Name: Galileo Galilei
State: Italy
Field of activity: Scientist
Greatest achievement: He proved that the planets revolve around the sun. He made a huge contribution to astronomy, physics, mathematics. He laid the foundation for classical mechanics.
Italy can rightfully be considered the forge of science - famous scientists who turned the concept of the world structure, physicists, astronomers, sculptors, architects were from this wonderful country. Not afraid of conflict with the Roman catholic church, they zealously defended their knowledge. To save their lives and the opportunity to work, some gave up their beliefs.
The most striking example of such behavior is Galileo Galilei. The scientist (most people just call him Galileo) was one of the most significant people in the history of science. He lived at a turning point in time, when different threads of thought met at the crossroads of sciences.
These were:
Looking ahead, we note that in the end, the ideas of Galileo and other scientists triumphed because they were able to prove their truth.
The future great scientist was born in the city of Pisa on February 15, 1564 in an aristocratic family. However, it cannot be said that the family bathed in luxury - on the contrary, only one name remained from aristocracy. Galileo's father, Vincenzo, was a musician. Although the family was impoverished, some members of the Galileo family held prominent positions in the past. So, several ancestors were members of the Council of the Florentine Republic, and one of the ancestors was even elected head of the city.
Almost nothing is known about the boy's early years. When the child was 8 years old, the family moved to Florence. This city was not chosen by chance - the Medici family has always patronized figures of science and culture. Upon reaching the age of 18, he enters the University of Pisa at the Faculty of Medicine. At the same time, interest in mathematics awakens. She absorbed the young student so much that the father was afraid that his son would abandon medicine. Already at that time, Galileo positioned himself as a fierce debater, defending his views to the bitter end, even if they ran counter to the authoritative opinion of scientists.
Unfortunately, Galileo was a student for only 3 years - the family's money ran out, and the father could not continue to pay for his son's education. Galileo returns to Florence without a degree.
Gradually abandoning medical studies, he became an inventor. One of his first instruments was a hydrostatic balance. Then, at the age of 22, Galileo published a book on hydrostatic balance - thus his name became known in the city. However, while it was necessary to find an opportunity to earn a living - technological progress was in its infancy. Galileo first worked as an art teacher.
At the age of 24, he began teaching art. He did not stay at this job - his scientific and mathematical abilities were noticed, and in 1589, at the age of only 25, he received a job offer at the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Pisa. The young scholar worked here for three years before moving to Padua and becoming a teacher at the local university in 1592. Galileo settled in this city, where he taught mathematics, physics and astronomy, made many important scientific discoveries.
These happy fruitful years were overshadowed by a sad event - in 1591, his father died.
He continues his research and in 1593 publishes the first book "Mechanics", where he described all his observations over several years. After the publication of a scientific work, the name of Galileo becomes known almost throughout Italy. But the main invention was waiting for him ahead - a telescope with a concave eyepiece, with which one could observe the stars and make various astronomical discoveries.
Of course, such research could not go unnoticed by the church - already in 1604, the first denunciation of Galileo was placed on the table of the Inquisition. Allegedly, he read forbidden literature in his room and is engaged in astrology, which was then equated with alchemy. However, this time he was lucky - the inquisitor in Padua sympathized with the young talent and ignored the denunciation.
Nevertheless, with the help of the telescope, Galileo made several stunning discoveries that years later did not cease to excite posterity - he discovered the first satellites in the orbit of a planet other than Earth - Jupiter. The four largest moons of the planet that he discovered were named Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. And together they are known as the satellites of Galileo. Galileo also discovered that Venus has phases similar to the Moon, ranging from a thin crescent to a full one.
This was the first practical, observational evidence that the sun is at the center solar system. In addition, he is credited with the discovery of the ring of Saturn. Well, a truly revolutionary discovery - there are mountains on the moon. For that time it was a real shock. The Milky Way, according to Galileo's research, consisted of stars located close to each other (due to which one gets the impression of a lunar "path").
He was also the first person to see the planet Neptune. This is known for certain from the drawings in his notebook. He noticed that it was moving, unlike other stars. In Galileo's time, the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn had been known for thousands of years, and no others were considered or searched for. Unfortunately, Galileo lost track of the moving star he found. Neptune was rediscovered only in 1846.
Galileo Galilei also adhered to the heliocentric system - the very one that was proposed by Copernicus. Through his telescope, he saw that the Polish astronomer was right, and his own research proved that it was the Sun that was in the center, and the planets revolved around it. Unfortunately, at that time many scientific discoveries went against church teachings. Therefore, the Inquisition began to pay closer attention to Galileo. The scientist was summoned to and demanded to stop his research and not mislead the people. I had to obey. But Galileo did not give up and in 1632 he published a book-dialogue in which supporters of both the teachings and Ptolemy discussed the solar system and planets.
