* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: Royal Society

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First science academy is 350 years old

From its classical pillars and porticoed entrance to its oil paintings of great men and women and archives that include the death mask of Sir Isaac Newton, history sits grandly on the Royal Society.
Scientists who visit its headquarters overlooking the tree-lined avenue that runs from Trafalgar Square to Buckingham Palace tend to enter the building with the hushed awe of a religious devotee entering a shrine.
Created three and a half centuries ago this year, the academy can lay serious claim to having set down the foundations of modern science.
It promoted the demonstration of facts through experimentation. It replaced obscure Latin rhetoric with plain English as the language of scientific discourse.
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The first fellows of the Royal Society, as it is now known, were followers of Sir Francis Bacon, a 17th-century statesman and philosopher who argued that knowledge could be gained by testing ideas through experiments. On a damp and murky night in November 1660, a dozen of them met to hear a lecture by a 28-year-old astronomer called Christopher Wren, who would later become the architect who designed St Paul;s Cathedral. Inspired, they determined to meet every week to discuss scientific matters and to witness experiments conducted by different members of the group. In so doing, they invented the processes on which modern science rests, including scientific publishing and peer review, and made English the primary language of scientific discourse.
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Historic science papers go online
One of the world's oldest scientific institutions is marking the start of its 350th year by putting 60 of its most memorable research papers online.
The Royal Society, founded in London in 1660, is making public manuscripts by figures like Sir Isaac Newton.

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