tradition. While Pythagoras coined the word, the first known elaboration on the topic was conducted by Plato, in his Symposium, he concludes that Love is that which lacks the object it seeks. Therefore, the philosopher is one who seeks wisdom, if he attains wisdom, therefore, the philosopher in antiquity was one who lives in the constant pursuit of wisdom, and living in accordance to that wisdom. Disagreements arose as to what living philosophically entailed and these disagreements gave rise to different Hellenistic schools of philosophy. In consequence, the ancient philosopher thought in a tradition, as the ancient world became schism by philosophical debate, the competition lay in living in manner that would transform his whole way of living in the world. Philosophy is a discipline which can easily carry away the individual in analyzing the universe. The second is the change through the Medieval era. With the rise of Christianity, the way of life was adopted by its theology. Thus, philosophy was divided between a way of life and the conceptual, logical, physical and metaphysical materials to justify that way of life, philosophy was then the servant to theology. The third is the sociological need with the development of the university, the modern university requires professionals to teach. Maintaining itself requires teaching future professionals to replace the current faculty, therefore, the discipline degrades into a technical language reserved for specialists, completely eschewing its original conception as a way of life. In the fourth century, the word began to designate a man or woman who led a monastic life. Gregory of Nyssa, for example, describes how his sister Macrina persuaded their mother to forsake the distractions of life for a life of philosophy. Later during the Middle Ages, persons who engaged with alchemy was called a philosopher - thus, many philosophers still emerged from the Classical tradition, as saw their philosophy as a way of life. Among the most notable are René Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Nicolas Malebranche, with the rise of the university, the modern conception of philosophy became more prominent
6.
Pythagoras
–
Pythagoras of Samos was an Ionian Greek philosopher, mathematician, and the putative founder of the movement called Pythagoreanism. Most of the information about Pythagoras was written centuries after he lived. He was born on the island of Samos, and travelled, visiting Egypt and Greece, around 530 BC, he moved to Croton, in Magna Graecia, and there established some kind of school or guild. In 520 BC, he returned to Samos, Pythagoras made influential contributions to philosophy and religion in the late 6th century BC. He is often revered as a mathematician and scientist and is best known for the Pythagorean theorem which bears his name. Many of the accomplishments credited to Pythagoras may actually have been accomplishments of his colleagues, some accounts mention that the philosophy associated with Pythagoras was related to mathematics and that numbers were important. It was said that he was the first man to himself a philosopher, or lover of wisdom, and Pythagorean ideas exercised a marked influence on Plato. Burkert states that Aristoxenus and Dicaearchus are the most important accounts, Aristotle had written a separate work On the Pythagoreans, which is no longer extant. However, the Protrepticus possibly contains parts of On the Pythagoreans and his disciples Dicaearchus, Aristoxenus, and Heraclides Ponticus had written on the same subject. These writers, late as they are, were among the best sources from whom Porphyry and Iamblichus drew, while adding some legendary accounts. Herodotus, Isocrates, and other writers agree that Pythagoras was the son of Mnesarchus and born on the Greek island of Samos. His father is said to have been a gem-engraver or a wealthy merchant, a late source gives his mothers name as Pythais. As to the date of his birth, Aristoxenus stated that Pythagoras left Samos in the reign of Polycrates, at the age of 40, around 530 BC he arrived in the Greek colony of Croton in what was then Magna Graecia. There he founded his own school the members of which he engaged to a disciplined. He furthermore aquired some political influence, on Greeks and non-Greeks of the region, following a conflict with the neighbouring colony of Sybaris, internal discord drove most of the Pythagoreans out of Croton. Pythagoras left the city before the outbreak of civil unrest and moved to Metapontum, after his death, his house was transformed into a sanctuary of Demeter, out of veneration for the philosopher, by the local population. In ancient sources there was disagreement and inconsistency about the late life of Pythagoras. His tomb was shown at Metapontum in the time of Cicero, according to Walter Burkert, Most obvious is the contradiction between Aristoxenus and Dicaearchus, regarding the catastrophe that overwhelmed the Pythagorean society
7.
