Advancements in Optics, 700-1449
Overview
The interest in the study of the laws and phenomena of optics was one of the most popular and potentially important scientific pursuits of the Middle Ages. As such, it was an influential avenue to the development of experimental scientific philosophy. Grounded in the optical thought of the Greeks in both European and Islamic intellectual traditions, the initial stages of the advance in optical study were the translation of ancient thought, Islamic commentary on the subject about the twelfth century, and European contributions built upon Islamic influences. The most original Islamic investigator was Ibn al-Haytham (in the Latin West, Alhazen), and his influence passed to both later Islamic and European scholars. By the thirteenth century, Greek theories of vision and concepts of light, the reflection and refraction of light, application of optics with burning mirrors and lenses, and most importantly, understanding the atmospheric phenomena of the rainbow and the halo became areas of research to European thinkers, especially the English Franciscans. The physical problem of the rainbow mechanism was the major area of practical research and was finally completely explained in Dietrich of Freiberg's theory of the early fourteenth century. Other strides were made in theory and application of accurate lenses and mirrors, as well.
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