A Surprising, Gross, and Utterly Fascinating Look at the Birth of Science

Published: July 10, 2020, 8 a.m.

Science in the 1600s wasn\u2019t an especially safe endeavor. People were burned at the stake for saying that the Earth revolved around the Sun. Galileo Galilei narrowly avoided that particular fate, but was placed under house arrest. That\u2019s\u2026 pretty different from our modern world, where we\u2019re all relying on scientists to understand the nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, and, hopefully, come up with a vaccine. How did we get to this point? Well, part of the reason is that, in 1660, a group of natural philosophers and thinkers came together to found what would become known as The Royal Society. That\u2019s according to Adrian Tinniswood, author of The Royal Society: And the Invention of Modern Science. He walks us through the important legacy of the oldest scientific institution in the world, and how it helped shape evidence-based science.