Ancient Greek
–
Ancient Greek includes the forms of Greek used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around the 9th century BC to the 6th century AD. It is often divided into the Archaic period, Classical period. It is antedated in the second millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Hellenistic phase is known as Koine. Koine is regarded as a historical stage of its own, although in its earliest form it closely resembled Attic Greek. Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic and earlier periods included several regional dialects, Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and of fifth-century Athenian historians, playwrights, and philosophers. It has contributed many words to English vocabulary and has been a subject of study in educational institutions of the Western world since the Renaissance. This article primarily contains information about the Epic and Classical phases of the language, Ancient Greek was a pluricentric language, divided into many dialects. The main dialect groups are Attic and Ionic, Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, some dialects are found in standardized literary forms used in literature, while others are attested only in inscriptions. There are also several historical forms, homeric Greek is a literary form of Archaic Greek used in the epic poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, and in later poems by other authors. Homeric Greek had significant differences in grammar and pronunciation from Classical Attic, the origins, early form and development of the Hellenic language family are not well understood because of a lack of contemporaneous evidence. Several theories exist about what Hellenic dialect groups may have existed between the divergence of early Greek-like speech from the common Proto-Indo-European language and the Classical period and they have the same general outline, but differ in some of the detail. The invasion would not be Dorian unless the invaders had some relationship to the historical Dorians. The invasion is known to have displaced population to the later Attic-Ionic regions, the Greeks of this period believed there were three major divisions of all Greek people—Dorians, Aeolians, and Ionians, each with their own defining and distinctive dialects. Often non-west is called East Greek, Arcadocypriot apparently descended more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the Bronze Age. Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest Greek influence, and can in some respects be considered a transitional dialect, thessalian likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence, though to a lesser degree. Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above had further subdivisions, generally equivalent to a city-state and its surrounding territory, Doric notably had several intermediate divisions as well, into Island Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern Peloponnesus Doric. The Lesbian dialect was Aeolic Greek and this dialect slowly replaced most of the older dialects, although Doric dialect has survived in the Tsakonian language, which is spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric has also passed down its aorist terminations into most verbs of Demotic Greek, by about the 6th century AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized into Medieval Greek
8.
Alexander von Humboldt
–
Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt was a Prussian geographer, naturalist, explorer, and influential proponent of Romantic philosophy and science. He was the brother of the Prussian minister, philosopher. Humboldts quantitative work on botanical geography laid the foundation for the field of biogeography, Humboldts advocacy of long-term systematic geophysical measurement laid the foundation for modern geomagnetic and meteorological monitoring. Between 1799 and 1804, Humboldt travelled extensively in Latin America and his description of the journey was written up and published in an enormous set of volumes over 21 years. Humboldt was one of the first people to propose that the lands bordering the Atlantic Ocean were once joined and this important work also motivated a holistic perception of the universe as one interacting entity. Alexander von Humboldt was born in Berlin in Prussia on 14 September 1769 and he was baptized as a baby in the Lutheran faith, with the Duke of Brunswick serving as godfather. At age 42, Alexander Georg was rewarded for his services in the Seven Years War with the post of Royal Chamberlain and he profited from the contract to lease state lotteries and tobacco sales. He first married the daughter of Prussian General Adjutant Schweder, in 1766, Alexander Georg married Maria Elisabeth Colomb, a well-educated woman and widow of Baron Hollwede, with whom she had a son. Alexander Georg and Maria Elisabeth had three children, a daughter, who died young, and then two sons, Wilhelm and Alexander and her first-born son, Wilhelms and Alexanders half-brother, was something of a neer do well, not often mentioned in the family history. Alexander Georg died in 1779, leaving the brothers Humboldt in the care of their emotionally distant mother, Humboldts mother expected them to become civil servants of the Prussian state. The money Baron Holwede left to Alexanders mother became, after her death, instrumental in funding Alexanders explorations, due to his youthful penchant for collecting and labeling plants, shells and insects, Alexander received the playful title of the little apothecary. On April 25,1789, he matriculated at Göttingen, then known for the lectures of C. G. Heyne and his brother Wilhelm was already a student at Göttingen, but they did not interact much since their intellectual interests were quite different. His vast and varied interests were by this time fully developed, at Göttingen he met Georg Forster, a naturalist who had been with Captain James Cook on his second voyage. Humboldt traveled with Forster in Europe, the two traveled to England, Humboldts first sea voyage, The Netherlands, and France. In England, he met Sir Joseph Banks, President of the Royal Society, the scientific friendship between Banks and Humboldt lasted until Bankss death in 1820, and the two shared botanical specimens for study. Banks also mobilized his scientific contacts in later years to aid Humboldts work, Humboldts scientific excursion up the Rhine resulted in his 1790 treatise Mineralogische Beobachtungen über einige Basalte am Rhein. Humboldts passion for travel was of long standing, Humboldts talents were devoted to the purpose of preparing himself as a scientific explorer. During this period, his brother Wilhelm married, but Alexander did not attend the nuptials, Humboldt graduated from the Freiberg School of Mines in 1792 and was appointed to a Prussian government position in the Department of Mines as an inspector in Bayreuth and the Fichtel mountains
9.
