WEEK 3

Section 3: Intellectual Revolution

Introduction

The Scientific Revolution is a complicated and disjointed movement upon whose periods
and actors’ historians do not always agree. Some scientists of the period built on the works of
those who came before them. Others made their own contribution strictly from their own
observations and at times contradicted the evidence and conclusions of their contemporaries.
With that caveat made, many historians claim that it began with Copernicus and ended with Isaac
Newton 150 years later.

During this century and a half of scientific innovation, numerous achievements were
made in science and astronomy. The modern scientific method of observation, hypothesis,
experimentation, analysis and conclusion was sculpted and refined in this era, and important
discoveries were made concerning gravity, the skeletal and muscular systems of the human body
and the rotations of the planets.

Desired learning Outcomes

At the end of this session, the students must have:

1. discussed how intellectual revolution shaped society across time;

2. explained how the scientific thoughts of Ptolemy, Copernicus, and Darwin
transformed the views of society in terms of intellectual, moral and social aspects;
3. discussed the scientific and technological developments in the Philippines.

Lesson Proper

Scientific Revolution, drastic change in scientific thought that took place during the 16th
and 17th centuries. A new view of nature emerged during the Scientific Revolution, replacing the
Greek view that had dominated science for almost 2,000 years. Science became an autonomous
discipline, distinct from both philosophy and technology, and it came to be regarded as having
utilitarian goals. By the end of this period, it may not be too much to say that science had
replaced Christianity as the focal point of European civilization. Out of the ferment of the
Renaissance and Reformation there arose a new view of science, bringing about the following
transformations: the reeducation of common sense in favour of abstract reasoning; the
substitution of a quantitative for a qualitative view of nature; the view of nature as a machine
rather than as an organism; the development of an experimental, scientific method that sought
definite answers to certain limited questions couched in the framework of specific theories; and
the acceptance of new criteria for explanation, stressing the “how” rather than the “why” that had
characterized the Aristotelian search for final causes.
PTOLEMAIC THEORY

Claudius Ptolemy was a Greek mathematician,

astronomer, geographer and astrologer. He lived in the city of
Alexandria in the Roman province of Egypt under the rule of the
Roman Empire, had a Latin name, cited Greek philosophers, and
used Babylonian observations and Babylonian lunar theory.
(Source: Wikipedia)

The Earth was the center of the Universe according to

Claudius Ptolemy, whose view of the cosmos persisted for 1400 years until it was overturned —
with controversy — by findings from Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton.
A Geocentric View
Ptolemy synthesized Greek knowledge of the known Universe. His work enabled
astronomers to make accurate predictions of planetary positions and solar and lunar eclipses,
promoting acceptance of his view of the cosmos in the Byzantine and Islamic worlds and
throughout Europe for more than 1400 years.
Ptolemy accepted Aristotle’s idea that the Sun and the planets revolve around a spherical
Earth, a geocentric view. Ptolemy developed this idea through observation and in mathematical
detail. In doing so, he rejected the hypothesis of Aristarchus of Samos, who came to Alexandria
about 350 years before Ptolemy was born. Aristarchus had made the claim that the Earth
revolves around the Sun, but he couldn’t produce any evidence to back it up.

Map of the Universe according to Ptolemy, from a 17th century Dutch atlas by Gerard Valck ©
Bettmann/CORBIS

Based on observations he made with his naked eye, Ptolemy saw the Universe as a set of
nested, transparent spheres, with Earth in the center. He posited that
the Moon, Mercury, Venus, and the Sun all revolved around Earth.
Beyond the Sun, he thought, sat Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, the only
other planets known at the time (as they were visible to the naked eye).
Beyond Saturn lay a final sphere — with all the stars fixed to it — that
revolved around the other spheres.
This idea of the Universe did not fit exactly with all of
Ptolemy’s observations. He was aware that the size, motion, and brightness of the planets varied.
So he incorporated Hipparchus’s notion of epicycles, put forth a few centuries earlier, to work
out his calculations. Epicycles were small circular orbits around imaginary centers on which the
planets were said to move while making a revolution around the Earth. By using Ptolemy’s
tables, astronomers could accurately predict eclipses and the positions of planets. Because real
visible events in the sky seemed to confirm the truth of Ptolemy’s views, his ideas were accepted
for centuries until the Polish astronomer, Copernicus, proposed in 1543 that the Sun, rather than
the Earth, belonged in the center.
After the Roman Empire dissolved, Muslim Arabs
conquered Egypt in 641 CE. Muslim scholars mostly accepted
Ptolemy’s astronomy. They referred to him as Batlamyus and
called his book on astronomy al-Magisti, or “The Greatest.”
Islamic astronomers corrected some of Ptolemy’s errors and made
other advances, but they did not make the leap to a heliocentric
(Sun-centered) universe.
Ptolemy’s book was translated into Latin in the 12th century and known as The
Almagest, from the Arabic name. This enabled his teachings to be spread throughout Western
Europe.
 We know few details of Ptolemy’s life. But he left one personal poem, inserted right after
the table of contents in The Almagest:
Well do I know that I am mortal, a creature of one day.
But if my mind follows the wandering path of stars
Then my feet no longer rest on earth, but standing by
Zeus himself, I take my fill of ambrosia, the food of the gods.
Source : Cynthia Stokes Brown
https://www.khanacademy.org/
For Further Discussion