The book was published and was a success - the first two months. Then it was banned, and the author was again summoned to the Pope. This time, things got underway. The investigation lasted several months, and the result was Galileo's renunciation of his beliefs.
The trial ended in 1633, and he was ordered to go to his villa Archertri near Florence with a ban on going to Rome, as well as engaging in scientific activities. It had to be done in secret. During these years, the health of the scientist noticeably weakened - the years affected. He was, after all, in his sixties. Scientific activity had to be done secretly - the Inquisition did not take its keen eyes off Galileo.
Galileo Galilei died on January 8, 1642, at the age of 77. He was survived by his eldest daughter, Virginia, who had died 8 years earlier and cared for her ailing father. The funeral was attended by two representatives of the Inquisition, all the works were subject to careful verification. A little later, another daughter of Galileo, Livia, died. And then, the grandson of the scientist, named after him, took the monastic vows and destroyed all the works of his grandfather in the fire. Thus, the original works of Galileo have not come down to us. However, his work continues to live.
Galileo Galileo
Born: February 15, 1564.
Died: January 8, 1642 (aged 77).
Galileo Galilei (Italian Galileo Galilei; February 15, 1564, Pisa - January 8, 1642, Arcetri) was an Italian physicist, mechanic, astronomer, philosopher and mathematician who had a significant impact on the science of his time. He was the first to use a telescope to observe celestial bodies and made a number of outstanding astronomical discoveries. Galileo is the founder of experimental physics. With his experiments, he convincingly refuted the speculative metaphysics of Aristotle and laid the foundation classical mechanics.
During his lifetime, he was known as an active supporter of the heliocentric system of the world, which led Galileo to a serious conflict with the Catholic Church.
Galileo was born in 1564 in the Italian city of Pisa, in the family of a well-born, but impoverished nobleman Vincenzo Galilei, a prominent music theorist and lute player. Full name Galileo Galilei: Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de Galilei (Italian: Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de "Galilei"). Representatives of the Galilean family have been mentioned in documents since the 14th century. Several of his direct ancestors were priors (members ruling council) of the Florentine Republic, and Galileo's great-great-grandfather, a well-known physician who also bore the name of Galileo, was elected head of the republic in 1445.
The family of Vincenzo Galilei and Giulia Ammannati had six children, but four managed to survive: Galileo(the eldest of the children), the daughters of Virginia, Livia and the youngest son of Michelangelo, who later also became famous as a lute composer. In 1572 Vincenzo moved to Florence, the capital of the Duchy of Tuscany. The Medici dynasty ruling there was known for its wide and constant patronage of the arts and sciences.
Little is known about Galileo's childhood. WITH early years the boy was attracted to art; throughout his life he carried a love of music and drawing, which he mastered to perfection. In his mature years, the best artists of Florence - Cigoli, Bronzino and others - consulted with him on issues of perspective and composition; Cigoli even claimed that it was to Galileo that he owed his fame. Based on the writings of Galileo, one can also conclude that he had a remarkable literary talent.
Galileo received his primary education in the nearby monastery of Vallombrosa. The boy was very fond of learning and became one of the best students in the class. He considered the possibility of becoming a priest, but his father was against it.
In 1581, the 17-year-old Galileo, at the insistence of his father, entered the University of Pisa to study medicine. At the university, Galileo also attended lectures on geometry (previously he was completely unfamiliar with mathematics) and became so carried away by this science that his father began to fear that this would interfere with the study of medicine.
Galileo was a student for less than three years; during this time he managed to thoroughly familiarize himself with the writings ancient philosophers and mathematicians, and earned a reputation among teachers as an indomitable debater. Even then, he considered himself entitled to have his own opinion on all scientific issues, regardless of traditional authorities.
Probably during these years he became acquainted with the theory of Copernicus. Astronomical problems were then lively discussed, especially in connection with the just carried out calendar reform.
Soon the father's financial situation worsened, and he was unable to pay for his son's further education. The request to release Galileo from payment (such an exception was made for the most capable students) was rejected. Galileo returned to Florence (1585) without receiving a degree. Fortunately, he managed to attract attention with several ingenious inventions (for example, hydrostatic balances), thanks to which he met the educated and wealthy science lover, the Marquis Guidobaldo del Monte. The Marquis, unlike the Pisan professors, was able to correctly evaluate him. Even then del Monte said that since the time of Archimedes the world had not seen such a genius as Galileo. Admired by the young man's extraordinary talent, the marquis became his friend and patron; he introduced Galileo to the Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand I de' Medici, and petitioned for a paid scientific position for him.
