> In article ,
> "Dan Drake" dandrake.com> wrote:
>

>> On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 04:39:19 UTC, Michael Press pacbell.net> wrote:
>>

>>> In article
>>> d45g2000hsc.googlegroups.com>,
>>> chazwin yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>

>>>> On Sep 4, 4:17 pm, Jerry Kraus yahoo.com> wrote:

>>>>> On Sep 3, 4:41 pm, "Dan Drake" dandrake.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>

>>>>>> On Tue, 2 Sep 2008 21:59:25 UTC, z snail-mail.net> wrote:

>>>>>>>> If anyone wants to know a bit more about the development of the work of
>>>>>>>> Copernicus, Kepler and Galileo it's well worth finding the Koestler book.- Hide quoted text -

>>>>>

>>>>>>>> - Show quoted text -

>>>>>

>>>>>>> according to an article by arthur c clarke, galileo couldn't resist
>>>>>>> insulting the officials. i don't know if he's right or not, but he
>>>>>>> deserves the benefit of the doubt.

>>>>>

>>>>>> Which "he" is the one who deserves the benefit of the doubt here? The
>>>>>> honored historical figure, or the writer expressing an opinion about him?
>>>>>> (Surely not actual historians, who don't rate a mention.) One way of
>>>>>> reducing the doubt would be to read what Galileo wrote. Then you could
>>>>>> come back with, let's say, three clear instances of his insulting the
>>>>>> officials.

>>>>>

>>>>>> The first, I know, will be the big famous one, which is actually false or
>>>>>> at least an unfounded charge. I'm curious to see what the other two will
>>>>>> be.

>>>>>
>>>>> Galileo was trying to advance his own views at the expense of those
>>>>> with more power than he had. This does tend to get one into
>>>>> difficulties, in general, unless your evidence is overwhelming --
>>>>> which Galileo's was not, at the time. He was able to challenge the
>>>>> existing system, not establish a new one, as Newton did.

>>>>
>>>> Newton was just one more link in the chain of reason. The heliocentric
>>>> system already made mush more sense at the time of Kepler and Galileo.
>>>> All Newton was to do was to describe it all mathematically from a
>>>> suggestion made by Robert Hooke.
>>>> Of the 2 systems available the heliocentric one was far and away the
>>>> most elegant and simple. The church's objections were never scientific
>>>> but psychological. Psychological in two ways: first, was that it was
>>>> thought that "divinely inspired" ideology should and could not be
>>>> wrong; any gainsaying of church dogma was "heretical", and secondly
>>>> the heliocentric hypothesis moved the earth away from its special
>>>> position at the centre of a relatively small universe to a subordinate
>>>> position which (with the evidential lack of stellar parallax evidence)
>>>> expanded the distance to the nearest star to unimaginable distances.

>>>
>>> Or it could be the RCC entered into a contract where they paid
>>> Copernicus to develop a method to calculate the date of Easter.
>>> Copernicus delivered a correct, easily calculated method. Implicit in,
>>> but not necessary to, his method is a heliocentric model. Since
>>> the project was funded by the RCC, they contended that they had
>>> the rights; and prosecuted those who used it without permission.
>>>

>>
>> The Intellectual Property theory. Oh joy, warring sect appears over the
>> horizon! Write a book, and you could get some people believing it.

>
> Intellectual property is a contentious matter today. Why not then?
>
> Or maybe Galileo was not taken to task for his work with the telescope,
> but rather his work with the microscope.