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The Day the Universe Changed is a ten-part documentary television series presented by science historian James Burke. The series tells a series of stories of how specific scientific and technological advances have shaped the Western way of life. The series posits that when one's view of the universe changes, the universe itself effectively changes.
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Episode Summary
Prior to the 15th Century, all knowledge was transmitted aurally. People relied on their church or traveling poets for news of the outside world. The innovation of writing, and later, the printing press, revolutionized not only communication, but also commerce, industry and innovation. -
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- It Started with the Greeks
- Medieval Conflict: Faith and Reason
- Scientific Imagination in the Renaissance
- Printing Transforms Knowledge
- Science Revises the Heavens
- The Factory and Marketplace Revolution
- Social Impacts of New Medical Knowledge
- Darwin's Revolution
- The New Physics: Newton Revised
- Changing Knowledge, Changing Reality
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Managed Since: 06/14/2009
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Printing Transforms Knowledge Part One
*@-2:15: The modern farm is an example of how technology has transformed an industry
*@-3:27: Before 1450, life was very local; few people left the land they grew up on. Natural occurrences acted as almanacs and people were very intimate with nature
*@-4:04: During the 15th Century, people gained knowledge about the outside world at church
*@-4:56: At this time, the difference between fact and fiction and depended on your own personal experience; if you had not experienced something that was described to you, it was considered a "fairy story."
*@-5:11: Everyone was illiterate, so it was a very aural world. James Burke illustrates this with an example of a 15th Century court proceeding might have looked like
*@-7:28: News of international events were spread thanks to traveling troubadours
*@-9:00: People used rhymes to help them remember things. Writing was incredibly rare and considered mystical because it was only done in the church -
Printing Transforms Knowledge Part Two
*@-0:20: By the 14th Century, almost every monastery had divisions of monks who spent their days copying texts word for word
*@-2:00: These monks were poorly organized
*@-4:40: Near the end of the 14th Century, Europe experienced a post bubonic plague economic boom
*@-6:53: During this period, markets shot up in many towns and the surplus wealth generated by the farmers went towards goods they never would have bought before, thus creating a new class of craftsmen to build such goods
*@-7:29: Survivors of the black death became incredibly wealthy thanks to the the inheritances they received
*@-7:38: The demand for documentation increased, so schools began teaching students how to write -
Printing Transforms Knowledge Part Three
*@-0:07: Aerial view of Rocamadour France
*@-4:00: In 1439, Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press
*@-4:40: Men traveled from church to church selling the use of their printers. The largest printing orders came from the wealthy, who wanted to print more money
*@-7:31: In Wittenberg, Germany, the Archbishop of Mainz and Magdeburg created a money scheme that upset Martin Luther, so he wrote a complaint and nailed it to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg
*@-08:21: Thanks to the printing press, Martin Luther's copied complaints spread quickly throughout Europe, thus beginning the first ever propaganda war. This became the greatest challenge for The Roman Catholic Church
*@-09:21:Martin Luther became the first ever to use the printing press to spread mass media. His books about how Germany needed to reform in order to protect themselves from the evils of Rome sold over 300,000 copies and created the first mass sense of nationalism in Germany -
Printing Transforms Knowledge Part Four
*@-1:06: Luther's writings enraged many and the book burnings followed
*@-1:47: Print shops became the marketplaces of ideas as craftsmen mingled with scholars, translators and political refugees
*@-3:17: The men who operated the early print houses of the 16th Century could be considered the first capitalists
*@-4:28: In 1550, science was really beginning to benefit from the printing press; it was more efficient for scientists to compare information as more scientific books became available
*@-6:20: We are reminded of part one of this episode, when everybody spoke in rhymes; because of the Printing Press, there was less to be remembered, so speech became more precise. What used to be regular aural speech was now considered poetry
*@-6:46: In the early 16th Century, the Frankfurt Book Fair was the place to go get a book published and still is today
*@-8:00: The Frankfurt Book Fair was another place where information flowed, thus helping the spread of knowledge -
Printing Transforms Knowledge Part Five
*@-0:01: Only two generations after the invention of the printing press, people were starting to collect personal libraries. Average people had access to knowledge on numerous topic, including pharmacology, history, medicine, maps, almanacs, geometry, surveying and surgery
*@-0:58: James Burke explains how important indexing and cross-indexing is and how it changed the world. He goes through a cross-index and shows how certain subjects relate. Surveying > Range Finders > Photography > Ballistics
*@-2:20: The invention of cross-indexing changed the world because suddenly "1+1=3;" cross-indexing makes anything possible
*@-2:54: After the invention of the airplane in the 1930s, war gunners were having problems hitting their targets due to the complex ballistics, so they cross-indexed arithmetic with ballistics and invented the computer
*@-3:47: Now computers can cross-index at the speed of light
*@-3:59: With facts changing so fast, what happens to standards, values and ethics?
*@-4:19: Roll Credits -
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View All The Day the Universe Changed Episode 4 Questions (8267) | Ask a Questionim asking the same question, how to change multiple desktop for XFCE4, i using xubuntu and whit compiz installed i cant change 2 to 4 deskto (1 Answer)Look in the following location in Xubuntu: "Xfce menu > Settings > Workspaces Settings" Then make your choices from there on how many virtual desktops that you want. read moreWhat would you change on this university's website? (4 Answers)I think it is very well made. It has a lot of interesting information like guest speakers. Change your references URL (no spaces)to the end of the sentence and then ... read moreis it the worlds biggest rivalry?http://rivals4ever.com/rivalry-of-Ohio-State-University-vs-University-of-Michigan-704-9.htm ? (3 Answers)It's hard to compare rivalries across sports. It is no doubt the biggest college football rivalry (though those participating in other rivalries may disagree). Especially so when you see how ... read moreHave you watched any of James Burkes documentaries? (2 Answers)Absolutely! I loved both Connections and The Day the Universe Changed. The episodes that stand out were one where he took a whack at a cow carcass with a claymore ... read more
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