Editing Scottish Enlightenment (section)

===Mathematics, science and medicine===
One of the central pillars of the Scottish Enlightenment was scientific and medical knowledge. Many of the key thinkers were trained as physicians or had studied science and medicine at university or on their own at some point in their career. Likewise, there was a notable presence of university medically-trained professionals, especially physicians, apothecaries, surgeons and even ministers, who lived in provincial settings.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Eddy|first1=Matthew Daniel|title='The Sparkling Nectar of Spas: The Medical and Commercial Relevance of Mineral Water', in Ursula Klein and Emma Spary (eds.), Materials and Expertise in Early Modern Europe: Between Market and Laboratory|date=2010|publisher=University of Chicago Press|location=Chicago|pages=198–226|url=https://www.academia.edu/1114266}}</ref> Unlike England or other European countries like France or Austria, the intelligentsia of Scotland were not beholden to powerful aristocratic patrons and this led them to see science through the eyes of utility, improvement and reform.<ref>{{Cite book|title=How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The true story of how western europe's poorest nation created our world and everything in it|url=https://archive.org/details/howscotsinvented00arth|url-access=limited|last=Herman|first=Arthur|publisher=Three Rivers Press|year=2001|isbn=0-609-80999-7|pages=[https://archive.org/details/howscotsinvented00arth/page/321 321]–322}}</ref>

[[Colin Maclaurin]] (1698–1746) was appointed as chair of mathematics by the age of 19 at Marischal College, and was the leading British mathematician of his era.<ref name=Mitchison1983p.150/> Mathematician and physicist [[Sir John Leslie]] (1766–1832) is chiefly noted for his experiments with heat and was the first person to artificially create ice.<ref>N. Chambers, ed., ''The Letters of Sir Joseph Banks: A Selection, 1768–1820'' (World Scientific, 2000), {{ISBN|1860942040}}, p. 376.</ref>

Other major figures in science included [[William Cullen]] (1710–90), physician and chemist, [[James Anderson of Hermiston|James Anderson]] (1739–1808), agronomist. [[Joseph Black]] (1728–99), physicist and chemist, discovered carbon dioxide (fixed air) and [[latent heat]],<ref>R. Mitchelson, ''A History of Scotland'' (London: Routledge, 2002), 0203412710, p. 352.</ref> and developed what many consider to be the first chemical formulae.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Eddy|first1=Matthew Daniel|title=How to See a Diagram: A Visual Anthropology of Chemical Affinity|journal=Osiris|date=2014|pages=178–96|doi=10.1086/678093|pmid=26103754|url=https://www.academia.edu/4588508|volume=29|s2cid=20432223}}</ref>

[[James Hutton]] (1726–97) was the first modern [[geologist]], with his ''Theory of the Earth'' (1795) challenging existing ideas about the [[age of the Earth]].<ref name="Denby">{{cite magazine |url=http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/10/11/041011crat_atlarge |title=Northern Lights: How modern life emerged from eighteenth-century Edinburgh |author=David Denby |magazine=[[The New Yorker]] |publisher=Review of [[James Buchan]]'s Crowded With Genius: Edinburgh's Moment of the Mind (Capital of the Mind: Edinburgh in the [[UK]]) [[HarperCollins]], 2003. Hardcover: ISBN 0-06-055888-1, ISBN 978-0-06-055888-8 |date=11 October 2004 |author-link=David Denby (film critic) }}</ref><ref name="Repcheck">{{cite book |last=Repcheck |first=Jack |title=The Man Who Found Time: James Hutton and the Discovery of the Earth's Antiquity |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/manwhofoundtimej0000repc |chapter-url-access=registration |year=2003 |publisher=[[Basic Books]], [[Perseus Books Group]] |location=[[Cambridge, Massachusetts]] |isbn=0-7382-0692-X |pages=[https://archive.org/details/manwhofoundtimej0000repc/page/117 117–43] |chapter=Chapter 7: The Athens of the North}}</ref> His ideas were popularised by the scientist and mathematician [[John Playfair]] (1748–1819).<ref>https://archive.org/details/NHM104643 {{cite book |author=Playfair, John |title=Illustration of the Huttonian Theory |year=1802 |publisher=Cadell & Davies |location=Edinburgh}} at [https://archive.org/ archive.org]</ref> Prior to [[James Hutton]], Rev. [[David Ure]] then minister to East Kilbride Parish was the first to represent the shells 'entrochi' in illustrations and make accounts of the geology of southern Scotland. The findings of [[David Ure]] were influential enough to inspire the Scottish endeavour to the recording and interpretation of [[natural history]] and [[Fossils]], a major part of the Scottish Enlightenment.<ref>''Life of Rev. David Ure'', 1865</ref><ref>''History of Rutherglen and East Kilbride'', 1793, David Ure</ref>

Edinburgh became a major centre of medical teaching and research.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Bynum|first1=W. F.|last2=Porter|first2=Roy|title=William Hunter and the Eighteenth-Century Medical World|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nJc0wTuTGuMC&pg=PA142|year=2002|publisher=Cambridge University Press|pages=142–43|isbn=9780521525176}}</ref>