Even though Ptolemy’s system was wrong, people believed in it. Why?
COPERNICAN THEORY
Nicolaus Copernicus was a
Renaissance-era mathematician and
astronomer, who formulated a model of the
universe that placed the Sun rather than Earth
at the center of the universe, in all likelihood
independently of Aristarchus of Samos, who
had formulated such a model some eighteen
centuries earlier. Wikipedia
(Source: nagaitoshiya.com)

This caused the paradigm shift of how the earth and sun were placed in the
heavens/universe. It is the idea that rejected Ptolemaic model (earth is the center of the solar
system) and proved the heliocentric model (Sun is the center of the solar system having the earth
revolving around it.)
Copernicus proposed that the sun was stationary in the center of the universe and the
earth revolved around it. Disturbed by the failure of Ptolemy’s geocentric model of the universe
to follow Aristotle’s requirement for the uniform circular motion of all celestial bodies and
determined to eliminate Ptolemy’s equant, an imaginary point around which the bodies seemed
to follow that requirement, Copernicus decided that he could achieve his goal only through a
heliocentric model. He thereby created a concept of a universe in which the distances of the
planets from the sun bore a direct relationship to the size of their orbits. At the time Copernicus’s
heliocentric idea was very controversial; nevertheless, it was the start of a change in the way the
world was viewed, and Copernicus came to be seen as the initiator of the Scientific Revolution.
Copernicus worked on a heliocentric for nearly his entire life. Unlike previous
astronomers and mathematicians who had used heliocentric models simply to make their
mathematical calculations of the planet's orbits more accurate, Copernicus firmly believed the
sun to be at the center of the solar system. Likely due to fears of potential backlash from church
authorities, Copernicus waited to publish his theories and calculations until shortly before his
death.
Regardless of errors and discrepancies in his final theory, Copernicus' greatest
achievement was the removal of the Earth from the center of the universe and solar system.

Summary
Views of the universe: Ptolemy vs. Copernicus

Copernicus’ model:
"Sun-centered," or "heliocentric"
Copernicus thought that the planets orbited the Sun, and that the Moon orbited Earth. The
Sun, in the center of the universe, did not move, nor did the stars.
Copernicus was correct about some things, but wrong about others. The Sun is not in the center
of the universe, and it does move, as do the stars. Also, both
Copernicus and Ptolemy thought the orbits of the planets were
circular, but we now know they are elliptical.

Ptolemy's model:
"Earth-centered," or "geocentric"

Ptolemy
thought that
all celestial
objects —
including
 the planets, Sun, Moon, and stars — orbited Earth. Earth, in the
center of the universe, did not move at all.

NOTE: The outer planets, like Uranus and Neptune, are missing from both charts because they
had not been discovered at the time. The planets are lined up to make the charts easy to read;
they never line up this way in nature.