In 1589 Galileo returned to the University of Pisa, now a professor of mathematics. There he began to conduct independent research in mechanics and mathematics. True, he was given a minimum salary: 60 skudos a year (a professor of medicine received 2,000 skudos). In 1590, Galileo wrote a treatise On Motion.
In 1591, his father died, and responsibility for the family passed to Galileo. First of all, he had to take care of the education of his younger brother and the dowry of two unmarried sisters.
In 1592, Galileo received a position at the prestigious and wealthy University of Padua (Republic of Venice), where he taught astronomy, mechanics, and mathematics. By recommendation letter Venetian doge to the university, one can judge that the scientific authority of Galileo was already extremely high in these years:
Realizing the importance of mathematical knowledge and its usefulness for other major sciences, we hesitated with the appointment, not finding a worthy candidate. Signor Galileo, a former professor at Pisa, who is very famous and rightly recognized as the most knowledgeable in the mathematical sciences, has now declared a desire to take this place. Therefore, we gladly give him the chair of mathematics for four years with a salary of 180 florins a year.
The years of stay in Padua are the most fruitful period of Galileo's scientific activity. He soon became the most famous professor in Padua. Crowds of students aspired to his lectures, the Venetian government constantly entrusted Galileo with the development of various kinds of technical devices, young Kepler and other scientific authorities of that time actively corresponded with him.
During these years he wrote the treatise Mechanics, which aroused some interest and was republished in a French translation. In early writings, as well as in correspondence, Galileo gave the first draft of a new general theory of the fall of bodies and the motion of a pendulum.
The reason for a new stage in the scientific research of Galileo was the appearance in 1604 new star now called the Kepler Supernova. This awakens a general interest in astronomy, and Galileo delivers a series of private lectures. Having learned about the invention of the telescope in Holland, Galileo in 1609 constructs the first telescope with his own hands and directs it to the sky.
What Galileo saw was so amazing that even many years later there were people who refused to believe in his discoveries and claimed that it was an illusion or an illusion. Galileo discovered mountains on the Moon, the Milky Way broke up into separate stars, but the 4 satellites of Jupiter discovered by him (1610) were especially struck by his contemporaries. In honor of the four sons of his late patron Ferdinand de' Medici (who died in 1609), Galileo named these satellites "Medician Stars" (lat. Stellae Medicae). Now they are more appropriately called "Galilean moons".
Galileo described his first discoveries with a telescope in the Starry Herald (lat. Sidereus Nuncius), published in Florence in 1610. The book was a sensational success throughout Europe, even the crowned persons were in a hurry to order a telescope. Galileo presented several telescopes to the Venetian Senate, which, in gratitude, appointed him professor for life with a salary of 1,000 florins. In September 1610, Kepler acquired a telescope, and in December, Galileo's discovery was confirmed by the influential Roman astronomer Clavius. There is general acceptance. Galileo becomes the most famous scientist in Europe, odes are composed in his honor, where he is compared with Columbus. The French king Henry IV on April 20, 1610, shortly before his death, asked Galileo to open some star for him. However, there were also those who were dissatisfied. Astronomer Francesco Sizzi (Italian Sizzi) published a pamphlet where he stated that seven is a perfect number, and even there are seven holes in the human head, so there can only be seven planets, and Galileo's discoveries are an illusion. Astrologers and doctors also protested, complaining that the appearance of new celestial bodies "is fatal to astrology and most of medicine," since all the usual astrological methods "will be completely destroyed."
During these years, Galileo enters into a civil marriage with the Venetian Marina Gamba (Italian Marina Gamba). He never married Marina, but became the father of a son and two daughters. He named his son Vincenzo in memory of his father, and his daughters, in honor of his sisters, Virginia and Livia. Later, in 1619, Galileo officially legitimized his son; both daughters ended their lives in the monastery.
Pan-European fame and the need for money pushed Galileo to a disastrous step, as it turned out later: in 1610 he left quiet Venice, where he was inaccessible to the Inquisition, and moved to Florence. Duke Cosimo II Medici, son of Ferdinand, promised Galileo an honorary and profitable position as an adviser at the Tuscan court. He kept his promise, which allowed Galileo to solve the problem of huge debts that had accumulated after the marriage of his two sisters.
Galileo's duties at the court of Duke Cosimo II were not burdensome - teaching the sons of the Tuscan duke and participating in some matters as an adviser and representative of the duke. Formally, he is also enrolled as a professor at the University of Pisa, but is relieved of the tedious duty of lecturing.
