A temptation exists to see science as separate from the world, as something pure and rational. Similarly, it is tempting to see the Scientific Revolution as a movement that existed as somehow separate from the world in which it emerged. However, the events of the Scientific Revolution, in its origins within the political and religious traditions of the Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Reformation, to its role in bringing about the Enlightenment, in the very experiences of the scientists themselves, all show that the scientific revolution functioned as part of society, played a vital role as cause of and reaction to a changing world.

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