DARWINISM
Scientific theories are historical entities. Often you can identify key individuals and
documents that are the sources of new theories—Einstein’s 1905 papers, Copernicus’ 1539 De
Revolutionibus, Darwin’s On the Origin of Species. Sometimes, but not always, the theory tends
in popular parlance to be named after the author of these seminal documents, as is the case with
Darwinism.
But like every historical entity, theories undergo change through time. Indeed, a scientific
theory might undergo such significant changes that the only point of continuing to name it after
its source is to identify its lineage and ancestry.
Darwinism is a theory of biological evolution developed by the English naturalist Charles
Darwin (1809–1882) and others, stating that all species of organisms arise and develop through
the natural selection of small, inherited variations that increase the individual's ability to
compete, survive, and reproduce.
The theory of evolution by natural selection, first formulated in Darwin's book "On the
Origin of Species" in 1859, is the process by which organisms change over time as a result of
changes in heritable physical or behavioral traits. Changes that allow an organism to better adapt
to its environment will help it survive and have more offspring.
Evolution by natural selection is one of the best substantiated theories in the history of
science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including
paleontology, geology, genetics and developmental biology.
The theory has two main points, said Brian Richmond, curator of human origins at the
American Museum of Natural History in New York City. "All life on Earth is connected and
related to each other," and this diversity of life is a product of "modifications of populations by
natural selection, where some traits were favored in and environment over others," he said.
 More simply put, the theory can be described as "descent with modification," said Briana
Pobiner, an anthropologist and educator at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of
Natural History in Washington, D.C., who specializes in the study of human origins.

The theory is sometimes described as "survival of the fittest," but that can be misleading,
Pobiner said. Here, "fitness" refers not to an organism's strength or athletic ability, but rather the
ability to survive and reproduce.
Ideas aimed at explaining how organisms change, or evolve, over time date back to
Anaximander of Miletus, a Greek philosopher who lived in the 500s B.C.E. Noting that human
babies are born helpless, Anaximander speculated that humans must have descended from some
other type of creature whose young could survive without any help. He concluded that those
ancestors must be fish, since fish hatch from eggs and immediately begin living with no help
from their parents. From this reasoning, he proposed that all life began in the sea.
Anaximander was correct; humans can indeed trace our ancestry back to fish. His idea,
however, was not a theory in the scientific meaning of the word, because it could not be
subjected to testing that might support it or prove it wrong. In science, the word “theory”
indicates a very high level of certainty. Scientists talk about evolution as a theory, for instance,
just as they talk about Einstein’s explanation of gravity as a theory.
A theory is an idea about how something in nature works that has gone through rigorous
testing through observations and experiments designed to prove the idea right or wrong. When it
comes to the evolution of life, various philosophers and scientists, including an eighteenth-
century English doctor named Erasmus Darwin, proposed different aspects of what later would
become evolutionary theory. But evolution did not reach the status of being a scientific theory
until Darwin’s grandson, the more famous Charles Darwin, published his famous book On the
Origin of Species. Darwin and a scientific contemporary of his, Alfred Russel Wallace, proposed
that evolution occurs because of a phenomenon called natural selection.
In the theory of natural selection, organisms produce more offspring that are able to
survive in their environment. Those that are better physically equipped to survive, grow to
maturity, and reproduce. Those that are lacking in such fitness, on the other hand, either do not
reach an age when they can reproduce or produce fewer offspring than their counterparts.
Natural selection is sometimes summed up as “survival of the fittest” because the “fittest”
organisms—those most suited to their environment—are the ones that reproduce most
successfully, and are most likely to pass on their traits to the next generation.
This means that if an environment changes, the traits that enhance survival in that
environment will also gradually change, or evolve. Natural selection was such a powerful idea in
explaining the evolution of life that it became established as a scientific theory.
Biologists have since observed numerous examples of natural selection influencing
evolution. Today, it is known to be just one of several mechanisms by which life evolves. For
example, a phenomenon known as genetic drift can also cause species to evolve. In genetic drift,
some organisms—purely by chance—produce more offspring than would be expected. Those
organisms are not necessarily the fittest of their species, but it is their genes that get passed on to
the next generation (nationalgeogrpahic.org)
Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution states that evolution happens by natural selection.
Individuals in a species show variation in physical characteristics. This variation is because of
differences in their genes.
Individuals with characteristics best suited to their environment are more likely to
survive, finding food, avoiding predators and resisting disease. These individuals are more likely
to reproduce and pass their genes on to their children.
Individuals that are poorly adapted to their environment are less likely to survive and
reproduce. Therefore, their genes are less likely to be passed on to the next generation.
As a consequence, those individuals most suited to their environment survive and, given enough
time, the species will gradually evolve.

Natural selection in action: The Peppered moth

Before the industrial revolution in the mid-1700s, the peppered moth was most
commonly a pale whitish colour with black spots.
This colouring enabled them to hide from potential predators on trees with pale-coloured
bark, such as birch trees.
The rarer dark-coloured peppered moths were easily seen against the pale bark of trees
and therefore more easily seen by predators.
As the Industrial Revolution reached its peak, the air in industrial areas became full of
soot. This stained trees and buildings black.
 As a result, the lighter moths became much easier to spot than the darker ones, making
them vulnerable to being eaten by birds.
The darker moths were now camouflaged against the soot-stained trees and therefore less likely
to be eaten.
Over time this change in the environment led to the darker
moths becoming more common and the pale moths rarer

A pale peppered moth on an oak tree.

