Galileo Galilei is a polymath from Florence, Italy. In 1851, he discovered he was talented in mathematics, and so he started tutoring and then became a professor in mathematics. In 1609, the spyglass was invented, and people could look through it and see things far away. Galileo took the spyglass and improved it to make a telescope. He was the first to look through it and he then saw that the earth did involve around the sun, as Copernicus had first suggested. Because of that, he was prosecuted by the church, with accusations of heresy.
In the old times, people used to think that the earth was the center of the universe, and that all planets revolved around it. Also, the church supported that theory, and people who opposed it were considered to be heretics. The theory that the sun may be the center and not the earth was introduced by Copernicus in the 16th century. Back then, that theory had zero credibility and a lot of errors. Copernicus’ work was not even published until almost his death.
Then, galileo was born in the late 16th century, years after Copernicus was dead. While in his medical school, he discovered that he was good in mathematics, and persued his father, Vincenzo galilei, to stop medicine, and start being a tutor in maths. After a while, he also became a mathematical professor.
In 1609, the spyglass was invented by Hans Lippershey in the Netherlands. After that, in the same year, galileo used the spyglass to create the first telescope and be the first person to look at the moon through one. He made the telescope using convex objective lens in a long tube. Galileo used the telescope vigorously and made a lot of discoveries, including the moons phases and also discovered that the moon isn’t smooth and instead is rough and uneven, instead of the smooth surface that everyone thought. The difference although from others that had also made telescopes (three-powered) was that he learned how to improve it and how to use the lens and more propertly. Because of that he was able to create an eight powered telescope and thus was able to observe the space.
There are many implications, both positive and negative in galileo’s invention (improved telescope) and discoveries (moon etc), which of course can also be seen by the reactions of the people when he published his discoveries.
First of all, we ought to mention the huge positive impact this discovery had in the understanding of the universe. After his discoveries, even though he wasn’t recognized in his time, he helped many other scientists to come up with many more inventions and discoveries (microscope, modern telescopes etc). this implication can be seen from a lot of perspectives and especially scientifically. That is because galileo made some really important discoveries, that have added to the global knowledge and understanding of the universe.
The telescope he also created has helped discover many planets and stars in out galaxy, even though it needed even more improvement. We perceive the telescope mostly as work of galileo even though it began from a Netherlands optician. The main reason from that is because galileo improved it and actually used it to look at the stars, because the spyglass could only see objects until a person’s horizon, while the eight powered telescope he used could even see the details of the moon. That invention of his helped the world both scientifically and economically. After the telescope was made and people recognized its significance, it was commercialized and made in masses for the people to use, even though at first it was so expensive that it was considered a privilege and only the rich people and royal family had it. That’s also why it was seen in many paintings. Except from the economical implication, the telescope also had a cultural implication, since after it’s commercialization it was used by lot of people and everyone saw that the space and even the earth by itself was different than what they knew and were able to find out how the universe was created and many more discoveries came in every science field. That led to the common knowledge that god didn’t create the universe and thus brought a religious implication.
Using the telescope, galileo galilei discovered that the earth is most likely to be spinning around the sun and after that discovery supported coppernicus’ theory that actually the sun was the center. The theory that the sun is the center opposes the church and its preachings and so that discovery brought him in a disagreement with the church and that made an religious implication. Also, disagreeing with the church almost got him killed, as he was perceived as a heretic. Because of all of this, galileo wasn’t known for his work, not until after he died and the theory that the sun is the centre was confirmed.
The discoveries of galileo also were something important to the society and made a social and cultural implication. That is because ,even though it was after death, he changed ideas and belifs on the people.
An important disadvantage that galileo’s work had, was that it wasn’t known, so the other scientists could not peer review it. That means that the work may had been inaccurate, and thus wrong, but the scientific society would never know. That gives galileo’s work a moral implication, since people could doubt his work and not actualy recognize him as a scientist.
Another disadvanteage is that the time that galileo made his discoveries was not really beneficial to him and his work almost got him killed. That is an ethical implication since people actually gave a lot of importance to being a heretic and or a witch, meaning that science was actually not really appreciated in that era. Had galileo made these discoveries in the modern age, he would be much more appreciated and maybe helped to discover even more.
In conclusion, we see that galileo’s work was actually really useful to the society and that even though he had conflicts with many people, both society and church, his work helped us to perceive the universe better. Also, his improvement to the telescope made possible more discoveries, such as the confirmation of Copernicus’ theory and the creation of modern day telescopes, and satellites. In addition, we see that all of his work was really helpful to the society and also showed how the church was having wrong preaches and never actually admitted how people could actually be correct and instead wanted to kill them. So again, in conclusion, galileo made really important discoveries, that were not appreciated by the society and caused him to have lots of disagreements with many people, church and societies.
Bibliography
- NASA, NASA, starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/whos_who_level2/galileo.html.
- Helden, Albert Van. “Galileo.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 14 Feb. 2018, www.britannica.com/biography/Galileo-Galilei.
- “Renaissance Genius : Galileo Galilei & H.” Google Boeken, Google, books.google.nl/books?id=bGKrPVoQY8QC&pg=PA88&hl=nl&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false.
- “Galileo Galilei.” Galileo Biography, www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/Biographies/Galileo.html