Science on This Day: November 28 | Magellan Enters the Pacific, The Royal Society is Established & Mariner 4 is Launched
How do we decide whether a scientific claim is true? What happens when a spacecraft sends back images that challenge what scientists thought they knew? And how can a journey across an unfamiliar ocean change the way people understand the world?
November 28 offers three stories that help answer these questions. In 1660, a group of scholars in London established the organisation that became the Royal Society, helping create a lasting institution for testing and sharing scientific ideas. In 1964, NASA launched Mariner 4 on a journey to Mars that would transform our understanding of the Red Planet. And in 1520, the expedition led by Ferdinand Magellan passed through the strait at the southern tip of South America and entered the Pacific Ocean.
Together, these events connect scientific methods, space exploration and the history of geography. They also provide practical ways to help students think about evidence, uncertainty and how new knowledge changes our understanding of the world.
November 28, 1660: The Royal Society is founded
Imagine a group of people meeting regularly to demonstrate experiments, discuss observations and question explanations of the natural world. In the seventeenth century, when many ideas about nature were still strongly influenced by ancient authorities and traditional beliefs, this was an important approach to developing knowledge.
On November 28, 1660, a group of 12 men met in London after a lecture by Christopher Wren, who was then Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College. They agreed to establish a society devoted to what was then called natural philosophy, a broad field that included what we now call science. The organisation became the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge. It received its royal charter in 1662.
The Royal Society did not invent scientific investigation. People had observed nature, conducted experiments and developed mathematical explanations for centuries. Its importance was in helping to establish a community where people could share findings, compare evidence and develop ideas through organised discussion. Members included figures such as Robert Boyle, whose work helped develop experimental approaches to chemistry and the study of gases, and later Isaac Newton, whose Principia Mathematica was published under the Society's auspices in 1687.
The Society adopted the motto Nullius in verba, commonly translated as “take nobody's word for it.” This does not mean that scientists should automatically reject what other people say. Rather, it expresses the principle that claims should be tested against evidence instead of accepted solely because someone influential has made them.
That distinction is central to science education. Students regularly encounter scientific explanations in textbooks, videos and online articles, but understanding science involves more than memorising accepted facts. It also means learning how scientists collect evidence, evaluate methods, compare competing explanations and revise conclusions when new information becomes available.
The Royal Society's early history also reminds us that scientific institutions reflect the society in which they develop. Its original membership consisted of men from relatively privileged backgrounds, and women were not admitted as Fellows until 1945. The history of science therefore includes both the development of new knowledge and the changing opportunities people have had to contribute to it.
For a classroom discussion, ask students what makes a scientific claim trustworthy. Is a claim more convincing because it appears in a textbook, because a famous scientist supports it, or because evidence and methods are available for others to examine? Students could compare two explanations of a familiar phenomenon and identify what observations or experiments would help distinguish between them.
The Royal Society's history page provides further background on its founding, motto and role in the development of organised science.
November 28, 1964: Mariner 4 begins its journey to Mars
By the twentieth century, scientific investigation was no longer limited to experiments conducted on Earth. Spacecraft were beginning to travel to other planets, allowing scientists to collect evidence directly from places that had previously been observed mainly through telescopes.
NASA launched Mariner 4 on November 28, 1964, sending the spacecraft on a journey of around eight months to Mars. Its mission was to fly past the planet, take photographs and measure conditions in the surrounding space and Martian atmosphere. It was a major step in planetary exploration, but reaching Mars was not guaranteed. An earlier spacecraft, Mariner 3, had failed to reach its destination after its protective launch shroud did not open correctly. Engineers used what they learned from that failure to redesign the shroud for Mariner 4.
The spacecraft successfully flew past Mars in July 1965. It returned 22 images of the planet's surface, providing the first close-up photographs of another planet. The pictures revealed a heavily cratered landscape that looked in some ways more like the Moon than the world many people had imagined.
Before these observations, some scientists and members of the public hoped that Mars might have conditions similar to Earth, perhaps including environments suitable for life. The images and other measurements from Mariner 4 showed that Mars had a much thinner atmosphere than Earth's and a cold, cratered surface. The results challenged some expectations about the planet, although the images covered only a small fraction of its surface and could not answer every question about its past or potential to support life.
This is an excellent example of how scientific understanding changes when new evidence becomes available. A hypothesis may be reasonable given the observations available at the time, yet later measurements can reveal that it needs to be revised. Mariner 4 did not answer every question about Mars, but it helped replace speculation with direct observations.
The mission also illustrates the engineering behind space science. Mariner 4 had to survive launch, operate in space, maintain its trajectory, communicate across enormous distances and collect data during a brief flyby. Its camera stored images for transmission to Earth, and the incoming digital data had to be converted into pictures. Engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory even assembled strips of printed numbers and hand-coloured them to create an early view of one image while they waited for the processed version.
For students, this offers a useful connection between physics, computing and engineering. A spacecraft does not simply send a photograph as a modern phone might. Instruments measure signals, convert them into data, and transmit that data to Earth, where computers and scientists interpret it. The resulting image is based on measurements, not a direct view through a window.
A practical activity is to show students one of Mariner 4's original images alongside a recent photograph of Mars. Ask them to identify what they can confidently infer from the older image, what remains uncertain and what additional measurements would help. Students could then design a short list of instruments for a future Mars mission, explaining which question each instrument would investigate.
