How did new societies, academies and instruments affect natural philosophy in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Europe?
The emergence of societies and instrumental measurements in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries prompted a radical change in thinking and began to reshape the very essence of natural philosophy. The 1600s marked the beginning of a shift of influence toward public societies and academies, the result of which is markedly clear today. Natural philosophers found that they did not have to be directly affected by the academic disciplinary hierarchy and had sufficient independence to pursue new investigations. Meanwhile, the increasing prevalence of instruments in empirical science provided new ways to study the world. New societies and instruments allowed for a change in the ideologies of natural philosophy that massively shaped future scientific thought and development.
