Once it was recognised that the earth was not the center of the world, but only one of the smaller planets, the illusion of the central significance of man himself became untenable. Hence, Nicolaus Copernicus, through his work and the greatness of his personality, taught man to be honest. (Albert Einstein, Message on the 410th Anniversary of the Death of Copernicus, 1953)
Introduction & Summary of Nicolaus Copernicus' CosmologyNicolaus Copernicus (1473 - 1543) is known as one of the founding fathers of Cosmology, liberating us from the earth centric view of the universe (as formalised by Ptolemy, approx. 90 - 160AD). He discovered that the earth orbits the sun.
As Copernicus wrote in De Revolutionibus Coelestibus;
Finally we shall place the Sun himself at the center of the Universe.
All this is suggested by the systematic procession of events and
the harmony of the whole Universe, if only we face the facts,
as they say, 'with both eyes open'. (Copernicus)
We find that the simplest explanation is most likely the true one as Max Born writes;
Nicolaus Copernicus' constructive achievement was that his system explained in a simpler way the phenomena which the traditional world system was able to explain only by means of complicated and artificial hypotheses. (Max Born, Einstein's Theory of Relativity)
The scientific truth of Copernicus' Theory (that the earth orbits the sun) was not recognised within his own lifetime. It was not until Galileo Galilei peered through his telescope, that Copernicus' Theory was proved by Empirical Science (and still faced extreme opposition from the orthodoxy who refused to look).
We can learn from great scientists of the past that important scientific discoveries are often first ignored, and then violently rejected, by the society of their time. As Nicolaus Copernicus confirms;
.. astronomers of my day are so inconsistent in these [astronomical] investigations ... that they cannot even explain or observe the constant length of the seasonal year. With them, it is as though an artist were to gather the hands, feet, head and other members for his images from diverse models, each part excellently drawn, but not related to a single body, and since they in no way match each other, the result would be monster rather than man. (Copernicus, Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions)
This webpage on Nicolaus Copernicus deals with three very interesting problems of Cosmology.
i) Is the universe Finite or Infinite?
ii) Are we at the center of the universe?
iii) Does the Earth orbit the Sun?
You may think the answers are now fairly obvious, the universe is finite and roughly spherical, we are not at the center of the universe, and we do orbit the sun. The metaphysics of Space and the Wave Structure of Matter (Wolff, Haselhurst) suggests differently, that only two of the above three conclusions are correct.
Please Cosmology and Simple Science to properly understand, but here I will simply state the solution.
i) Yes the universe is spherical and finite. In fact matter and the universe are one and the same thing, as matter is formed from Spherical Standing Waves which determine the size of our finite spherical universe within an Infinite Space. Thus the conception of matter as tiny particles is wrong, matter is large not small, but the Wave-Center of the Spherical Waves forms the tiny 'particle' effect.
ii) This is the surprise. We are actually at the center of our own universe, but within an infinite Space (thus there is no center of Space). So Ptolemy was correct (for the wrong reasons) and Copernicus made an error (he correctly showed that the Earth orbits the Sun, he incorrectly assumed this meant we were not at the center of the universe).
iii) Yes, the Earth does orbit the Sun.
I hope that you will read on the Wave Structure of Matter (WSM) as a way of understanding not only Ptolemy and Nicolaus Copernicus, but also the modern Cosmology which evolved from Albert Einstein's Relativity. Below are some links to more information on Nicolaus Copernicus.
Nicolaus Copernicus & Ptolemy LinksNicolaus
Copernicus Biography
http://www.phy.hr/~dpaar/fizicari/xcopern.html
Nicolaus Copernicus Museum in Frombork - Lovely site with cool animated image. Life of Nicolaus Copernicus. De Revolutionibus. Portraits of Nicolaus Copernicus. Discovered that the Earth is not in the center of the Universe but it circles the Sun.
http://www.frombork.art.pl/Ang02.htm
Ptolemy: Man, Astronomer & Geographer - Ptolemy lived in Alexandria (Egypt) from approx. 87 - 150 AD. He synthesized and extended Hipparchus's system of epicycles and eccentric circles to explain his geocentric theory of the solar system.
http://www.seds.org/billa/psc/theman.html
Biography of Ptolemy - Ptolemy believed the planets and Sun to orbit the Earth in the order Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn.
http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Ptolemy.html
"When
forced to summarize the general theory of relativity in one sentence: Time
and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ... Physical
objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended.
In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... The particle
can only appear as a limited region in space in which the field strength
or the energy density are particularly high. ...
The free, unhampered exchange of ideas and scientific conclusions
is necessary for the sound development of science, as it is in all spheres
of cultural life. ... We must not conceal from ourselves that no
improvement in the present depressing situation is possible without a severe
struggle; for the handful of those who are really determined to do something
is minute in comparison with the mass of the lukewarm and the misguided.
...
Humanity is going to need a substantially new way of thinking if
it is to survive!" (Albert Einstein)
Our world is in great trouble due to human
behaviour founded on myths and customs that are causing the destruction
of Nature and climate
change. We can now deduce
the most simple science theory of reality - the wave structure of matter
in space. By understanding how we and everything around us are interconnected
in Space we can then deduce solutions to the fundamental problems of
human knowledge in physics,
philosophy, metaphysics,
theology,
education,
health, evolution
and ecology, politics
and society.
This is the profound new way of thinking that Einstein
realised, that we exist as spatially extended structures of the universe
- the discrete and separate body an illusion. This simply confirms the intuitions
of the ancient
philosophers and mystics.
Given the current censorship
in physics / philosophy of science journals (based on the standard
model of particle physics / big
bang cosmology) the internet is the best hope for getting new knowledge
known to the world. But that depends on you, the people who care about science
and society, realise the importance of truth and reality.
It is easy to help - just click on the social network sites (below) or grab
a nice image / quote you like and add it to your favourite blog,
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philosophy sites on the Internet (300,000 page views / week) and have
a wonderful collection of knowledge from the greatest minds in human history,
so people will appreciate your contributions. Thanks! Geoff
Haselhurst - Karene
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