Kosmos (Humboldt)
–
Kosmos is an influential treatise on science and nature written by the German scientist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt. Kosmos began as a lecture delivered by Humboldt at the University of Berlin. In the first volume of Kosmos, Humboldt paints a general “portrait of nature”, describing the nature of outer space. In the second volume he describes the history of science, Humboldt goes on to suggest that when one contemplates the beauty of the cosmos, one can obtain personal inspiration and a beneficial, if subjective, awareness about life. Kosmos was influenced by Humboldt’s various travels and studies, but mainly by his journey throughout the Americas. As he wrote, “it was the discovery of America that planted the seed of the Cosmos. ”Due to all of his experience in the field, Humboldt was preeminently qualified for the task to represent the universe in a single work. He had extensive knowledge of fields of learning, varied experiences as a traveler. Kosmos was highly popular when it was released, with the first volume selling out in two months, and the work translated into most European languages, since the early years of the nineteenth century, Humboldt had been a world-famous figure, second in renown only to Napoleon. As the son of a family in Prussia, he received the best education available at the time in Europe, studying under famous thinkers at the universities of Frankfurt. By the time he wrote Kosmos, Humboldt was an explorer, cosmographer, biologist, diplomat, engineer. While considered a geographer, he is accredited with contributing to most of the sciences of the world environment found today. Probably more than any other factor, Humboldts career was shaped by his travels in South, Humboldt said that his Cosmos was born on the slopes of the Andes. From the notes he gathered on this journey, Humboldt was able to produce at least thirty volumes based on his observations. Twenty-five years after his exploration of the Americas, at the age of sixty, Humboldt undertook a tour, subsidized by the Tsar of Russia. Between May and November 1829, Humboldt and his two subordinates, C. G, ehrenberg and Gustav Rose, traveled across the vast expanse of the Russian empire. This work was very modest in comparison to Humboldts South American publications, asie Centrale focused on the facts and figured of Central Asian geography, along with data to complete his isothermal world map. It was during his South American and Asian explorations that Humboldt made the observations crucial to forming his physical description of the universe in Kosmos. In 1827, having spent himself into poverty publishing his works, his king, Friedrich Wilhelm III, reminded Humboldt of his debt
10.
Holism
–
Holism is the idea that systems and their properties should be viewed as wholes, not just as a collection of parts. The term Holism was coined by J C Smuts in Holism and it was Smuts opinion that Holism is a concept that represents all of the wholes in the universe, and these wholes are the real factors in the universe. Further, that Holism also denoted a theory of the universe in the vein as Materialism and Spiritualism. The derived adjective holistic has been applied to a range of fields where they incorporate the concept of holism. The field characterizes a whole as a unified and synthesised event in the system of Relativity, as such, the concept of field entails both activity and structure. Darwins theory of organic descent placed primary emphasis on the role of natural selection, the whole exhibits a discernible regulatory function as it relates to cooperation and coordination of the structure and activity of parts, and to the selection and deselection of variations. The result is a correlation of organs and functions. The activities of the parts are directed to central ends, co-operation and it is the intermingling of fields which is creative or causal in nature. This is seen in matter, where if not for its dynamic structural creative character matter could not have been the mother of the universe, with minds the regulatory function of Holism acquires consciousness and freedom, demonstrating a creative power of the most far-reaching character. Holism is not only creative but self-creative, and its structures are far more holistic than its initial structures. Holism exemplifies this idea while emphasizing the holistic character of the process. The whole completely transforms the concept of Causality, results are not directly a function of causes, the whole absorbs and integrates the cause into its own activity, results appear as the consequence of the activity of the whole. It is the edition of Holism and Evolution that provides the most recent. In philosophy, any doctrine that emphasizes the priority of a whole over its parts is holism, some suggest that such a definition owes its origins to a non-holistic view of language and places it in the reductivist camp. Alternately, a definition of holism denies the necessity of a division between the function of separate parts and the workings of the whole. It suggests that the key characteristic of a concept of holism is a sense of the fundamental truth of any particular experience. This exists in contradistinction to what is perceived as the reductivist reliance on inductive method as the key to verification of its concept of how the function within the whole. In the philosophy of mind, a state may be identified only in terms of its relations with others
11.
