The battle over the Sun-centered universe was as much political as it was scientific. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a theory that had been defended since antiquity was suddenly challenged by the new theory that the Earth revolved around the Sun. In antiquity, the Earth had not yet been recognized as a “planet.” Thus, there was no apparent contradiction in saying that the Sun and the “planets” revolved around the Earth. At this time, it seemed to be the most natural theory in the world. Most importantly, it was defended by the Catholic Church – which held political as well as doctrinal power, and was at the peak of its military and political might.
Thus, advocating the theory was then an offense punishable by death. Giordano Bruno had been executed for this offense in 1600. Unlike other supporters of this theory, Giordano Bruno was no scientist, and supported this theory more for his own religious reasons. But many other supporters of the “Sun-centered universe” were true scientists. These included Nicolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei. Thus, they were more of a threat to the prevailing establishment of the time, because they could marshal some evidence for their point of view.
Tycho Brahe
But these are not the only astronomers covered here. They also cover Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler. Tycho Brahe was the most famous astronomical observer of his age. He gathered a wealth of data that was later used by Johannes Kepler. The uneasy relationship between the two men was later dramatized in an episode of Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos,” called “The Harmony of the Worlds.” Kepler is most famous as the namesake of what are today called “Kepler’s laws of planetary motion.” Among other things, these laws postulate that planetary orbits are elliptical, rather than perfectly circular. Kepler had tried to model planetary orbits with the equation of a circle, but could not make the data fit this theory. Thus, he accepted the contrary evidence, and discovered that the true shape of planetary orbits is an ellipse, which one can basically translate as an oval.
Johannes Kepler
Nonetheless, the controversy over the Sun-centered universe is still a major focus of this audiobook. You might already know that while the Earth is not the center of the universe, neither is the Sun. That is to say, the Sun revolves around the center of the galaxy – which, in turn, revolves around other things, and so forth. All of it moves, and none of it is stationary. Nonetheless, the Sun-centered universe was closer to the truth than was the “Earth-centered universe.” Lest this post come across as anti-Catholic, I should acknowledge that the Catholic Church has since come a long way in this regard. But at this time, its authorities felt that the church would lose face, if they recognized any of the new evidence for the “Sun-centered universe.” They have since acknowledged that this theory was an improvement over what had come before. But at this time, many church authorities felt threatened by this new theory, and were dead-set against acknowledging the evidence for it.
Nicolaus Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus had published this theory shortly before his death in 1543. But he didn’t live long enough after its publication to incur the wrath of the church. By contrast, Galileo Galilei openly became a symbol of the new theory. He was warned many times to stop advocating it, but he was not yet willing to shut up about it. Only when he was threatened with torture did Galileo pretend to recant his views. Some have criticized him for “dishonestly recanting” his theory, under threat of torture and death. But these critics should take a look at the kind of medieval torture devices that Galileo was then threatened with. More to the point, they should consider the scientific discoveries that Galileo himself would later make, after his life had been spared by the Catholic Church. This audiobook goes over a number of these discoveries in some detail – showing that science advanced because of this apparent disavowal, rather than just going “backwards” as is sometimes claimed.
Galileo facing the Roman Inquisition
This story is rife with human drama – not to mention controversy. Nonetheless, this audiobook does not lose focus on the science involved – examining theories and evidence, and the debates surrounding them. This is what makes this audiobook’s coverage different from some other coverage that I have seen. They certainly do justice to the human drama of it, but they also do justice to the science involved. They keep their discussion understandable, even for laypersons like me. Nonetheless, you can still get a sense of the complexity of the issues.
Galileo Galilei
I highly recommend this audiobook to anyone interested in this sort of thing. It is a good introduction to Renaissance astronomy, and the many discoveries that were made during (and shortly after) this time. Most importantly, it is a good examination of the “Sun-centered universe” theory, and the battle over it during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
If you liked this post, you might also like:
Part of an audiobook series
Science & Discovery
Astronomy: The Heavenly Challenge
Others to be covered later
See also the audiobook series
The Giants of Philosophy
Others to be covered later
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