Image credit: Shutterstock

A pale peppered moth on a dark tree.

Image credit: Shutterstock
Different types of evolution
Convergent evolution
When the same adaptations evolve independently, under
similar selection pressures.
For example, flying insects, birds and bats have all
evolved the ability to fly, but independently of each other.
Co-evolution
When two species or groups of species have evolved
alongside each other where one adapts to changes in the other.
For example, flowering plants and pollinating insects such as bees.

Adaptive radiation
When a species splits into a number of new forms when a change in the environment
makes new resources available or creates new environmental challenges.
For example, finches on the Galapagos Islands have developed
different shaped beaks to take advantage of the different kinds of food
available on different islands.
Sketches of the heads of finches from the Galapagos Islands showing the differences in their
beak shapes due to evolution.

Image credit: John Gould (14.Sep.1804 - 3.Feb.1881) - From "Voyage of the Beagle"; also online through
Biodiversity

Evolution of modern humans

The origin of modern humans has probably been the most debated issue in evolutionary
biology over the last few decades.

Where did we come from?

Our evolutionary history is written into our genome?. The human genome looks the way
it does because of all the genetic changes that have affected our ancestors. The exact origin of
modern humans has long been a topic of debate.
Modern humans (Homo sapiens), the species? that we are, means ‘wise man’ in Latin. Our
species is the only surviving species of the genus Homo but where we came from has been a
topic of much debate. Modern humans originated in Africa within the past 200,000 years and
evolved from their most likely recent common ancestor, Homo erectus, which means ‘upright
man’ in Latin. Homo erectus is an extinct species of human that lived between 1.9 million and
135,000 years ago.
Historically, two key models have been put forward to explain the evolution? of Homo
sapiens. These are the ‘out of Africa’ model and the ‘multi-regional’ model. The ‘out of Africa’
model is currently the most widely accepted model. It proposes that Homo sapiens evolved in
Africa before migrating across the world.
On the other hand, the ‘multi-regional’ model proposes that the evolution of Homo
sapiens took place in a number of places over a long period of time. The intermingling of the
various populations eventually led to the single Homo sapiens species we see today.
FREUDALISM
Sigmund Freud (1856 to 1939) was the founding father of psychoanalysis, a method for
treating mental illness and also a theory which explains human behavior.
Freud believed that events in our childhood have a great influence on our adult lives,
shaping our personality. For example, anxiety originating from traumatic experiences in a
person's past is hidden from consciousness, and may cause problems during adulthood (in the
form of neuroses).
Thus, when we explain our behavior to ourselves or others
(conscious mental activity), we rarely give a true account of our
motivation. This is not because we are deliberately lying. While human
beings are great deceivers of others; they are even more adept at self-
deception.
Freud's life work was dominated by his attempts to find ways of
penetrating this often subtle and elaborate camouflage that obscures the hidden structure and
processes of personality.
His lexicon has become embedded within the vocabulary of Western society. Words he
introduced through his theories are now used by everyday people, such as anal (personality),
libido, denial, repression, cathartic, Freudian slip, and neurotic.
The Unconscious Mind
Freud (1900, 1905) developed a topographical model of the mind, whereby he described
the features of the mind’s structure and function. Freud used the analogy of an iceberg to
describe the three levels of the mind.
 On the surface is consciousness, which consists of those thoughts that are the focus of our
attention now, and this is seen as the tip of the iceberg. The preconscious consists of all which
can be retrieved from memory.
The third and most significant region is the unconscious. Here lie the processes that are
the real cause of most behavior. Like an iceberg, the most important part of the mind is the part
you cannot see.
The unconscious mind acts as a repository, a ‘cauldron’ of primitive wishes and impulse
kept at bay and mediated by the preconscious area.
For example, Freud (1915) found that some events and desires were often too frightening
or painful for his patients to acknowledge, and believed such information was locked away in the
unconscious mind. This can happen through the process of repression.
Sigmund Freud emphasized the importance of the unconscious mind, and a primary
assumption of Freudian theory is that the unconscious mind governs behavior to a greater degree
than people suspect. Indeed, the goal of psychoanalysis is to make the unconscious conscious.
The Psyche
Freud (1923) later developed a more structural model of the mind comprising the entities
id, ego, and superego (what Freud called “the psychic apparatus”). These are not physical areas
within the brain, but rather hypothetical conceptualizations of important mental functions.
 The id, ego, and superego have most commonly been conceptualized as three essential
parts of the human personality.
Freud assumed the id operated at an unconscious level according to the pleasure principle
(gratification from satisfying basic instincts). The id comprises two kinds of biological instincts
(or drives) which Freud called Eros and Thanatos.
Eros, or life instinct, helps the individual to survive; it directs life-sustaining activities
such as respiration, eating, and sex (Freud, 1925). The energy created by the life instincts is
known as libido.
In contrast, Thanatos or death instinct, is viewed as a set of destructive forces present in
all human beings (Freud, 1920). When this energy is directed outward onto others, it is expressed
as aggression and violence. Freud believed that Eros is stronger than Thanatos, thus enabling
people to survive rather than self-destruct.
The ego develops from the id during infancy. The ego's
goal is to satisfy the demands of the id in a safe a socially
acceptable way. In contrast to the id, the ego follows the reality
principle as it operates in both the conscious and unconscious
mind.
The superego develops during early childhood (when
the child identifies with the same sex parent) and is responsible
for ensuring moral standards are followed. The superego
operates on the morality principle and motivates us to behave in a socially responsible and
acceptable manner.
The basic dilemma of all human existence is that each element of the psychic apparatus
makes demands upon us that are incompatible with the other two. Inner conflict is inevitable.
For example, the superego can make a person feel guilty if rules are not followed. When
there is a conflict between the goals of the id and superego, the ego must act as a referee and
mediate this conflict. The ego can deploy various defense mechanisms (Freud, 1894, 1896) to
prevent it from becoming overwhelmed by anxiety.
Freud shook the foundations of psychology. He did this by shaping several schools of
thought. Many psychiatrists still practice these schools of thought. In this sense, Freud was a
revolutionary in his way of seeing humans and our minds.
In this article, we’re not going to focus as much on his contributions. Instead, we’re going
to look at why he became a revolutionary. We’ll also see why he’s still a significant figure today.
Freud is still a key figure in the history of psychology. You could even say that Freud’s effect on
psychology is as significant as Copernicus’s effect on how we see the universe when he
discovered the sun was the center of everything and not the Earth. If you agree with us, let’s
take a look at this important historical figure!