Middle Ages
–
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or Medieval Period lasted from the 5th to the 15th century. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and merged into the Renaissance, the Middle Ages is the middle period of the three traditional divisions of Western history, classical antiquity, the medieval period, and the modern period. The medieval period is subdivided into the Early, High. Population decline, counterurbanisation, invasion, and movement of peoples, the large-scale movements of the Migration Period, including various Germanic peoples, formed new kingdoms in what remained of the Western Roman Empire. In the seventh century, North Africa and the Middle East—once part of the Byzantine Empire—came under the rule of the Umayyad Caliphate, although there were substantial changes in society and political structures, the break with classical antiquity was not complete. The still-sizeable Byzantine Empire survived in the east and remained a major power, the empires law code, the Corpus Juris Civilis or Code of Justinian, was rediscovered in Northern Italy in 1070 and became widely admired later in the Middle Ages. In the West, most kingdoms incorporated the few extant Roman institutions, monasteries were founded as campaigns to Christianise pagan Europe continued. The Franks, under the Carolingian dynasty, briefly established the Carolingian Empire during the later 8th, the Crusades, first preached in 1095, were military attempts by Western European Christians to regain control of the Holy Land from Muslims. Kings became the heads of centralised nation states, reducing crime and violence, intellectual life was marked by scholasticism, a philosophy that emphasised joining faith to reason, and by the founding of universities. Controversy, heresy, and the Western Schism within the Catholic Church paralleled the conflict, civil strife. Cultural and technological developments transformed European society, concluding the Late Middle Ages, the Middle Ages is one of the three major periods in the most enduring scheme for analysing European history, classical civilisation, or Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Modern Period. Medieval writers divided history into periods such as the Six Ages or the Four Empires, when referring to their own times, they spoke of them as being modern. In the 1330s, the humanist and poet Petrarch referred to pre-Christian times as antiqua, leonardo Bruni was the first historian to use tripartite periodisation in his History of the Florentine People. Bruni and later argued that Italy had recovered since Petrarchs time. The Middle Ages first appears in Latin in 1469 as media tempestas or middle season, in early usage, there were many variants, including medium aevum, or middle age, first recorded in 1604, and media saecula, or middle ages, first recorded in 1625. The alternative term medieval derives from medium aevum, tripartite periodisation became standard after the German 17th-century historian Christoph Cellarius divided history into three periods, Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. The most commonly given starting point for the Middle Ages is 476, for Europe as a whole,1500 is often considered to be the end of the Middle Ages, but there is no universally agreed upon end date. English historians often use the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485 to mark the end of the period
12.
Petrus Apianus
–
Petrus Apianus, also known as Peter Apian, was a German humanist, known for his works in mathematics, astronomy and cartography. The lunar crater Apianus and minor planet 19139 Apian are named in his honour and he was born as Peter Bienewitz in Leisnig in Saxony, his father was a shoemaker. The family was well off, belonging to the middle-class citizenry of Leisnig. Apianus was educated at the Latin school in Rochlitz, from 1516 to 1519 he studied at the University of Leipzig, during this time, he Latinized his name to Apianus. When the plague broke out in Vienna in 1521, he completed his studies with a B. A. and moved to Regensburg and he married the daughter of a councilman of Landshut, Katharina Mosner, in 1526. They would have 14 children together, five girls and nine sons, in 1527, Peter Apian was called to the University of Ingolstadt as a mathematician and printer. Among the first books he printed were the writings of Johann Eck, later, his print shop soon became well known for its high-quality editions of geographic and cartographic works. Through his work, Apian became a favourite of emperor Charles V. Charles had praised his work at the Imperial Diet of 1530, in 1535, the emperor made Apian an armiger, i. e. granted him the right to display a coat of arms. All this furthered Apians reputation as an eminent scientist, Apian is also remembered for publishing the only known depiction of the Bedouin constellations in 1533. On this map Ursa Minor is an old woman and three maidens, Draco is four camels and Cepheus was illustrated as a shepherd with sheep, despite many calls from other universities, including Leipzig, Padua, Tübingen, and Vienna, Apian remained in Ingolstadt until his death. Although he neglected his duties, the university evidently was proud to host such an esteemed scientist. Apians work included in mathematics—in 1527 he published a variation of Pascals triangle, in 1531, he observed a comet and discovered that a comets tail always point away from the sun. Apian was followed by his son Philipp, who, in addition to his own research, ein newe und wolgegründete underweisung aller Kauffmanns Rechnung in dreyen Büchern, mit schönen Regeln und fragstücken begriffen, Ingolstadt 1527. A handbook of commercial arithmetic, depicted in the painting The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger, Cosmographiae introductio, cum quibusdam Geometriae ac Astronomiae principiis ad eam rem necessariis, Ingolstadt 1529. Ein kurtzer bericht der Observation unnd urtels des jüngst erschinnen Cometen, a scientific book on astronomical instruments in German. ^1 Whether Apian ever received the money is uncertain, in any case he wrote a letter to the emperor in 1549 asking him to finally pay the promised sum. Röttel, K. Peter Apian, Astronomie, Kosmographie und Mathematik am Beginn der Neuzeit, Polygon-Verlag 1995, Peter and Philipp Apian, in German. Volume 1, Vom Astrolab zum mathematischen Besteck, oConnor, John J. Robertson, Edmund F. Petrus Apianus, MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews
13.
