Make: Volume 78

Build the vacuum

pump that became

the symbol of

the Scientific

Revolution

The age historians call the Scientific Revolution

was an important, pivotal time. It was the period,

chiefly during the 16th and 17th centuries,

in which people began to understand nature

in modern terms — the astronomy, biology,

chemistry, optics, and physics we recognize today

— through the work of Galileo, Kepler, Newton,

and others.

One of the leading lights of the Scientific

Revolution was Robert Boyle (1627–1691), a

wealthy Irish aristocrat who is remembered

as the first modern chemist. Perhaps his most

important contribution was not any single

discovery but r ...