Galileo Galilei Essay Research Paper Galileo GalileiThe free essay sample

Galileo Galilei Essay, Research Paper Galileo GalileiThe paper which I will be composing will discourse the life, finds, and the modern impact of the scientific accomplishmentsof Galileo Galilei. Born in Pisa, Italy in 1564, Galileo entered Pisa University as a medical pupil in 1581 and became aprofessor of mathematics at Padua. An uranologist and mathematician, Galileo was, unluckily for himself, a adult male aheadof his clip. Galileo discovered the jurisprudence of uniformly accelerated gesture towards the Earth, the parabolic way of missiles, and the jurisprudence that all organic structures have weight. Among his other achievements was the betterment of the refracting telescopein 1610 and his protagonism of the Copernican theory which brought him into a struggle of thoughts and truths between himself andthe Inquisition. He was condemned by the church whose theories threatened everything that was taught by the priesthoodas the sanctum truth and he was finally broken by the Inquisition. Before being finally defeated by the church, nevertheless, Galileo made many parts to the universe of natural philosophies. His scientific finds and enterprises were merely a part of hiscontributions to the scientific community. Galileo # 8217 ; s methods of proving and turn outing his theories were besides of major importancesince these painstaking and exact methodological analysiss would put the basis for future scientific finds. His brilliancebrought about a new epoch in scientific promotion and his licking at the custodies of the church put a halt to the scientificrevolution which he had started. In 1993 the Vatican officially recognized the cogency of Galileo Galilei # 8217 ; s scientific work. Mentions Cited1. GALILEO: PIONEER SCIENTIST # 8211 ; Stillman Drake 19902. GALILEO A LIFE # 8211 ; James Reston, Jr. 19413. COLLEGE MATHEMATICS JOURNAL # 8211 ; May 1994, Volume 25 Issue 3, p 193 Galileo Galilei was a great scientist and innovator in the Fieldss of mechanics, uranology, thermometry, and magnetic attraction, althoughmechanics and uranology were his chief passions. He was arguably one of t he brightest work forces who of all time lived. Galileodiscovered and enhanced many scientific finds of his clip period and was extremely regarded as a Mathematician andNatural Philosopher. Galileo was persecuted for his positions on Earth # 8217 ; s relationship with the remainder of the celestial spheres since hebelieved that the Earth revolved around the Sun and that the celestial spheres were invariably altering and germinating. Since Galilei # 8217 ; svision of a metamorphosing existence came in direct struggle with the positions of Aristotle, positions held by and supported by thechurch, Galileo was finally called before the Inquisition and forced to abjure his positions. However, Galileo Galilei madesignificant parts to the scientific community and he is remembered as a great scientist and pioneer. Galileo Galilei was born in 1564 in Pisa, Italy ( so a portion of the Duchy of Tuscany ) , to Vincenzo Galilei, a instrumentalist, andGiulia Ammannati. Galileo studied medical sp ecialty at the university of Pisa from 1581 to 1585, but his existent involvements were inmathematics and natural doctrine and Galileo left the university in 1585 without a grade. It was during this clip framethat Galileo began to doubt conventional scientific discipline, since much of what he was being taught at that clip as scientific fact wasconflicting with the grounds which he saw in his hands-on medicalobservations ( Hitzeroth, Heerboth, The Importance ofGalileo, pp 14-15 ) . Following his period as a pupil, Galileo tried his manus at teaching.Galileo began in private learning in Florence and he returned to the university of Pisa to learn mathematics in 1589. Galileotaught at the university of Pisa until 1592 when he was appointed professor of mathematics at Padua ( the university of theRepublic of Venice. ) Galileo # 8217 ; s responsibilities as a professor of mathematics at Padua were to learn Euclidian geometry and criterion ( geocentric ) uranology to medical pupils. The medical pupils at that clip were expected to cognize some astronomy inorder to do usage of star divination in their medical patterns. In Padua, he continued his natural philosophies research in the country of mechanicsand uranology. In the country of mechanics is where Galileo # 8217 ; s most celebrated observations were exhibited. The traditional theory accepted bynearly everyone at that clip was Aristotle # 8217 ; s theory that heavier objects, when dropped from the same tallness