Philosophy
–
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. The term was coined by Pythagoras. Philosophical methods include questioning, critical discussion, rational argument and systematic presentation, classic philosophical questions include, Is it possible to know anything and to prove it. However, philosophers might also pose more practical and concrete questions such as, is it better to be just or unjust. Historically, philosophy encompassed any body of knowledge, from the time of Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle to the 19th century, natural philosophy encompassed astronomy, medicine and physics. For example, Newtons 1687 Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy later became classified as a book of physics, in the 19th century, the growth of modern research universities led academic philosophy and other disciplines to professionalize and specialize. In the modern era, some investigations that were part of philosophy became separate academic disciplines, including psychology, sociology. Other investigations closely related to art, science, politics, or other pursuits remained part of philosophy, for example, is beauty objective or subjective. Are there many scientific methods or just one, is political utopia a hopeful dream or hopeless fantasy. Major sub-fields of academic philosophy include metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, logic, philosophy of science, since the 20th century, professional philosophers contribute to society primarily as professors, researchers and writers. Traditionally, the term referred to any body of knowledge. In this sense, philosophy is related to religion, mathematics, natural science, education. This division is not obsolete but has changed, Natural philosophy has split into the various natural sciences, especially astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology and cosmology. Moral philosophy has birthed the social sciences, but still includes value theory, metaphysical philosophy has birthed formal sciences such as logic, mathematics and philosophy of science, but still includes epistemology, cosmology and others. Many philosophical debates that began in ancient times are still debated today, colin McGinn and others claim that no philosophical progress has occurred during that interval. Chalmers and others, by contrast, see progress in philosophy similar to that in science, in one general sense, philosophy is associated with wisdom, intellectual culture and a search for knowledge. In that sense, all cultures and literate societies ask philosophical questions such as how are we to live, a broad and impartial conception of philosophy then, finds a reasoned inquiry into such matters as reality, morality and life in all world civilizations. Socrates was an influential philosopher, who insisted that he possessed no wisdom but was a pursuer of wisdom
14.
Physical cosmology
–
Physical cosmology is the study of the largest-scale structures and dynamics of the Universe and is concerned with fundamental questions about its origin, structure, evolution, and ultimate fate. These advances made it possible to speculate about the origin of the universe, a few researchers still advocate a handful of alternative cosmologies, however, most cosmologists agree that the Big Bang theory explains the observations better. Cosmology draws heavily on the work of many areas of research in theoretical. Areas relevant to include particle physics experiments and theory, theoretical and observational astrophysics, general relativity, quantum mechanics. Modern cosmology developed along tandem tracks of theory and observation, in 1916, Albert Einstein published his theory of general relativity, which provided a unified description of gravity as a geometric property of space and time. At the time, Einstein believed in a universe. This is because masses distributed throughout the universe gravitationally attract, however, he realized that his equations permitted the introduction of a constant term which could counteract the attractive force of gravity on the cosmic scale. Einstein published his first paper on relativistic cosmology in 1917, in which he added this cosmological constant to his equations in order to force them to model a static universe. However, this so-called Einstein model is unstable to small perturbations—it will eventually start to expand or contract, the Einstein model describes a static universe, space is finite and unbounded. It was later realized that Einsteins model was just one of a set of possibilities, all of which were consistent with general relativity. The cosmological solutions of general relativity were found by Alexander Friedmann in the early 1920s and his equations describe the Friedmann–Lemaître–Robertson–Walker universe, which may expand or contract, and whose geometry may be open, flat, or closed. In the 1910s, Vesto Slipher interpreted the red shift of spiral nebulae as a Doppler shift that indicated they were receding from Earth, however, it is difficult to determine the distance to astronomical objects. One way is to compare the size of an object to its angular size. Another method is to measure the brightness of an object and assume an intrinsic luminosity, due to the difficulty of using these methods, they did not realize that the nebulae were actually galaxies outside our own Milky Way, nor did they speculate about the cosmological implications. In 1929, Edwin Hubble provided a basis for Lemaîtres theory. Hubble showed that the nebulae were galaxies by determining their distances using measurements of the brightness of Cepheid variable stars. He discovered a relationship between the redshift of a galaxy and its distance and he interpreted this as evidence that the galaxies are receding from Earth in every direction at speeds proportional to their distance. Given the cosmological principle, Hubbles law suggested that the universe was expanding, two primary explanations were proposed for the expansion
15.
