"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."
Galileo Galilei (1564 - 1642)
What do you do when the same society that brought you up attempts to suppress your own discoveries? Do you sit back and let them destroy your work? Or do you fight for your right to question, to seek knowledge? These are difficult questions, ones that even great thinkers today have trouble answering. I will share with you today a bit of the story of Galileo Galilei.
Galileo among other things, dared to question the church explanation of the universe. He supported the idea that the solar system was heliocentric, meaning that the Earth and all the other planets revolved around the sun. This frightened the church, as it threatened not only scripture but major beliefs as well. Humans were no longer at the center, and God was no longer in a specific place. This idea raised such uncertanties that it seemed prudent for the Church just to condemn it. Galileo was only allowed to portray his ideas as mathematical supposition, not fact. The heliocentric idea of the universe (Copernicanism) seemed to have lost the battle, but Galileo was just getting started.
Galileo never accepted his condemnation. In 1632, he published his most famous work, Dialogue_on_the_Two_Chief_World_Systems:_Ptolemaic_and_Copernican. Unlike most scholarly books, it was written in Italian rather than Latin, making it more widely available to the common people, which alarmed church authorities. In this work Galileo discussed both sides of the conflict of Earth's place in the universe. It was clear in his book who had won the argument, and the Dialogue was quickly seen as a defense to the Copernican system. In 1633, Galileo was brought before the Inquisition, forced to recant his position, and placed under house arrest for the remaining eight years of his life.
Galileo clearly was an example of scientific thinking at its finest. He pursued knowlege even when he met opposition from his own society. This paved the way for other great thinkers, such as Newton and Paracelsus, opening a the door to a scientific revolution that would change the way we think forever.
"Historia vitae magistra"
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2 comments:
Nice post for a blog that just started. Looking forward to new ones :D
I agree. Looks like this blog has a great future. I hope you include some topics about space too. That would be cool.
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