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As a student of the middle ages, I tend to give more than the normal amount of thought to the meaning and moment of the Renaissance. There are so many factors, it's hard to find a catalyst or even a somewhat unmoved mover. However, when it comes right down to it, I suspect it's ultimately the usual pump primer: money.
Strangely, money in the middle ages seemed to have the opposite effect it's having now. Before the concept of intellectual property there was a far more basic method for ensuring your trade secrets were yours alone to exploit. They were, well, trade secrets. And only a trusted guild member had access to them.
Of course, trusted guild members can be bribed. And exclusivity can be given exception for a large enough contribution. Ultimately, every Medici who wanted it could wear the red hat of a Cardinal. And when money has bought everything it can, it starts to look at art, and education, and anything that can make the wealthy feel they've not just caught up to the nobility, but surpassed it. And strangely, instead of holding secrets tight, there began a mad rush to uncover secrets and shout them to the world, even if no one had held them tight before.
Science is one of the results of free exchange of information. And, for a time, scientists fought for the only coin that truly mattered, bragging rights. Then, instead of simply being akin to a work of art or lofty scholarly contemplation, the fruits of empirical exploration begin to emerge at world changing speed. Scientists know what's opened the flood gates and keep the exchange of information open as well as they can.
Now money is having a cooling effect. Secrets are hard to keep, but modernly they can be guarded through litigation. And they can be made harder to access, unless you're in some particular group, or organization, or guild...
Now that information can be money, those with the purse strings are desperately trying to control it in the moder age. Today's story of ugliness the attempt to close previously open National Institutes of Health research. Science seems assailed by both Fundamentalist and Capitalists. The Church and the Nobility?
Strangely, money in the middle ages seemed to have the opposite effect it's having now. Before the concept of intellectual property there was a far more basic method for ensuring your trade secrets were yours alone to exploit. They were, well, trade secrets. And only a trusted guild member had access to them.
Of course, trusted guild members can be bribed. And exclusivity can be given exception for a large enough contribution. Ultimately, every Medici who wanted it could wear the red hat of a Cardinal. And when money has bought everything it can, it starts to look at art, and education, and anything that can make the wealthy feel they've not just caught up to the nobility, but surpassed it. And strangely, instead of holding secrets tight, there began a mad rush to uncover secrets and shout them to the world, even if no one had held them tight before.
Science is one of the results of free exchange of information. And, for a time, scientists fought for the only coin that truly mattered, bragging rights. Then, instead of simply being akin to a work of art or lofty scholarly contemplation, the fruits of empirical exploration begin to emerge at world changing speed. Scientists know what's opened the flood gates and keep the exchange of information open as well as they can.
Now money is having a cooling effect. Secrets are hard to keep, but modernly they can be guarded through litigation. And they can be made harder to access, unless you're in some particular group, or organization, or guild...
Now that information can be money, those with the purse strings are desperately trying to control it in the moder age. Today's story of ugliness the attempt to close previously open National Institutes of Health research. Science seems assailed by both Fundamentalist and Capitalists. The Church and the Nobility?