450--1700


 * Tycho Brahe

**

Died: 1601**
 * Born: 1546 Denmark

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Tycho was born into high nobility in Denmark. He is referenced as "probably the most famous observational astronomer of the sixteenth-century." His work led to the work of Johannes Kepler. Tycho's parents forced him into the nobility and into court, but he took a greater liking to astronomy rather than the court of law. In 1572 a appearance of a "new star" led to Tycho's first publication (name could not be found). It was printer and distributed in the year of 1573. Tycho invented numerous quantities of tools for astronomy that were built and distributed, the sextant being one of them. The sextant is still used today by mariners to "shoot stars."


 * Richard Boyle

**

Born: 25 Jan 1627 in Lismore, County Waterford, Ireland Died: 30 Dec 1691 in London, England
[|http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Biographies/Boyle.html]

Known as "The father of modern Chemistry."

He was one of the first scientists to work with Controlled experiments, and worked with a group of people with experiments. He created and invented the first vacuum pump. Boyle's pump could be operated easily and efficiently by one man. He published various publishes on various topics such as Theology, Science, and Philosophy. His first major scientific report, The Spring and Weight of the Air, was published in 1660 and described experiments using a new vacuum pump of his design. With it Boyle demonstrated that the sound of a bell in the receiver (a thirty quart vacuum chamber) faded as the air was removed, proving that air was necessary for the transmission of sound. Boyle's best known contribution to scientific knowledge is the 1661 publication of "The Sceptical Chymist" in which he discusses the idea of an element. Aristotelian science held that elements were not just the simplest of all substances but were also necessary ingredients of all bodies, i.e., if water is an element then all bodies must contain at least a small amount of water. Boyle's idea of an element was somewhat vague and certainly not "modern" in the 20th century sense. But he presented persuasive experimental evidence that most of the commonly accepted elements (fire, water, salt, mercury, etc) did not meet both of the Aristotelian criteria.


 * Bruno Giordano



Born: Naples, 1548**
 * Died: February 17, 1600**

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Was an Italian Priest, Philosopher, cosmologist, and occultist. He is known for his system of mnemonics based on organized knowledge, his ideas on Extra-terrestial Life and his support of Copernicus's heliocentric model of the Solar System. Like other early thinkers seeking a more reasonable view of the universe, Bruno adopted a model of the world comprising some aspects that have been incorporated into the modern scientific model and others, such as his "Animistic" cosmology and disdain for mathematics, which are inconsistent with the modern scientific model. Although Bruno did not wholly embrace Copernicus's preference for mathematics over speculation, he advocated the Copernican view that the earth was not the center of the universe, and extrapolated some consequences that were radical departures from the cosmology of the time. According to Bruno, Copernicus's theories contradicted the view of a celestial sphere, immutable, incorruptible, and superior to the sublunary sphere or terrestrial region. Bruno went beyond the heliocentric model to envision a universe which, like that of Plotinus in the third century C.E., or like Pascal's nearly a century after Bruno, had its center everywhere and its circumference nowhere.