Article: Optics

OPTICS

OPTICS. The development of optics between 1450 and 1789 can be conveniently divided into two phases bridged by the optical work of Johannes Kepler (1576 1630) and distinguished by a radical change in analytic focus. During the first phase, that focus was primarily on sight, not light. During the second, it shifted completely from sight to light. Reflecting this shift, the following essay consists of three sections, the first dealing with pre-Keplerian optics, the second with the Keplerian transition, and the third with post-Keplerian developments.

PRE-KEPLERIAN OPTICS

By 1450 two ostensibly contradictory models of sight were available to European thinkers. The first ...

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