Junior cycle runner-up essay
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"Electric Chatter on the Lines" by Sinead O’Neill, St Caimin’s Community School,
Shannon, Co Clare, who came third in the Senior Cycle category of the
Science Week 2008 photography competitionBy Nicola Walsh (14), Mount Anville Secondary School, Dublin 14.
Junior cycle runner-up in the Science Week 2008 schools essay competition on "Science – Shaping Our World"Science has shaped our world since before a name had even been put to the subject. The alchemists of hundreds of years ago carried out experiments that they thought would lead them to the discovery of the Philosopher's Stone.
The alchemists carried out these experiments dramatically, with many puffs of smoke and loud bangs. Because of the dramatic way that the alchemists carried out their experiments, they became known as wizards or magicians.
Their dramatic experiments have proved to be useful to the development of modern science. During their search for the elixir that would give the drinker eternal life, many accidental discoveries were made by the alchemists, and these discoveries are used in laboratories today.
In 1669, an alchemist called Hennig Brandt isolated a pale waxy substance from urine that glowed in the dark because it contained phosphorus. By 1300, alchemists had begun to discover the mineral acids, nitric acid, hydrochloric acid and sulphuric acid, a significant finding which has shaped modern chemistry. In laboratories today, the mineral acids are the foundation to most chemical reactions.
The science that came before the time of the alchemists was more centred around philosophy and mathematics rather than the quest for the Philosopher's Stone. Science in ancient Greece was based on logical thinking and mathematics.
It was also based on technology and everyday life. The Greek way of thinking was the first to search for a natural reason for life instead of a supernatural one. The science of the ancient Greeks is where many of the scientific ideas in the modern world come from: it is from Greek studies that the theory of natural selection or "survival of the fittest" comes from (this theory was later elaborated on and perfected by Charles Darwin,) the Greeks also were the first people to discover that the Earth is round (this was then later rediscovered by Galileo in 1663).
Just as the alchemists made discoveries that led to the development of modern science, the ancient Greek scientists made discoveries that alchemists and modern scientists benefited from. Over the past 400 years, since the time of the alchemists, science has developed rapidly.
Modern science, the science today, has shaped our world as we know it and is constantly rearranging our world with every experiment carried out and with every significant scientific discovery made.
By the 17th century, scientific investigations began to replace the strange recipes and experiments of the alchemists. One of the main people to make a breakthrough in introducing the new, scientific way of thinking was Robert Boyle, an Irish scientist.
In 1661, Boyle wrote a book that criticised the secrecy of the alchemists. In his book, Boyle explained how the approach to science should be taken and he insisted that full details of experiments carried out should be given. From then on, scientists became less secretive about their work and they adopted a common approach to their work: the scientific method.
Since scientists introduced the scientific method into their work and became less secretive, many developments in science have been made.
In the past 100 years alone, the first aircraft was built by the Wright brothers, the sound barrier has been broken by an aircraft, and humans have travelled into space. In less than a century, developments in aviation have progressed from nothing to trips out of this world!
If I were to pluck one of my ancestors from the folds of time, circa 1440, the time of the invention of the printing press, and bring him to the present time, and if I were to show my ancestor the present-day equivalent of the printing press: the publisher's headquarters, which reels out thousands of books in a day, how could he comprehend?
Cures for ever more erratic and exotic diseases are being found all the time. The life expectancy of people is higher than ever, and can only keep climbing if the current trend of the mixing of newer and better antidotes continues.
If the Wright brothers were to travel through time to the first launch of a rocket into space, how would they be able to understand that aircraft now fly not only between nations but in between planets too? If the concept of the automatic gun had to be explained to the people of the Stone Age, would they accept this modern weapon?
If the Internet, the most revolutionary invention in technology, had to be explained to a person who lived through the invention of the wireless radio, would they be able enough to use it? Would they be able to adapt to an invention 73 years ahead of their time?
From the time of the science of the ancient Greeks to today, science has shaped our world dramatically. One scientific experiment led to another scientific experiment, one invention led to a modified, improved version of that invention.
My point is this: science is forever whittling away at the world that we live in. People are constantly adapting to the new technology and medicines that, thanks to science, come into existence on almost a weekly basis.
Because of our constant adapting to the current situation, we don't see the huge leaps that science takes from year to year, we see the small steps that science takes in shaping our world every week.