as lighter 1s, will fall at a faster rate. In resistance to this impression, Galileo stated that with the remotion of outside influences such as windresistance, both objects will fall at the same time at virtually the same velocity. Although a really popular narrative of Galileo statesthat he attempted to turn out this theory by dropping different weights from the belfry ( tilting tower ) of the Duomo in Pisa, this peculiar experiment was neer really proven to hold occurred. However, a similar experimen t had already been madeby the Flemish applied scientist Simon Stevin in 1586. Galileo has said that his involvement in Aristotle # 8217 ; s Theory about falling objectswas aroused when, during a hailstorm, he noticed that both big and little hailstones hit the land at the same clip. Thisobservation caused Galileo to earnestly doubt Aristotle # 8217 ; s Theory since harmonizing to Aristotle, the larger-sized hailstones wouldhave had to hold fallen from a much greater tallness and at virtually the same clip as the igniter hailstones in order for themto reach the land at the same clip ( which Galileo found really unlikely. ) Galileo was besides really much interested in uranology. Tycho Brahe, a Danish uranologist, found a supernova in theconstellation Cassiopeia in 1572 which quickly disappeared two old ages subsequently. This find challenged Aristotle # 8217 ; s theoryof the celestial spheres as perfect, unchanging, and changeless. This find, along with another nova visual aspect in 1604, alsopersuaded Galileo to give three public talks in Padua in his capacity as a professor of mathematics. Galileo used the novaas an alibi to dispute Aristotle # 8217 ; s positions of celestial spheres which were unchanging. In 1609, Galileo learned of a field glass that a Dutchman had shown in Venice. Using his ain proficient accomplishments as amathematician and a workingman, along with studies of the building of the device, Galileo made a series of telescopes whoseoptical public presentation was much better than that of the Dutch instrument. The first telescope he constructed had a threefoldmagnification, which he rapidly improved to 32 times magnification. It was this instrument which Galileo used to develophis astronomical finds. The legion astronomical finds made by Galileo with the assistance of his telescopes were described in a short book calledMessage from the stars or Starry Messenger ( Sidereus Nuncius ) published in Venice in May 1610. In this book, Galileo claimed to hold seen mountains on the Moon, to have proved that the Milky Way was made up of a myriad of tiny stars, andto have seen four small bodies (moons) orbiting the planet Jupiter. Galileo named the moons of Jupiter the â€Å"Medicean stars†.It was after this discovery of the moons of Jupiter that Galileo became the official mathematician and natural philosopher tothe Grand Duke of Tuscany. It was also during this time frame that Galileo made many mathematical observations of physicalproperties. Among these observations was the discovery that projectiles follow parabolic paths. This discovery allowed arcs of physicalobjects to be calculated. Another achievement of Galileo in this time period was the naming of the cycloid curve in 1599.In 1639, Galileo wrote to Toricelli about the cycloid, saying that he had been studying it’s properties for forty years. Galileotried and failed to find the area of a cycloid by comparing it’s area to that of the generating circle. After his failure at tryingto find a mathematical method of finding the area of a cycloid, he tried weighing pieces of metal cut into the shape of thecycloid. He found that the ratio of the weights was approximately three to one but decided that it was not exactly three. It was in his employ with the Grand Duke of Tuscany in Florence that Galileo first became involved in disputes aboutCopernicanism. Copernicanism was a theory that was posed by Nicolaus Copernicus on the position of the earth in relationto the heavens. Copernicus had stated in the book On the revolutions of the heavenly spheres (De revolutionibus orbiumcoelestium, Nuremberg, 1543), that the Sun (not the Earth) is at rest in the center of the universe and that the earth revolvesaround the sun. This theory , also known as the heliocentric theory, was lent credence in Galileo’s eyes when, in 1613, hediscovered that, when seen through the telescope, the planet Venus showed phases resembling those of the Moon, andtherefore Venus must orbit the Sun a nd not the Earth(Drake, Galileo: Pioneer Scientist, pp. 136 – 137). Galileo went to greatlengths to support Copernicanism in the use of his discoveries and