Displacing the earth, and hence man as the center of the universe…
…Late fifteenth century astronomy was a confused collection of systems inherited from a diverse past, with no certainty of fact or theory. Medieval astronomical theory was based on Aristotelian cosmology, Ptolemaic mathematical astronomy, and Islamic modifications of both. To the layman, like Dante, it was easy, for Aristotle sufficed, and the universe was a tidy nest of spherical boxes, with the earth at the center and the planets arranged on solid crystalline spheres ranging ever outward until one reached the sphere of the fixed stars and the primum mobile, the “first mover,” or cause of motion. For the astronomer, who knew that simple motion on a sphere, or even a system of spheres, could not “save the appearances” or account for the observed motions of moon, sun, and planets, the intellectual position was full of distress.
—English: Nicolaus Copernicus portrait from Town Hall in Thorn/Toruń – 1580)—WIKI
The philosophical position was equally difficult. Both Platonic and Aristotelian metaphysics taught that the heavens and the region around the earth obeyed different physical laws; the heavens being perfect and unchanging, heavenly bodies possessed perfect motion- that is, uniform motion in a circle. But since shortly after the time of Aristotle, astronomers had known that the motion of the planets was too complex to be represented by a system of either circles or spheres centered on the earth.
Things were becoming very complicated; the method of epicycles, the device of the equant point; and as Kepler was to show, the velocity of a planet is not uniform, but faster when the planet is near the sun. Finally, there was the very practical problem of the calendar, clearly inaccurate by 1500, but requiring more knowledge of lunar motion and the length of the year for rectification.
—This image was selected as picture of the day on Wikimedia Commons for 21 June 2008. It was captioned as follows:
English: The Ptolemaic geocentric model of the Universe according to the Portuguese cosmographer and cartographer Bartolomeu Velho (Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris).—Read More:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bartolomeu_Velho_1568.jpg
There was plenty here to exercise the mind of the young Copernicus, and it is clear that he thought long and deeply upon it….( to be continued)…
ADDENDUM:
(see link at end)… The following is from Jakob J. Petuchowski, The Theology of Haham David Nieto: An Eighteenth-Century Defense of the Jewish Tradition, pp. 59, 61:
Hardly less medieval is Nieto’s attitude towards the Copernican system. It was not, however, that Nieto failed to be convinced by the scientific arguments in favor of Copernicus’ hypothesis… Nieto considers this to be absolutely logical. However, he also insists that “our attitude to Science must be that we accept whatever is not opposed to the Written and the Oral Law…” But in the heliocentric view of Copernicus we have, according to Nieto, an instance where Science does contradict the Scriptures. For we read in Joshua 10:12f: “Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon… And the sun stayed in the midst of the heaven, and hastened not to go down about a whole day.” This can only mean that, according to the Scriptures, the sun normally does move and revolve like the other planets…
David Gans (1541-1613), in his Nehmad veNaim, is full of praise for Copernicus, whom he considers to be the greatest scholar of the age. But he does not accept his world view which, he says, was already known by the ancients and rejected by them. This attitude is explained by Waxman as being due partly to the influence of Tycho Brahe who was a great opponent of the Copernican revolution, and partly to the piety of the author who could not accept the view of Copernicus since it contradicts Biblical passages. Read More:http://hirhurim.blogspot.ca/2005/01/copernicus-and-jews.html
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