Post by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettPost by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettPost by SolomonWPost by JennyBI don't see how it could have been adopted. We only know of it
because Archimedes wanted the largest model of the Universe he
could find to calculate the number of grains of sand it might
contain. For all practical purposes, such as calculating where the
planets would be at a particular time, he used the Ptolemaic model,
which gave the most accurate results until Kep large modelled
planetary orbits as ellipses.
Johannes Kepler determined his laws from his analysis of Tycho
Brahe's data. The ancient Greeks could have collected the data just
as Tycho did and then some ancient genius could have determined
Kepler's law.
Didn't Ptolemy have some data so accurate that there was a question a
few years ago as to whether he falsified his figures? But he didn't
come up with ellipses; and he didn't even come up with a heliocentric
view.
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Post by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettPost by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettPtolemy's model had epicycles within epicycles, while Copernicus's
model was simpler (needed less of them); and Kepler then refined it by
positing elliptical orbits, which didn't need _any_. Perhaps the
Greeks just didn't see simplicity as much of an advantage as we do.
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Post by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettPost by jerry krausAh, but don't you see Pete, that's the point. The Copernican view is
only "simpler" in the sense that the machinery needed to run the solar
system is less complicated.
What other meaning of 'simpler' would you use, when considering the
machinery needed to run the solar system?
Well, Pete, it's not just the solar system, it's the universe as a whole.
Specifically, IS the solar system the universe as a whole? This concept
is rather key here, of course. You see, what, exactly, is running the
universe? If we're just dealing with the earth, surrounded by a few
planets, then a mechanical system seems plausible enough. A fairly
complex one, but, nevertheless, a kind of clockwork mechanism. If we're
dealing with an infinite universe, then we need an entirely different type
of system, based on the Theory of Universal Gravitation. This is NOT a
simple system. But, it does make the operation of the solar system alone
somewhat simpler.
Post by Pete BarrettPost by jerry krausIt's also much, much, much more difficult to
understand! That's why Galileo got into trouble with the Inquisition,
he couldn't come up with the Theory of Universal Gravitation, to
explain the
mechanism by which the Copernican system would operate. And, once we
accept a heliocentric model, the stars become much more plausible
candidates to have their own solar systems, in an infinite universe,
since the Earth is no longer the be all and end all of the Universe.
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Post by jerry krausPost by Pete BarrettNot entirely. The Greeks rejected Aristarchus's notions at least partly
because they couldn't see any parallax when observing stars from
different ends of the putative orbit of the earth. So their rejection of
an infinite universe (or at least not understanding the huge distances
involved to the stars) came first.
So, why did Copernicus, Galileo and Newton feel any differently? They
didn't have stellar parallax either, that took centuries yet.
Of course, but they realised that if the distances involved were great
enough, there would be no observable parallax. The Greeks must have realised
that as well, but rejected the distances involved as unbelievable
Post by jerry krausYou are
mistaken, Pete, the egocentric obsession and oversimplification of an
earth centered universe, most certainly, came first. The universe
limited to our solar system is, actually, and secondary manifestation of
this particular scientific neurosis.
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1975JRASC..69..153F
I haven't read it all, but the first page seems to be saying exactly what I
was saying (but putting iyt much better than I could do).
Post by jerry krausCopernicus, Galileo and Newton felt differently -- as did Aristarchus,
too, of course -- because once we see the earth as no longer the center of
universe, our entire perspective on the universe changes, in a fundamental
way, psychologically. Instantly, the parallels between the stars and the
sun become readily apparently, and we see an infinite universe as the most
plausible. Hence, the Buddhists and Hindus ALWAYS saw the universe as
infinite, because they departed from the egocentric perspective.
So why didn't the Indians develop a heliocentric theory before the 16th
century ( which they did then independently of Copernicus)?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliocentrism#Medieval_Islamic_world suggests
that the Muslim world was questioning geocentrism, but without heliocentrism
becoming widely accepted.
Post by jerry krausYou see, the fields of science really need to be psychoanalyzed more than
a little bit. Scientists inevitably project their own egos and personal
practical and emotional needs onto their work, their ideas, their
theories. They can't help it. And, we suffered a dark age and 2,000
years of intellectual stagnation specifically because of it, here!
I think we're all aware that scientific theories are highly dependent on the
society they originate in; but they're also dependent on observations, and
if they confict with observation, they don't get very far. There might be a
few which are dependent on the psychology of the individual scientist who
first comes up with the theory, but surely not so many that they need to be
psychoanalysed the way you're doing!
Post by jerry krausIn all probability, the more than century old obsession with the Theory of
Relativity is another manifestation of a kind of scientific neurosis,
which, no doubt, Einstein himself would readily acknowledge.
Oversimplifications of this type are always the enemies of true scientific
progress.
As far as I know, there are no observations which confict with Relativity,
and a great many which are consistent. That makes it pretty good as a
scientific theory, whatever its origins in European society of the late
19th/early 20th centuries. No doubt eventually there will be such
observations, and then someone will come up with a better theory which
includes Relativity as a special case (just as Relativity contains Newton's
Law of Gravitation as a special case); but there's no sign of needing that
yet.
--
Pete BARRETT