observations, he also used his great mathematical skills toaid in proving Copernican theories.Between 1619 and 1624 Galileo adapted a telescope for the viewing of extremely small objects. This microscope, which hecalled â€Å"occhialini† was composed of the tube of a telescope, of reduced size, furnished with two lenses. Galileo gave hismicroscopes to various people, including Federigo Cesi. It was the support of the Copernican theories which brought Galileo into direct conflict with the Inquisition and the RomanCatholic Church. Since Copernicanism was in contradiction with Scripture, Galileo was treading on thin ice with theInquisition. A young Dominican, Tommaso Caccini, denounced Galileo, his theories, and the Copernican theories officiallyfrom the pulpit during a sermon in the Santa Maria Novella in 1614 (de San tillana, The Crime of Galileo, p. 42). In 1616,Galileo was officially advised by Cardinal Bellarmino on the behalf of the Pope to proceed with caution and to speak onlyhypothetically about the Copernican theory and not as if the theory were reality. Following this confrontation with thechurch, Galileo returned to Florence and continued work on his book (Dialogue Concerning theTwo Chief World Systems),as the Pope wished, Galileo gave more emphasis to mathematical arguments rather than to experimental or physicalarguments. Although Galileo tried to obey the Pope’s wishes in his wording of the Dialogue, when the book finally appeared in 1632, itraised an immediate storm of protest leading immediately to the arrest of Galileo and a trial by the Inquisition. The inquisitionfound Galileo guilty of publishing a heretical book and insisted that he denounce his theories and confess his â€Å"crimes† beforethe church. Although he was lead to believe that this act would cause the Inquisition to be lenient (and would keep them fromtorturing him to death), Galileo was still sentenced to life imprisonment at his villa in Arcetri near Florence (Reston, GalileoA Life, pp. 253 – 254.)It was during this house arrest that Galileo produced perhaps his greatest work, his Discourses on the Two New Sciences ,which has been hailed as possibly the cornerstone of modern physics. This book was smuggled out of Italy to France and waspublished in Leyden in 1638. In this book, Galileo presented the true laws of accelerated motion and falling bodies, as wellas the fundamental theory of projectile motion and important applications of mathematics to a multitude of physical problems. Galileo died totally blind at 77 years old in 1642. Galileo believed that experimentations and observations of theseexperiments was crucial to the scientific process. (Shapere, Galileo A Philisophical Study, p. 126) Although Galileo was agreat scientist, Pope Urban VIII refused to permit Galil eo’s burial with a monument, instead, Galileo was buriedunceremoniously in the Church of Santo Croce, in Florence. His remains have since been moved to their present locationin a magnificent tomb opposite that of Michelangelo near the entrance to the church. It was only as recently as 1993 that thechurch has admitted that they were wrong and that Galileo’s theories were correct. Galileo’s extraordinary accomplishments in the fields of mathematics and astronomy upheld and proved the theories ofCopernicus whose theories may have been scoffed at as fantasy. He began the scientific revolution of his time period andhis persecution by the church, unfortunately, put an end to the revolution. He was truly a pioneer. Were it not for Galileo’scourage of his convictions, many scientific discoveries, including those of other scientists of his era, may never have occurredor may have been delayed considerably. Without the theories, discoveries, and experiments of Galil eo Galilei, we may neverhave made it to the moon, been able to examine viruses or germs under a microscope to be able to defeat them, or been ableto write a physical science term paper (on Galileo of course.) If for no other reason than his invention of the microscope,Galileo deserves to be known as one of the greatest scientists the world has ever known. References Cited1. Drake, Stillman – 1990, GALILEO: PIONEER SCIENTIST, The University of Chicago Press, pp. 2612. Reston, James Jr. – 1941, GALILEO A LIFE, Harper Collins Publishers, pp. 3193. De Santillana, Giorgio – 1955, THE CRIME OF GALILEO, The University of Chicago Press, pp. 3394. Hitzeroth, Deborah, Sharon Heerboth – 1961, THE IMPORTANCE OF GALILEO GALILEI, Lucent Books, pp. 955. Shapere, Dudley – 1974, GALILEO A PHILOSOPHICAL STUDY, The University of Chicago Press, pp. 1616 COLLEGE MATHEMATICS JOURNAL – May 1994, Volume 25 Issue 3, p 193