Spacetime
–
In physics, spacetime is any mathematical model that combines space and time into a single interwoven continuum. Until the turn of the 20th century, the assumption had been that the 3D geometry of the universe was distinct from time, Einsteins theory was framed in terms of kinematics, and showed how measurements of space and time varied for observers in different reference frames. His theory was an advance over Lorentzs 1904 theory of electromagnetic phenomena. A key feature of this interpretation is the definition of an interval that combines distance. Although measurements of distance and time between events differ among observers, the interval is independent of the inertial frame of reference in which they are recorded. The resultant spacetime came to be known as Minkowski space, non-relativistic classical mechanics treats time as a universal quantity of measurement which is uniform throughout space and which is separate from space. Classical mechanics assumes that time has a constant rate of passage that is independent of the state of motion of an observer, furthermore, it assumes that space is Euclidean, which is to say, it assumes that space follows the geometry of common sense. General relativity, in addition, provides an explanation of how gravitational fields can slow the passage of time for an object as seen by an observer outside the field. Mathematically, spacetime is a manifold, which is to say, by analogy, at small enough scales, a globe appears flat. An extremely large scale factor, c relates distances measured in space with distances measured in time, waves implied the existence of a medium which waved, but attempts to measure the properties of the hypothetical luminiferous aether implied by these experiments provided contradictory results. For example, the Fizeau experiment of 1851 demonstrated that the speed of light in flowing water was less than the speed of light in air plus the speed of the flowing water, the partial aether-dragging implied by this result was in conflict with measurements of stellar aberration. By 1904, Lorentz had expanded his theory such that he had arrived at equations formally identical with those that Einstein were to derive later, but with a fundamentally different interpretation. As a theory of dynamics, his theory assumed actual physical deformations of the constituents of matter. For example, most physicists believed that Lorentz contraction would be detectable by such experiments as the Trouton–Noble experiment or the Experiments of Rayleigh and Brace. However, these negative results, and in his 1904 theory of the electron. Einstein performed his analyses in terms of kinematics rather than dynamics and it would appear that he did not at first think geometrically about spacetime. It was Einsteins former mathematics professor, Hermann Minkowski, who was to provide an interpretation of special relativity. Einstein was initially dismissive of the interpretation of special relativity
16.
Observable universe
–
There are at least two trillion galaxies in the observable universe, containing more stars than all the grains of sand on planet Earth. Assuming the universe is isotropic, the distance to the edge of the universe is roughly the same in every direction. That is, the universe is a spherical volume centered on the observer. Every location in the Universe has its own universe, which may or may not overlap with the one centered on Earth. The word observable used in this sense does not depend on modern technology actually permits detection of radiation from an object in this region. It simply indicates that it is possible in principle for light or other signals from the object to reach an observer on Earth, in practice, we can see light only from as far back as the time of photon decoupling in the recombination epoch. That is when particles were first able to emit photons that were not quickly re-absorbed by other particles, before then, the Universe was filled with a plasma that was opaque to photons. The detection of gravitational waves indicates there is now a possibility of detecting signals from before the recombination epoch. The surface of last scattering is the collection of points in space at the distance that photons from the time of photon decoupling just reach us today. These are the photons we detect today as cosmic microwave background radiation, however, with future technology, it may be possible to observe the still older relic neutrino background, or even more distant events via gravitational waves. It is estimated that the diameter of the universe is about 28.5 gigaparsecs. The total mass of matter in the universe can be calculated using the critical density. Some parts of the Universe are too far away for the light emitted since the Big Bang to have had time to reach Earth. In the future, light from distant galaxies will have had time to travel. This fact can be used to define a type of cosmic event horizon whose distance from the Earth changes over time, both popular and professional research articles in cosmology often use the term universe to mean observable universe. It is plausible that the galaxies within our observable universe represent only a fraction of the galaxies in the Universe. If the Universe is finite but unbounded, it is possible that the Universe is smaller than the observable universe. In this case, what we take to be very distant galaxies may actually be duplicate images of nearby galaxies and it is difficult to test this hypothesis experimentally because different images of a galaxy would show different eras in its history, and consequently might appear quite different
17.