NASA's Mariner 4 mission overview includes details of the spacecraft and its discoveries. NASA also provides the first digital image of Mars from Mariner 4, which is particularly useful for discussing how scientific data becomes a visual image.
November 28, 1520: Magellan's expedition enters the Pacific
More than four centuries before Mariner 4 travelled to Mars, another expedition crossed a boundary into an unfamiliar environment from the perspective of European navigators. On November 28, 1520, three ships from Ferdinand Magellan's expedition entered the Pacific Ocean after travelling through the passage at the southern tip of South America now known as the Strait of Magellan.
Magellan, a Portuguese navigator sailing for the Spanish Crown, had set out in 1519 to find a westward sea route to the Spice Islands in Southeast Asia. At the time, spices were valuable commodities, and European powers were competing to establish trade routes and expand their influence. Finding a navigable passage through South America was a major challenge. The expedition had to contend with difficult weather, unfamiliar coastlines, shortages and the risk of losing ships.
After navigating the strait, the surviving ships reached a vast ocean. Magellan called it Pacífico, meaning peaceful, because the waters encountered during this part of the voyage were comparatively calm. The name has endured, even though the Pacific can produce some of the world's most powerful storms and waves.
The voyage was a remarkable achievement in navigation, but it is important to describe the history carefully. The Pacific was not an unknown ocean to the people who lived around it. Indigenous communities and Pacific Island societies had long histories of seafaring, navigation, settlement and exchange. Magellan's expedition is significant in the history of European exploration and in the first European-led crossing of the Pacific from the Americas, not because it was the first human encounter with the ocean.
The expedition's wider story also demonstrates the risks and consequences of exploration. Magellan himself died in the Philippines in 1521, and he did not complete the journey around the world. One of his ships, the Victoria, eventually returned to Spain in 1522 under Juan Sebastián Elcano, completing the first recorded circumnavigation of the Earth by an expedition. The journey expanded European geographic knowledge while also forming part of a wider history of imperial expansion, trade and conflict.
This event provides a strong connection between geography and science. Navigation at the time relied on observations of the stars, instruments, maps, knowledge of winds and currents, and careful recording of a ship's position. Students can investigate how navigators estimated latitude and longitude, why determining longitude was historically difficult, and how modern satellite navigation has changed travel.
A useful classroom question is: How can a journey change what people believe they know about the world? Students could compare a historical map with a modern map and identify which information was based on direct observation, which might have been inferred and which regions were already well known to the people who lived there. This also opens up a discussion about who creates maps, whose knowledge is recorded and how place names can reflect the perspectives of those doing the naming.
The US Library of Congress provides a useful historical account of Magellan's expedition crossing the Pacific, including the date and the conditions experienced by the crew.
Bringing November 28 into your science classroom
These three events may appear unrelated at first, but each asks students to think about how people gather and interpret information. The Royal Society emphasises testing claims and sharing evidence. Mariner 4 demonstrates how new measurements can challenge existing expectations. Magellan's expedition shows how observation, navigation and mapping shape geographical knowledge, while reminding us that historical accounts can reflect the viewpoint of the people who recorded them.
One way to connect all three is to ask students to consider the difference between evidence, interpretation and assumption. Give them a short claim about Mars, a historical map or a scientific experiment and ask what evidence supports it. Then ask what the evidence cannot tell them. This helps students avoid treating a single observation as a complete explanation.
You could also use one event as a five-minute starter before a more substantial lesson. The Royal Society fits well with experimental design and evaluating sources. Mariner 4 works naturally in a unit on the Solar System, waves, digital data or engineering. Magellan's expedition can support work on navigation, Earth's oceans, mapmaking and the history of exploration.
If you want to build regular science-history starters into your teaching, my November Science on This Day resource contains 109 STEM stories across the month. It includes an interactive HTML version with filters and discussion questions, editable slides, a filterable spreadsheet and a PDF alternative. You can select stories that connect to your current topic rather than needing to use every event in sequence.
You can also explore the full range of science teaching resources in my store, with materials across physics, chemistry, biology, Earth science and space science. There are free and paid resources available, making it easier to find an activity that fits your students and lesson plans.
What else happened around this date?
November 29 offers several further opportunities to connect science history with classroom topics. It marks the birth of Christian Doppler in 1803, whose work is associated with the Doppler effect. Students can explore how the observed frequency of a wave changes when its source and observer move relative to one another, with examples ranging from passing sirens to astronomical observations. The date also connects to Richard Byrd's 1929 flight over the South Pole and a pioneering 1944 operation to treat a child with a congenital heart condition. That medical story is particularly important for recognising the contribution of laboratory technician Vivien Thomas, whose experimental work helped develop the surgical technique.
On November 30, the birth of Jagadish Chandra Bose in 1858 offers a connection to radio waves, experimental physics and plant responses. Students can also explore the story of Ann Hodges, who was struck by a meteorite in Alabama in 1954, a rare and well-documented event that can lead into a discussion of asteroids, meteoroids, meteors and meteorites.
Looking ahead to December, the December Science on This Day resource includes 132 STEM stories across all 31 days of the month, with multiple formats for choosing, displaying and discussing events in class.
Science history is useful because it makes scientific ideas part of a bigger human story. November 28 shows how scientific communities develop, how spacecraft can challenge our expectations, and how exploration changes the maps people use to understand the world. Each story offers students an invitation to ask not just what happened, but how we know, what changed as a result and whose perspective is represented in the account.
Thanks for reading
Cheers and stay curious
Oliver - The Teaching Astrophysicist
