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The Background of 

 Modern Science 



This is probably the first century in history in 

 which any appreciable number of young people can seri- 

 ously say to themselves that they are considering science 

 as a career. Science has of course existed for a much longer 

 time, but until recently it has usually been practiced as a 

 sort of side issue by priests, magicians, engineers, physi- 

 cians, or gentlemen farmers. They drew their financial sup- 

 port from the art which they practiced and used their leisure 

 or extra time to advance pure knowledge. The astronomer 

 Kepler summed the situation up very well when he said 

 that God who has given each animal a specialized means 

 of support has given astrology to astronomy. Society is 

 accustomed to pay people for doing only those things that 

 seem to bring more or less immediate benefits, and the public 

 at large has only now come to realize that it is worthwhile 

 to pay people to develop organized knowledge about the 

 nature of things. 



A little later we will briefly review the development of 

 science by earlier Western societies in order to put the prob- 

 lem in perspective and to understand what it is about mod- 

 em science that makes it so different from what has gone 

 before. But first let us take a look at how different it really 



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