Galileo continues Scientific research and discovers the phases of Venus, spots on the Sun, and then the rotation of the Sun around its axis. Galileo often set out his achievements (as well as his priority) in a cocky-polemical style, which made him many new enemies (in particular, among the Jesuits).
The growth of Galileo's influence, the independence of his thinking, and his sharp opposition to the teachings of Aristotle contributed to the formation of an aggressive circle of his opponents, consisting of peripatetic professors and some church leaders. Galileo's ill-wishers were especially outraged by his propaganda of the heliocentric system of the world, since, in their opinion, the rotation of the Earth contradicted the texts of the Psalms (Psalm 104:5), a verse from Ecclesiastes (Ecclesiastes 1:5), as well as an episode from the Book of Joshua ( Joshua 10:12), which refers to the immobility of the Earth and the movement of the Sun. In addition, a detailed substantiation of the concept of the Earth's immobility and refutation of the hypotheses about its rotation was contained in Aristotle's treatise "On the Sky" and in Ptolemy's "Almagest".
In 1611, Galileo, in the halo of his glory, decided to go to Rome, hoping to convince the Pope that Copernicanism was quite compatible with Catholicism. He was well received, elected the sixth member of the scientific "Academia dei Lincei", met Pope Paul V, influential cardinals. I showed them my telescope, gave explanations carefully and prudently. The cardinals created a whole commission to find out whether it was a sin to look at the sky through a trumpet, but they came to the conclusion that it was permissible. It was also encouraging that Roman astronomers openly discussed the question of whether Venus moves around the Earth or around the Sun (the change in the phases of Venus clearly spoke in favor of the second option).
Emboldened, Galileo, in a letter to his student Abbot Castelli (1613), stated that the Holy Scripture refers only to the salvation of the soul and is not authoritative in scientific matters: “not a single saying of Scripture has such a coercive force as any natural phenomenon has.” Moreover, he published this letter, which caused the appearance of denunciations to the Inquisition. In the same 1613, Galileo published the book Letters on Sunspots, in which he openly spoke in favor of the Copernican system. On February 25, 1615, the Roman Inquisition opened the first case against Galileo on charges of heresy. The last mistake of Galileo was the call to Rome to express its final attitude towards Copernicanism (1615).
All this caused a reaction that was the opposite of what was expected. Alarmed by the success of the Reformation, the Catholic Church decided to strengthen its spiritual monopoly - in particular, by banning Copernicanism. The position of the church is clarified by a letter from the influential Cardinal Bellarmino, sent on April 12, 1615, to the theologian Paolo Antonio Foscarini, a defender of Copernicanism. The cardinal explains that the church does not object to the interpretation of Copernicanism as a convenient mathematical device, but accepting it as a reality would mean admitting that the previous, traditional interpretation of the biblical text was erroneous. And this, in turn, will shake the authority of the church:
Firstly, it seems to me that your priesthood and Mr. Galileo act wisely, being content with what they say presumably, and not absolutely; I always assumed that Copernicus said the same thing. Because if one says that the assumption of the motion of the Earth and the immobility of the Sun allows one to represent all phenomena better than the assumption of eccentrics and epicycles, then this will be said beautifully and does not entail any danger. For a mathematician, this is quite enough. But to wish to assert that the Sun is in fact the center of the world and revolves only around itself, without moving from east to west, that the Earth stands in the third heaven and revolves around the Sun with great speed, is very dangerous to assert, not only because it means excite all philosophers and scholastic theologians; it would be to harm the holy faith by presenting the provisions of Holy Scripture as false. Secondly, as you know, the Council of Trent forbade the interpretation of Holy Scripture contrary to the general opinion of the holy fathers. And if your priesthood wants to read not only the holy fathers, but also new commentaries on the book of Exodus, Psalms, Ecclesiastes and the book of Jesus, then you will find that everyone agrees that you need to understand literally that the Sun is in the sky and rotates around the Earth with great speed, and the Earth is the most distant from the sky and stands motionless in the center of the world. Judge for yourselves, with all your prudence, whether the Church can allow the Scriptures to be given a meaning contrary to everything that the Holy Fathers and all Greek and Latin interpreters wrote?
Named after Galileo:
The "Galilean satellites" of Jupiter discovered by him.
Impact crater on the Moon (-63º, +10º).
Crater on Mars (6º N, 27º W)
A 3200 km diameter region on Ganymede.
Asteroid (697) Galilee.
The principle of relativity and the transformation of coordinates in classical mechanics.
NASA's Galileo space probe (1989-2003).
European project "Galileo" satellite navigation system.
