Science In The 1600s

Ptolemy, a Roman astronomer came up with the theory that the universe revolved around Earth and all the creatures inhabiting it (Doc. C). This theory, The Geocentric Universe of Ptolemy, was adjusted by most of the people during The Middle Ages. However, much later on, Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish astronomer, disagreed with Ptolemy’s theory. With his use of math and reason, he came up with a new theory called The Heliocentric Universe of Copernicus (Doc. C). He said that the universe & Earth itself revolves around the sun. The Church denied this theory because they did not want to be proven wrong. If the Church was wrong about this part of the universe, this would then cause man to wonder what else they could be wrong about, or even lied to them about. This new theory taught men to think for themselves and not to rely on the Church for

The statement acts to justify his finding with the church and connect them to God. Copernicus realized that the church would be quick to judge him, and possibly this is why he didn’t publish his theories until late in his life. His discoveries were not so much as important as were his methods of observation and application of mathematics to explain the world. His methods of discovery helped model the direction of science over the next hundred years.

Among these people were Copernicus who believed the sun was at the center of the world and the earth, stars and planets revolved around it. Danish astronomer Brahe helped contribute to this idea by contributing a large mass of data about the universe that he was able to discover. His student Kepler kept his ideas going, as he formulated many laws of planetary motion. He said the orbits around the sun were elliptical, planets don’t move in a uniform speed and the time a planet completes its orbit is related to its distance from the sun. Meanwhile, Florentine Galileo decided to use experiments to find out what happened and not what should happen, and discovered that a uniform force makes a uniform acceleration as well as inertia laws, that an object will be in motion forever unless stopped by another force.

While the Roman Catholic Church believed that the earth was the center of the universe, Nicolaus Copernicus’s discovered that the Earth actually was one of the planets hat revolved around the sun. “For, in the first place, they are so uncertain about the motion of the sun and moon that they cannot establish and observe a constant length even for the tropical year. (Document 1)” The church belief did not make sense because it was wrong. They were going off wrong information that they could not establish a constant year, which confuses people. Nicolaus said that the earth moved around the sun, which made more sense and

Galileo created a telescope and turned it to the sky. As a result of his observations, our solar system was seen in a way that had never been imaginable before. He discovered that the Earth was not at the center of the solar system, but instead the earth revolved around the sun. Prior to this discovery, the church adopted the idea that the Earth was at the center of the solar system and everything revolved around it. This discovery altered our view of science and the church in large and small

Copernicus release his theory of the heliocentric view while he was on his death bed. Primary reason for this was because of the Catholic’s church control on society at the time and the effects it would have on religious society stating that the earth was not the center of the universe. After Copernicus released

Copernicus began to question Ptolemy at a very young age. Copernicus didn’t believe Ptolemy’s view of the universe and that it was geocentric. Copernicus found mathematical errors to help him prove that Earth was not the center of the universe. After some research Copernicus realized that the universe was

In the early medieval period, the masses believed that earth was at the center of the universe and everything revolved around it. “...the judgement of many centuries has approved the view that the Earth remains fixed as center in the midst of the heavens…” Nicolaus Copernicus thought that this idea was absurd and continued to explain that the Earth actually moves. He was afraid to even discuss the idea as anyone during the period would just reject it immediately. The Earth being flat was in part influenced by religion and by writing his theories, he was almost apologetic for suggesting the heavens were different from what almost all people believed. “...that the earth is situated in the third sphere and revolves with great speed around the sun, is a very dangerous thing, not only by irritating all the philosophers and scholastic theologians, but also injuring our holy faith and rendering the Holy Scriptures false.” The change in culture was seen as a danger to religion as the new ideas went against a lot of factors in religion. The strict religious ideas caused almost a cultural revolt for new ideas. But because religion was being changed radically, it left room for new ideas like this to start spreading to the

Copernicus and Galileo were two men who contributed to new beliefs and theories about the earth, and disagreed with beliefs that were over 2000 years old. Both questioned the view of the earth being geocentric. However, in this time the Roman Catholic Church was ruling and did not agree with these new theories, most likely due to . Because of this Galileo and Copernicus has to stay true to their beliefs and stick it out till their minds were changed. Individuals change their minds because of new evidence provided causing a better outlook on things, in this case Galileo's and Copernicus' findings of the world eventually changed the beliefs of the Roman Catholic Church.

Nicholas Copernicus was the first to question the universal truths and teachings of the church. He devised a theory that the earth along with the other planets revolved around the sun. This theory disagreed with Aristotle and the old teachings that the universe revolved around the earth, and that man was the center of the universe.

Let's say that you worked extremely hard on a project and you did extremely well. You get that paper back and you failed! This is exactly what happened to Nicolaus Copernicus because the church rejected his ideas. Why would they do that? They did this because Nicolaus Copernicus proved everyone wrong when he discovered that actually we lived in a heliocentric universe. Nicolaus Copernicus was a very important figure in the Renaissance. He was a leading astronomer, mathematician, and scientist. He created the idea of a heliocentric universe which meant he created the idea that the Sun was the center of the universe instead of the Earth. He was correct. During his time the church had so much power it could reject his ideas, which they did by banning his book to be read.

The idea that the Earth was the center of the universe was not challenged until about 1507 when Nicholas Copernicus went to Rome and chaired the mathematics department. He wanted to find out how Earth works so that he can glorify God. His findings, however, contradicted the church’s scriptures, or more specifically, the Bible. Because his work had no backing, he could not prove that his theory was valid and therefore could not confront the Church. His findings were ahead of his time.

Galileo Galilei proved Copernicus theory. Copernicus was a scientist who had an interesting theory stating that there were other planets then earth and that those planets with us and the moon revolve around the sun. The Catholic Church did not believe Copernicus theory because his theory could not be proven by the bible and if the bible didn’t have it then it’s “not true”. Galileo was interested in his theory; he wanted to see if it is actually true. Galileo became very interested in this matter and decides to study at Padora, Galileo studied long and hard each day of looking in his telescope and reading some of other people’s theories. Finally after a long time of hard working he found the proof that it was RIGHT! He was so excited to show

Nicolaus is argueably one of the greatest minds of astronomy. Born on February 19, 1473. Early in his life his father passed away. His grandfather took him into protection were Nicolaus soon after enrolled at University of Cracow. before Nicolaus applied a strong role in astronomy there were already hypothesis on where the Earth and its bretheren planets lie in the universe. He soon grew in his studies to prove that the roman catholic church had put the Earth at the center of the universe with all other planets orbiting it, plus the moon was its own celesterial body. During his studies of the the night sky and observations of how the stars moved he then came to a conculsion that they were wrong. Back in this time period what the Catholic church

The Catholic Church played an important role at the time when all the works in which the movement of the earth was admitted, Catholics were forbidden to teach, and even read, the Copernican theories. The “Copernican Theory” modeled some problems of enormous importance for Christian’s obviously theological nature. Leaders like Martin Luther and John Calvin told us that Scripture brandished against Nicolaus Copernicus and provoked repression against its followers, but generally abandon the fight Protestantism once the “Theories of Copernicus” were confirmed with indisputable evidence. In this paper, I will first evaluate the history about how “Copernican Theory” and its model of the earth came into existence. I will also analyze the “Copernican Theory” in light of Churches idea of the earth being flat. I will ultimately argue that Nicolaus Copernicus played an important role in the history of Philosophy of Science.