Big Bang
–
The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model for the universe from the earliest known periods through its subsequent large-scale evolution. If the known laws of physics are extrapolated to the highest density regime, detailed measurements of the expansion rate of the universe place this moment at approximately 13.8 billion years ago, which is thus considered the age of the universe. After the initial expansion, the universe cooled sufficiently to allow the formation of subatomic particles, giant clouds of these primordial elements later coalesced through gravity in halos of dark matter, eventually forming the stars and galaxies visible today. Since Georges Lemaître first noted in 1927 that a universe could be traced back in time to an originating single point. More recently, measurements of the redshifts of supernovae indicate that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, the known physical laws of nature can be used to calculate the characteristics of the universe in detail back in time to an initial state of extreme density and temperature. American astronomer Edwin Hubble observed that the distances to faraway galaxies were strongly correlated with their redshifts, assuming the Copernican principle, the only remaining interpretation is that all observable regions of the universe are receding from all others. Since we know that the distance between galaxies increases today, it must mean that in the past galaxies were closer together, the continuous expansion of the universe implies that the universe was denser and hotter in the past. Large particle accelerators can replicate the conditions that prevailed after the early moments of the universe, resulting in confirmation, however, these accelerators can only probe so far into high energy regimes. Consequently, the state of the universe in the earliest instants of the Big Bang expansion is still poorly understood, the first subatomic particles to be formed included protons, neutrons, and electrons. Though simple atomic nuclei formed within the first three minutes after the Big Bang, thousands of years passed before the first electrically neutral atoms formed, the majority of atoms produced by the Big Bang were hydrogen, along with helium and traces of lithium. Giant clouds of primordial elements later coalesced through gravity to form stars and galaxies. The framework for the Big Bang model relies on Albert Einsteins theory of relativity and on simplifying assumptions such as homogeneity. The governing equations were formulated by Alexander Friedmann, and similar solutions were worked on by Willem de Sitter, extrapolation of the expansion of the universe backwards in time using general relativity yields an infinite density and temperature at a finite time in the past. This singularity indicates that general relativity is not a description of the laws of physics in this regime. How closely models based on general relativity alone can be used to extrapolate toward the singularity is debated—certainly no closer than the end of the Planck epoch. This primordial singularity is itself called the Big Bang, but the term can also refer to a more generic early hot. The agreement of independent measurements of this age supports the model that describes in detail the characteristics of the universe. The earliest phases of the Big Bang are subject to much speculation, in the most common models the universe was filled homogeneously and isotropically with a very high energy density and huge temperatures and pressures and was very rapidly expanding and cooling
18.
Cosmic ray
–
Cosmic rays are high-energy radiation, mainly originating outside the Solar System. Upon impact with the Earths atmosphere, cosmic rays can produce showers of particles that sometimes reach the surface. Composed primarily of protons and atomic nuclei, they are of mysterious origin. Data from the Fermi space telescope have been interpreted as evidence that a significant fraction of cosmic rays originate from the supernovae explosions of stars. Active galactic nuclei probably also produce cosmic rays, the term ray is a historical accident, as cosmic rays were at first, and wrongly, thought to be mostly electromagnetic radiation. In current usage, the cosmic ray almost exclusively refers to massive particles. Massive particles – those that have rest mass – can gain additional, kinetic, mass-energy when they are moving, through this process, some particles acquire tremendously high mass-energies. These are significantly higher than the energy of even the highest-energy photons detected to date. The energy of the massless photon depends solely on frequency, not speed, at the higher end of the energy spectrum, relativistic kinetic energy is the main source of the mass-energy of cosmic rays. Hence, the highest-energy detected fermionic cosmic ray was around 3×106 times more energetic than the highest-energy detected cosmic photons, of primary cosmic rays, which originate outside of Earths atmosphere, about 99% are the nuclei of well-known atoms, and about 1% are solitary electrons. Of the nuclei, about 90% are simple protons, i. e. hydrogen nuclei, 9% are alpha particles, identical to helium nuclei, a very small fraction are stable particles of antimatter, such as positrons or antiprotons. The precise nature of this fraction is an area of active research. An active search from Earth orbit for anti-alpha particles has failed to detect them, one can show that such enormous energies might be achieved by means of the Centrifugal mechanism of acceleration in Active galactic nuclei. At 50 J, the highest-energy ultra-high-energy cosmic rays have energies comparable to the energy of a 90-kilometre-per-hour baseball. As a result of discoveries, there has been interest in investigating cosmic rays of even greater energies. Most cosmic rays, however, do not have such extreme energies, however, his paper published in Physikalische Zeitschrift was not widely accepted. In 1911 Domenico Pacini observed simultaneous variations of the rate of ionization over a lake, over the sea, Pacini concluded from the decrease of radioactivity underwater that a certain part of the ionization must be due to sources other than the radioactivity of the Earth. In 1912, Victor Hess carried three enhanced-accuracy Wulf electrometers to an altitude of 5300 meters in a balloon flight
19.
