• Question: when was science found

    Asked by pencilcase2000 to Cathal, Ciara, Emma, Michael, Sive on 13 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: Cathal Cummins

      Cathal Cummins answered on 13 Nov 2013:


      Science was not “found” really; science began as stories passed down from generation to generation. For example, how to make bread, beer, swords, and how to heal wounds. When people began to write, it became easier to communicate this wisdom and it became more refined and exact. These early “scientists” are very different from today’s scientists but we owe them a lot — if it wasn’t for them, science could never have got to where it is today!

    • Photo: Michael Nolan

      Michael Nolan answered on 14 Nov 2013:


      Science would have started as soon as we became conscious and started looking at the world around us and wondering how it works and what we can do to make it suit us better.

      What we think of as science required language, maths and writing to really grow so that observations and ideas and theories could be conveyed, correctly described and kept for others to work on. Together with a systematic way of thinking and observing, you are looking at ancient Greece as the birthplace of what we now call science. They were the first to look at the world and observe it and notice patterns for which general explanations could be given and used to derive a deeper understanding.

    • Photo: Emma Cahill

      Emma Cahill answered on 15 Nov 2013:


      I think modern science started when people began to document their findings and how they asked their questions.
      I know for Neuroscience (the study of the brain) the first real steps came with the Ancient Greeks. Before that, people didnt care much about the brain. The Egyptians would chuck it out and not keep it during the mumification process for example. Hippocrates said that actually it was the brain that controlled humor and feelings and even our movements, he got these ideas from seeing soldiers with head injuries. But another famous scholar, Aristotle, said No it was the heart that controls emotion, because when we are excited it beats faster and we cant live with out it! It took centuries before people prooved that Hippocrates was right.

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