THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION AN INTEGRATED NARRATIVE APPROACH TO PHYSICS AND CALCULUS.

THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION

AN INTEGRATED NARRATIVE APPROACH TO PHYSICS AND CALCULUS

WHY MESS WITH SCIENCE?

• Our science classes have much to offer, especially at Christian classical schools where we have wonderful devoted Christian teachers.

• Some say we just need to go faster and teach science and math facts to students younger in order to prepare them for STEM careers.

• So why mess with a good thing?

WHAT IS AT STAKE?

• Students don’t turn away from the Christian faith because of any particular fact that science gives, it is the form of the story that science tells that turns some to disbelief.

• Our science teachers are the front-line storytellers.• Yes, our teachers are good, devoted people who don’t contradict the teachings of the

Bible.

• It is not them, nor sometimes even the topics they teach, that is at issue but the unconscious form of that ‘Science’ takes in most classes.

THE PROBLEM WITH SCIENCE IS NOT WHAT YOU THINK

From James K.A. Smith:

“[Charles] Taylor suggests that those who convert to unbelief ‘because of science’ are less convinced by data and more moved by the form of the story that science tells and the self-image that comes with it (rationality=maturity).

Moreover, the faith that they left was often worth leaving. If Taylor is right, it seems to suggest that the Christian response to such converts to unbelief is not to have an argument about the data or ‘evidences’ but rather to offer an alternative story that offers a more robust, complex understanding of the Christian faith.

The goal of such a witness would not be the minimal establishment of some vague theism but the invitation to historic sacramental Christianity.”

James K.A Smith in How (Not) to be Secular (based on the work of Charles Taylor)

BEYOND THE WARFARE THESIS

• Science and Christianity are not at war. (1st three years)

• Christianity actually has positive resources for natural science. (next three years)

• The resources offered by Christianity are not just of historical interest (e.g. where science came from), they simplify and enrich the discussion in the present and for the future. (last six years)

THE BASIC INSIGHT

• Begin by investigating our Christian tradition and faith, and be willing to submit to it in order to understand it. Credo ut Intelligam

• For hundreds of years, thinkers in the West held together our knowledge of nature and our knowledge of God.

• How did they do it?

THE LIBERAL ARTS AND NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

• By looking at the rise of modern science one can clearly discern the role of both the four liberal arts of the Quadrivium (the mathematics) and the role of Natural Philosophy.

• All of these were harmoniously governed by Theology.

• Two lesser known liberal arts that may be rightly studied here are astronomy and music.

MATHEMATICS IN NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

• Newton’s magnum opus was called, Principia Mathematica Philosophiae Naturalis or The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy

• Kepler’s life work was expressed in his Harmonices Mundi or Harmonies of the World. Note Kepler’s fascination with the mathematical liberal art of music (Harmonices) for his vision of reality.

THE REAL STORY

• The real story of the Scientific Revolution is about the rise of these ancient mathematical liberal arts under the aegis of Christian theology, their transformation, and their influence on Natural Philosophy.

• The story must also include the mixed legacy of the mechanistic, atomistic worldview which contended with the traditional Christian synthesis.

• The story is not just about physics per se but about the influence of mathematics in natural science (physis means nature). On the other hand, an integrated physics and calculus class is the most elegant way to reshape this narrative in a manner which respects the state of these two disciplines.

WELCOME TO…

The Scientific Revolution Class:An Integrated Narrative Approach to Physics and Calculus

STARTING FROM THE END

• Student Comments• Michael Reynolds• Isak Davis

STARTING FROM THE END

• Summative Exam• An evidence, reasoning, and narrative approach• The justification component augments the strong

focus on application prevalent in natural science• wisdom as well as work

The Scientific Revolution

Final Exam

I. Explain what happened in the 17th century that is often referred to as the Scientific

Revolution. Discuss its origins and central philosophical causes. Pay particular attention to the details of rational, empirical and poetic advances, mathematical demonstrations, and how and why men like Kepler and Newton sought to describe the universe as a whole. (1:15 minutes, 50 points)

II. What are some of the good and bad consequences of the Scientific Revolution that linger in modern culture. Consider C.S. Lewis request for a repentant science. Interpret these quotes from Lewis and briefly discuss any potential ways that natural science might heed his call. (15 minutes, 10 points)

At the end of his magisterial work The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis asked his readers to, “imagine a new Natural Philosophy.” In addition to Lewis, others of the Inklings such as J.R.R. Tolkien, Dorothy Sayers, and Owen Barfield seemed troubled by the modern conception of man’s relationship with nature. Consider the rage of the Ents depicted by Tolkien or the book Saving the Appearances by Barfield which was described as “a brilliant reinterpretation of man’s relationship to nature in an age of physical science.” In The Abolition of Man Lewis discussed a concern, perhaps common among the Inklings, that a process is underway in modern Western culture which is destroying the possibility of man being truly human. He warned that “if the scientists themselves cannot arrest this process before it reaches the common Reason and kills that too, then someone else must arrest it.” Lewis called science to repent in at least three ways. Against scientism he charged science to remain, “continually conscious that the ‘natural object’ produced by analysis and abstraction is not reality but only a view, and always correcting the abstraction.” Against skepticism and reductionism he hoped that, “When it explained it would not explain away. When it spoke of the parts it would remember the whole… Its followers would not be free with the words only and merely.” And against domination and dreams of power he noted, “The regenerate science which I have in mind would not do even to minerals and vegetables what modern science threatens to do to man himself…While studying the It it would not lose…the Thou-situation… In a word, it would conquer Nature without being at the same time conquered by her and buy knowledge at a lower cost than that of life.” He finished allowing that, “perhaps I am asking impossibilities,” but he also held out hope that, “from science herself the cure might come.”