Outer space
–
Outer space or just space, is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including Earth. The baseline temperature, as set by the radiation from the Big Bang, is 2.7 kelvins. In most galaxies, observations provide evidence that 90% of the mass is in a form, called dark matter. Data indicates that the majority of the mass-energy in the universe is a poorly understood vacuum energy of space which astronomers label dark energy. Intergalactic space takes up most of the volume of the Universe, there is no firm boundary where outer space starts. However the Kármán line, at an altitude of 100 km above sea level, is used as the start of outer space in space treaties. The framework for international law was established by the Outer Space Treaty. This treaty precludes any claims of sovereignty and permits all states to freely explore outer space. Despite the drafting of UN resolutions for the uses of outer space. Humans began the exploration of space during the 20th century with the advent of high-altitude balloon flights. Earth orbit was first achieved by Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union in 1961, due to the high cost of getting into space, manned spaceflight has been limited to low Earth orbit and the Moon. Outer space represents an environment for human exploration because of the dual hazards of vacuum. Microgravity also has an effect on human physiology that causes both muscle atrophy and bone loss. In addition to health and environmental issues, the economic cost of putting objects, including humans. In 350 BCE, Greek philosopher Aristotle suggested that nature abhors a vacuum and this concept built upon a 5th-century BCE ontological argument by the Greek philosopher Parmenides, who denied the possible existence of a void in space. Based on this idea that a vacuum could not exist, in the West it was held for many centuries that space could not be empty. As late as the 17th century, the French philosopher René Descartes argued that the entirety of space must be filled, in ancient China, there were various schools of thought concerning the nature of the heavens, some of which bear a resemblance to the modern understanding. In the 2nd century, astronomer Zhang Heng became convinced that space must be infinite, extending well beyond the mechanism that supported the Sun, the surviving books of the Hsüan Yeh school said that the heavens were boundless, empty and void of substance
20.
Cosmic microwave background
–
The cosmic microwave background is the electromagnetic radiation left over from the time of recombination in Big Bang cosmology. In older literature, the CMB is also known as cosmic microwave background radiation or relic radiation. The CMB is a cosmic radiation that is fundamental to observational cosmology because it is the oldest light in the universe. With a traditional optical telescope, the space between stars and galaxies is completely dark, however, a sufficiently sensitive radio telescope shows a faint background glow, almost isotropic, that is not associated with any star, galaxy, or other object. This glow is strongest in the region of the radio spectrum. The discovery of CMB is landmark evidence of the Big Bang origin of the universe, when the universe was young, before the formation of stars and planets, it was denser, much hotter, and filled with a uniform glow from a white-hot fog of hydrogen plasma. As the universe expanded, both the plasma and the radiation filling it grew cooler, when the universe cooled enough, protons and electrons combined to form neutral hydrogen atoms. These atoms could no longer absorb the radiation, and so the universe became transparent instead of being an opaque fog. This is the source of the alternative term relic radiation, precise measurements of the CMB are critical to cosmology, since any proposed model of the universe must explain this radiation. The CMB has a black body spectrum at a temperature of 2. 72548±0.00057 K. The spectral radiance dEν/dν peaks at 160.23 GHz, in the range of frequencies. In particular, the radiance at different angles of observation in the sky contains small anisotropies, or irregularities. This is an active field of study, with scientists seeking both better data and better interpretations of the initial conditions of expansion. Although many different processes might produce the form of a black body spectrum. As a result, most cosmologists consider the Big Bang model of the universe to be the best explanation for the CMB. The high degree of uniformity throughout the universe and its faint but measured anisotropy lend strong support for the Big Bang model in general. Moreover, the fluctuations are coherent on angular scales that are larger than the apparent cosmological horizon at recombination, either such coherence is acausally fine-tuned, or cosmic inflation occurred. The cosmic microwave radiation is an emission of uniform, black body thermal energy coming from all parts of the sky