Freud and the unconscious

The unconscious was his most revolutionary idea. However, today it’s perhaps one of the least
discussed topics. In the historical moment that Freud lived in, social psychology hadn’t been
developed yet. However, we already knew that we didn’t have complete control over what
happened to us. People already knew that certain external variables, such as the amount of
sunlight a person got every day, could influence their mood. It’s also true that this same sunlight
could blind us or make us stumble. Freud took this concept one step further.
Freud pointed out that inside each of us, there’s a side we can’t access directly or in a
conscious way. However, this side does manifest itself in our emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.
It’s a kind of genius that acts behind the scenes. It moves the puppet’s strings but doesn’t show
its face on stage.
 The unconscious is ignored by the conscious mind. This unconscious mind can
sometimes take us down some difficult roads. It could make us feel sad without us consciously
knowing why or make us have symbolic dreams. It can even cause certain errors in our speech.
Today, there a few people who can deny that we have an unconscious part that influences
us. Our conscious mind doesn’t have an easy access to it. The unconscious mind could hold a
childhood memory, but it also could hold deteriorated self-esteem or attachment or commitment
issues. These issues can make all your relationships fail.

Key Points
Sigmund Freud ‘s psychoanalytic theory of personality argues that human behavior is the
result of the interactions among three component parts of the mind: the id, ego, and superego.
This “structural theory” of personality places great importance on how conflicts among
the parts of the mind shape behavior and personality. These conflicts are mostly unconscious.
Another look at childhood
Freud believed that childhood is a significant stage in which events that will influence us
throughout our lives take place. In addition, this influence will happen primarily through the
unconscious. We use models we have internalized but haven’t processed.
Freud also tells us that sexuality also plays an important role in childhood. This idea was
very important to him. We see this, for example, in his Oedipus and Electra complexes.
However, he spoke of child sexuality as something natural and refrained from entering into any
moral debate about it.
For him, this sexuality is very present and can have consequences. In the case of boys, for
example, competition with the father for the love of the mother can stimulate them to grow. This
can make the boy want to imitate the father and try to overcome him. On the other hand, this
idealization of the mother can make the boy find people similar to his mother attractive when it
comes to relationships.
One thing you can certainly say about Freud is that he wasn’t afraid to fight to put an end
to certain taboos. One of the most important ideas he tackled may have been childhood
idealization.