• Student Exam

SOME KEY CONCEPTS

• Key Moments• Galileo Ramp Experiments• Proving Kepler’s Third Law• Discussions of Atomism• Discovering the Integral Algorithm

FORMATIVE MOMENTS

• These moments are open ended, historical, guided inquiry.

• The students experience some struggle and must wrestle with their own ideas, practices, beliefs, and habits.

• They learn to work together and respect each others’ different gifts.

SOME KEY CONCEPTS

• Six Key Phenomena• Linear Motion

• Ball Rolling on Table

• Stone Falling from Rest

• Mass on a Spring

• Rotational Motion• The Motion of the Planets

• Levers

• Pendulum

REASONING FROM PHENOMENA TO CAUSES

• This is experimentally oriented in observation and guided inquiry.

• It outflanks a key problem of modernity—the critical question—What is Real?

• It grounds students in reality and helps them realize it is our causal descriptions that are finite and limited, not reality itself.

SOME KEY CONCEPTS

• Key Questions• Is there a Harmony Among the Five Terrestrial Phenomena?

• Is there a Harmony within the Motion of the Planets?

• Are the Motions of the Heavens Harmonized with the Motions on the Earth?

QUESTIONS AND MYSTERY

• Having the students begin with questions helps them keep focused on reasoning up to the thesis of the class—the universal law of gravitation.

• It provides them with a context for the facts and discoveries they encounter.

• Questions often lead to more questions. Some are puzzles to be solved and others lead to foundational mysteries. This is OK.

TRUTH DOES NOT EXCLUDE MYSTERYBUT EMBRACES IT

• Divine Mysteries• The Trinity• The Incarnation• The New Covenant

• Natural Mysteries• The One and the Many• Form and Matter, Soul and Body• Determinism and Free Will

The Divine and Natural Mysteries

How do we do this?

WHAT IS OUR STORY?

• We are undoing much of the good work of other teachers in the humanities and theology because we are unintentionally telling the wrong story.

• Telling ‘no story’ is actually just one form of the story we often tell (the story of neutral science and modern progress).

• The concern is not primarily with the informative aspect of our science classes but with the formative aspect of them.

BAD HABITS

• Textbook physics suggests that everything is best understood in isolation by reducing things into their parts. Reality is basically matter in motion.

• Students learn that there is always a right or wrong answer in science. There is really no mystery just what science has not yet answered. Judgment becomes merely a matter of method.

• The goal of homework problems in science is predictive knowledge, knowledge as power, perhaps understood as useful for a vocation. While this ought certainly to be a component of science, it leaves little room for knowledge conceived as wisdom which shapes us and demands our submission.

TEACHER AND SCHOOL PREPARATION

• A teacher who wishes to do this must take it slow and begin with baby steps.

• He or she should already have experience teaching that same level class in the traditional way or have an expert guide.

• A physics teacher who does this must be willing to engage the math. A ‘no-formula’ conceptual approach won’t work. All the key thinkers were wrestling with numbers and proportionalities (which we now call formulas). This would be tough in a 9th grade physics-first class.

• A teacher must be willing to read, learn, grow, and be creative with curriculum.

• Teachers from other classes ought to be supportive of this endeavor since it offers great opportunity for interdisciplinarity.

STUDENT PREPARATION

• Students must understand that the class is different from other science classes they may have had.

• It is best if the school uses this narrative approach in other classes as well.

• A students should not attempt this as an A.P. class unless they are very committed to it and well prepared.

TO AP OR NOT AP, THAT IS THE QUESTION

• I do not recommend introducing the Scientific Revolution class as an AP class the first year it is offered.

• The AP component to this class is very demanding and often discourages the students.

• It is quite a notable achievement to colleges as the AP Physics C Mechanics test is considered to be one of the hardest AP tests. Colleges get to see the scores and that can help distinguish strong performers.

• Our goal is 70% passing and half of those getting fours or fives. We achieve this goal reasonably well, but there is always room for improvement.

SOME RESOURCES TO DO THIS

• www.recoveringnature.org

• An upcoming book on Natural Science which will include a chapter on the Scientific Revolution class, a biology class, and a K-6 curriculum as well as three chapters on the principles behind these.

• A section of the website and a network of teachers who are ready to implement this class. Please indicate on the sheet if you would like more information regarding this and talk to me afterwards.

REMEMBER WHAT IS AT STAKE

• Students don’t turn away from the Christian faith because of any particular fact that science gives, it is the form of the story that science tells that turns some to disbelief.

• Our science teachers are the front-line storytellers.• Yes, our teachers are good, devoted people who don’t contradict the teachings of the

Bible.

• It is not them, nor sometimes even the topics they teach, that is at issue but the unconscious form of that ‘Science’ takes in most classes.

LET’S TELL A BETTER STORY

• Questions?