Science Changes Its Mind

In an interesting book bearing the title Architects of Ideas Trattner tells us that in every age previous to our own there was supposed to exist a body of knowledge final and infallible. Frequently people thought of this knowledge as having been revealed directly from heaven. Embodied in rigid tradition and held sacred by all authorities, it was considered heresy to question any time-honored belief. The great development in human culture that Mees has called the Helix of History began somewhere in the eastern hemisphere five or six millennia ago. For many centuries advancement was slow. Succeeding turns of the helix fell very close together. It was not until relatively very recent times that Kepler, Galileo, da Vinci, Vesalius and other kindred spirits succeeded in liberating the mind of man from the bondage of tradition, and in starting the advance that has placed Science in the honored position among human activities and achievements that it occupies today