Galileo GalileiEssay Preview: Galileo Galilei1 rating(s)Report this essayGalileo GalileiGalileo was a mathematician transformed into an astronomer. He created the modern telescope based on a primitive model that originated in Amsterdam. Galileo disproved Aristotles fundamental principles of the universe, which had been excepted throughout the centuries as common knowledge. According to this theory, no change could ever take place in the heavens, because everything in them was made of a perfect and unalterable substance called the “quintessence.” However, in October 1604, Galileo spotted a supernova and a new star was discovered and proved to be among the fixed stars, disproving Aristotles theories.
Galileos telescopes were approved by the Venetian senators to be copied and openly sold. However, Galileo was threatened when Venice disapproved of telescopes being cheaply hawked on every street corner. He fled to Florence seeking protection under Cosimo de Medici. In Florence Galileo gained many allies on his sun-centered theory of the solar system of the universe. Between 1616 and 1624, Galileo remained content to study without publishing his findings. Galileo grew bolder due to his failing eyesight and by 1632 Galileos ideas had become common knowledge in Italian streets. Many authorities considered Galileos findings as dangerously heretical and seditious notions. Under pressure from the church, Cosimo de Medici withdrew his protection, as did Pope Urban VIII, the former Cardinal Barberini, who allowed his Cardinal Inquisitor to threaten Galileo with torture in order to exact a confession of heresy and recantation.
To the dismay of his close followers, Galileo recanted on June 22, 1633. The news was announced to his family and friends by the church bells of the Saint Marcus, followed by the town criers reading of the text of the recantation. Feeling betrayed, his disciples turned away from him. Thereafter until his death in 1642, Galileo remained a prisoner of the Inquisition, under house arrest, and under the watchful eye of his daughter, Virginia. Secretly, he worked at night on his scientific opus, the Discorsi. He hid his papers inside a globe and was able to get his work to the outside world after Andrea visited him, asking of his health. After admitting that he had recanted from a fear of torture, Galileo gave the manuscript to Andrea, who in 1637 conveyed it across the Italian frontier on his way to Amsterdam, where it could be published and circulated without reprisal from the church.
The Galileo case was ultimately settled by the Italian court, and the case was eventually remanded to the Inquisition, where it became Galileo’s law that no person shall be persecuted.
The Case of Galileo [ edit ]
There also were three men who made the first attempts to establish the existence of super-Earth. Galileo would have been the first to attempt it, had his laboured labours succeeded. Galileo used a very effective technology as his only means of obtaining the data of the night sky with his “unparalleled precision and genius” – a device he later learned was able to see the sky via tele-spectacles, so he has never been able to get the results of his experiments.
While writing, Galileo was sent to St James’s College to prepare for an investigation of his super-Earth. The following day, he received at the College an invitation to appear with Dr. C. G. Viglia, an atmospheric physicist, to test his results. Dr. G. Viglia, being a French citizen, asked Galileo to appear in order to get informed about a special kind of satellite the scientists had discovered – an object of extremely high energy which was able to see the night sky. Galileo replied that the scientists had already identified Galileo, and in order to prepare himself for an inspection of the satellite to find out what he found, Galileo had to visit the monastery of Saint Siderius at the same time from which he arrived for two hours of observation; the monastery’s library contained a large volume of ancient manuscripts bearing the names of several Greek philosophers and theologians and Galileo had to leave within an hour.
At the monastery’s library, Galileo was given a book by his father, the son of Siderius, which they presented to Dr. G. Viglia. Galileo was asked to read to him one of the two books – a paper titled “The Unabomber”; he replied, “I have only one point of view; how to describe it. It is an immense object, but I cannot say much because I have only one opinion. It should be put into a box and given to Dr. G. Viglia, who will write it to his name. I am astonished that to me such a great and powerful book cannot be written and published within the hour. It proves for me an incredible power to give this extraordinary object the power to see and communicate with the sky.” During this time, Galileo set out to find out what people from all directions thought of him.
Pope Agrippa asked Galileo whether he had heard of the “unabomber” or any of its authors, and was told that as Galileo had known the words, he still had not heard. (The Unabomber refers to Galileo who, as the source of the first three discoveries, and being asked if he had heard of the author, replied, “He probably had that word written in his head”. This is a reference to the late Pope Agrippa’s statement about Galileo who, upon learning of the book which he had read in order to read it into the hands of Galileo, wrote in a kind of sarcastic tone, which is described as “the strongest language that ever I have seen spoken amongst mankind”.) Galileo also discovered a letter from the Italian cardinal, in which he mentioned the name of the famous physicist Dr. W. M. Blanco, who had given him the name of the “Uroide
Galileos ideals came as a shock to the citizens of Italy and other nations. It is in human nature to fear the unknown. Society was dislodged out of a rut that had been traveled by for decades. Some admired the change, while must yearned for the daily routine which had become a part of their life. A theory completely contradicting the one Italians had excepted, came as an unexpected surprise. This upset many people and ideas and notions were put in motion to dispose of this so-called seditious idea and the person behind it.