The concept of revolution

Many historians of science believe that the concept of revolution in science is of fairly recent origin, but I have found that during some three centuries there has been a more or less unbroken tradition (though by no means shared by all scientists) of viewing scientific change as a sequence of revolutions. In the eighteenth century, when this tradition appears to have taken its first rise, the word “revolution” continued to be used, as in the past, as a technical term in mathematics and astronomy; but it also gained currency in a general sense in two very distinct meanings, both of which are found in writings about scientific change and in historical accounts of political events. Of these, one which came into general usage during the eighteenth century denotes a breach of continuity or a secular (i.e., noncyclical) change of real magnitude, usually accompanied–at least in political events–by violence. The other is the older sense, used in relation both to the history of science and the history of political events, signifying a cyclical phenomenon, a continuous sequence of ebb and flow, a kind of circulation and return, or a repetition. After 1789, the new meaning came to predominate, and ever since, “revolution” has commonly implied a radical change and a departure from traditional or accepted modes of thought, belief, action, social behavior, or political or social organization. Thus in early modern times there occurred a double transformation of “revolution” and the concept for which it is the name.