Middle/dark Ages

[Justified Saint]

I think [i]Francis[/i] Bacon is the rightful heir to father of the scientific method. Maybe Roger was an ancestor of his and it ran in the genes.

To the comment about not really knowing what went on during the Middle Ages, there is actually a good deal of sense to that observation. The amount of documents we have for periods like the Renaissance and beyond dwarf what we have on the Middle Ages, making it more difficult to reconstruct daily life. There is nothing surprising to this phenomenon, the further you go back in history the more holes there are in the historical record.

[Hassan]

[quote name='Justified Saint' post='1892429' date='Jun 16 2009, 01:46 AM']I think [i]Francis[/i] Bacon is the rightful heir to father of the scientific method. Maybe Roger was an ancestor of his and it ran in the genes.[/quote]



Haha. Lol, that's it. I can't believe I said Robert Bacon.


I generally horrid with names



I'm a Kuhnian, so I'm probably not going to agree with that, but who knows.

[Justified Saint]

[quote name='Winchester' post='1890012' date='Jun 13 2009, 08:34 PM']Actually, women's status fell after the medieval period. Read Regine Pernoud.[/quote]

Depends on how you define status. In some aspects, it could be argued that women's fortunes worsened as a result of Reformation and Counter-Reformation ideologies that reaffirmed traditional roles for women. However, in other aspects there was definite improvement. Women tended to be more educated and their place in the family argubably strengthened as the ideal of the "good wife" emerged (on the other hand it could just as well be seen as another ploy to control women). Basically, there really isn't much difference from one period to another in terms of the relative freedoms and "status" of women.

[Resurrexi]

[quote name='Hassan' post='1892431' date='Jun 16 2009, 01:49 AM']Haha. Lol, that's it. I can't believe I said Robert Bacon.


I generally horrid with names



I'm a Kuhnian, so I'm probably not going to agree with that, but who knows.[/quote]

According to Wikipedia, both Roger Bacon (13th century) and Francis Bacon (17th century) were advocates of the scientific method.

Edited June 16, 2009 by Resurrexi

[Justified Saint]

[quote name='Hassan' post='1892431' date='Jun 15 2009, 11:49 PM']Haha. Lol, that's it. I can't believe I said Robert Bacon.


I generally horrid with names



I'm a Kuhnian, so I'm probably not going to agree with that, but who knows.[/quote]

At least you didn't say Kevin Bacon

[Hassan]

[quote name='Justified Saint' post='1892441' date='Jun 16 2009, 01:00 AM']At least you didn't say Kevin Bacon [/quote]

[Justified Saint]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1892437' date='Jun 15 2009, 11:59 PM']According to Wikipedia, both Roger Bacon (13th century) and Francis Bacon (17th century) were advocates of the scientific method. [/quote]

The scientific method is overrated. People have been thinking scientifically for as long as history. Bacon (Francis) popularized the concept during the Enlightenment to contrast the rise of rational thinking with everything that had preceeded it (superstition, magic, religion etc.)

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='picchick' post='1889541' date='Jun 13 2009, 08:10 AM']I mean come on people! There were no flushing toliets!!![/quote]
The flushing toilet is hardly a modern invention. There were water-flushing toilets in the Harrapan civilisation, according to Wiki, for what it's worth.

[quote name='KnightofChrist' post='1890706' date='Jun 15 2009, 02:18 AM']All I cared about was defending that time in history from preconceived notions based on elementary level education. Many historians today dislike even the term dark ages, and the term is rarely used because of the value judgment it implies.[/quote]
My medieval history prof got very angry if someone called it the "dark ages".

[CatherineM]

I heard Kevin Bacon lost most of his money with Madoff. Guess he should have done more research. Maybe he didn't get any of those genes from his glorious ancestors.

[picchick]

I like bacon.

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='Hassan' post='1889814' date='Jun 13 2009, 07:12 PM']I guess the fall of the Roman empire and the virtual collapse of western civilization was also Protestant Propaganda.

To Resurrexi, yes Benedicts founding of monastic communities was a great thing.[/quote]


There was no collapse of Western Civilization, there was a collapse of Roman civilization. It was replaced with Germanic Civilization which, in many ways, I think was superior. .

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='KnightofChrist' post='1890706' date='Jun 14 2009, 09:18 PM']All I cared about was defending that time in history from preconceived notions based on elementary level education. Many historians today dislike even the term dark ages, and the term is rarely used because of the value judgment it implies.[/quote]


I am a medievalist and I don't care if you call the Easrly middle ages the Dark Ages or not. The Middle Ages is a pejoritive term also, indicating it is the time between the ancients and the "rebirth" of Ancient knowledge and learning. In otherwords all that unimportant ignorant stuff inbetween. THere is no term for the Medieval period which does not at its heart carry a judgement in it.


The Dark ages were dark because we don't know a lot about it becuase there were not as many records. This is the same reason they used to call Africa the Dark Continent ( no people it had nothing to do with race). So if you feel comfortable with it.... go for it. It doesn't change the fact that major advances ( scientific, cultural, and religious) occured during that time.

[The Thurifer]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1889749' date='Jun 13 2009, 01:15 PM']The Dark Ages are what is sometimes called the Early Middle Ages, just after the fall of the Roman Empire.[/quote]

This is correct. They were called "dark" because of the relative dearth of extant literature and arts in that period, not because of any great evils that took place in that time. The Medieval period which followed was anything but dark, and represented the pinnacle of European culture, faith, and thought, which devolved through the "Enlightenment" and the Reformation into the septic, anti-Christian culture of today. We are currently living in the Darkest Ages, as much of our contemporary North American and European society has descended into a well-dressed barbarianism.