Conflict and neurosis

 Another revolutionary idea that Freud dealt with revolved around neurosis. Freud
suggested that there are internal conflicts between what we desire (it-instinct) and what we allow
ourselves to do (superego-forbidden in terms of culture or society). These things make us
collapse into neurosis. This means that neurotic disorders arise from the displacement of the id to
the unconscious by the superego in an attempt to drown them out. (exploringyourmind.com)
Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality argues that human behavior is the
result of the interactions among three component parts of the mind: the id, ego, and superego.
This theory, known as Freud’s structural theory of personality, places great emphasis on the role
of unconscious psychological conflicts in shaping behavior and personality. Dynamic
interactions among these fundamental parts of the mind are thought to progress through five
distinct psychosexual stages of development. Over the last century, however, Freud’s ideas have
since been met with criticism, in part because of his singular focus on sexuality as the main
driver of human personality development.
Freud’s Structure of the Human Mind
According to Freud, our personality develops from the interactions among what he
proposed as the three fundamental structures of the human mind: the id, ego, and superego.
Conflicts among these three structures, and our efforts to find balance among what each of them
“desires,” determines how we behave and approach the world. What balance we strike in any
given situation determines how we will resolve the conflict between two overarching behavioral
tendencies: our biological aggressive and pleasure-seeking drives vs. our socialized internal
control over those drives.
Freud believed that the id, ego, and superego are in constant conflict and that adult
personality and behavior are rooted in the results of these internal struggles throughout
childhood. He believed that a person who has a strong ego has a healthy personality and that
imbalances in this system can lead to neurosis (what we now think of as anxiety and depression)
and unhealthy behaviors.
Conflict within the mind: According to Freud, the job of the ego is to balance the
aggressive/pleasure-seeking drives of the id with the moral control of the superego.

IMPACT
 Freud's most obvious impact was to change the way society thought about and dealt with
mental illness. Before psychoanalysis, which Freud invented, mental illness was almost
universally considered 'organic'; that is, it was thought to come from some kind of deterioration
or disease of the brain. Research on treating mental illness was primarily concerned–at least
theoretically–with discovering exactly which kinds of changes in the brain led to insanity. Many
diseases did not manifest obvious signs of physical difference between healthy and diseased
brains, but it was assumed that this was simply because the techniques for finding the differences
were not yet sufficient.
If this is true–and we have a great deal of evidence that it is–why is Freud still so important?
There are at least two reasons. The first is purely practical: psychoanalysis has enormous
historical significance. Mental illness affects a large proportion of the population, either directly
or indirectly, so any curative scheme as widely accepted as was Freud's is important to our
history in general. The second, more important, reason is that Freud gave people a new way of
thinking about why they acted the way they did. He created a whole new way of interpreting
behaviors: one could now claim that a person had motives, desires, and beliefs–all buried in the
unconscious–which they knew nothing about but which nonetheless directly controlled and
motivated their conscious thought and behavior. This hypothesis, derived from but independent
of Freud's psychiatric work, was the truly radical part of his system of thought (sparknotes.com).

Synthesis

COPERNICAN • After Galileo publicly championed the Copernican theory, the Catholic
Church ordered him not to discuss it further and then it condemned the Copernican theory as
false. Galileo was quiet for a while, but he publicly defended his views in 1632 and was tried by
the Inquisition, found "vehemently suspect of heresy," forced to recant and spent the rest of his
life under house arrest.
Further discovery showed that the sun is only at the center of our solar system, not the
center of the universe as the Copernican theory postulated and is merely one of millions of stars.
Since then scientists have discovered more than one galaxy. All these discoveries forever
changed our understanding of the world we live in. For the first time the biblical and popular
notion thatf the earth is the center of the universe was seriously confronted by an unwanted
reality.
DARWINIAN • This has brought a great impact on how people approach Biology
forever. This revolution provided a different than the "theory of Creation". The Darwinian
revolution started when Charles Darwin published his book "The Origin of Species" that
emphasizes that humans are the result of an evolution.
FREUDIAN • This theory has started to revolutionize Psychiatry with Sigmund Freud.
This includes the "Freudian Theory of Personality" that involves the human development
contributes to his/her personality and also his "psychoanalysis" that is the process for achieving
proper functioning if a human does not complete his/her developmental stage.