Unit of acceleration "Gal" (Gal) in GHS system, equal to 1 cm / sec².
Galileo, a scientific entertainment and educational television program shown in several countries. In Russia, it has been running since 2007 on STS.
Airport in Pisa.
To commemorate the 400th anniversary of Galileo's first observations, the UN General Assembly declared 2009 the Year of Astronomy.
Bertolt Brecht. Life of Galileo. Play. - In the book: Bertolt Brecht. Theater. Plays. Articles. Statements. In five volumes. - M.: Art, 1963. - T. 2.
Liliana Cavani (director) Galileo (movie) (English) (1968). Retrieved March 2, 2009. Archived from the original on August 13, 2011.
Joseph Losey (director) Galileo (film adaptation of Brecht's play) (English) (1975). Retrieved March 2, 2009. Archived from the original on August 13, 2011.
Philip Glass (composer), opera Galileo.
Haggard (rock band) - The Observer (built on several facts from Galileo's biography)
Enigma in the album A Posteriori released the track "Eppur si muove".
The Italian astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei is known as one of the greatest scientific minds. During his lifetime, however, he was persecuted by the Catholic Church for his belief that the Sun, not the Earth, was at the center of the universe. Find out more about the iconic scientist, including whether he invented the telescope, what punishment he received after being tried by the Roman Inquisition, and how his middle finger ended up in a museum.
Galileo, whose father was a lute player and musical theorist, was born in Pisa, Italy. Despite the fact that his father was from a noble family, he was not rich. At the age of ten, Galileo began his studies at a monastery near Florence and intended to become a monk. However, his father was against his son leading a religious life, so he took Galileo away from the monastery. At 16, Galileo entered the University of Pisa to study medicine at his father's insistence. Instead, however, he became interested in mathematics and focused on it. Galileo left the university in 1585 without a degree. He continued his mathematical studies on his own and earned money by giving private lessons, then returned in 1589 to the University of Pisa to teach mathematics there.
Galileo did not invent the telescope - this discovery is attributed to the Dutch lens maker Hans Lippershey. However, he was the first person to systematically use optical instruments to study the sky. The Lippershey telescope patent application from 1608 is the earliest, but the Dutch government decided that the telescope was too easy to copy, especially since another scientist had already demonstrated a similar device a year earlier, so the patent was denied. In 1609, Galileo learned about the device and developed his own version, greatly improving the design. In the fall of that year, he pointed a telescope at the moon and found that it was covered with craters and mountains - thereby debunking the common belief that the surface of the moon is smooth.
Galileo had three children with a woman named Marina Gamba, whom he never married. In 1613 he sent his two daughters, Virginia, born in 1600, and Livia, born a year later, to a monastery near Florence, where they remained for the rest of their lives, despite their father's troubles with the Catholic Church. Galileo maintained a close relationship with his eldest daughter, known as Sister Mary Celeste. In the convent she sewed and baked for him when she was relieved of her tasks. He, in turn, organized the supply of food and other necessary things to the impoverished monastery. Galileo's son Vincenzo, born in 1606, studied medicine at the University of Pisa, married and lived in Florence.
The heliocentric theory of how the universe functions has seriously challenged the widely held belief that the Earth is the center of the solar system. In 1616, the Catholic Church declared the theory heretical because it was seen as contradicting certain lines from the Bible. Galileo received permission from the Catholic Church to study the ideas of Copernicus, as long as he did not promote or defend them. In 1632 he published his famous book, which presented a discussion between Ptolemy and Copernicus. The book was seen as supporting the ideas of Copernicus, resulting in Galileo being tried by the Roman Inquisition a year later. He was found guilty of heresy, forced to publicly repent, and sentenced to life in prison.
Although Galileo was sentenced to life imprisonment, his sentence was soon changed to house arrest. He lived his last years in a villa in his hometown of Arcetri, near Florence. He couldn't meet friends or publish books, but he was visited nonetheless. famous people from all over Europe, such as the philosopher Thomas Hobbes and the poet John Milton. In addition, he managed to transfer the manuscript of a new work, which was published in 1638 - at the same time Galileo was completely blind. He died on January 8, 1642 at the age of 77.
After his death, Galileo was buried in the aisle of the church of Santa Croce in Florence. Almost a century later, in 1737, when the remains of the scientist were transported to the burial place of honor in the Basilica of Santa Croce, three fingers, a vertebra and a tooth were removed from the body. Two fingers and a tooth of Galileo were kept by one of his admirers - the body parts of the scientist were passed down from generation to generation, at the beginning of the 19th century it seemed that they were lost forever, until they showed up at an auction in 2009, where they were bought by one of the collectors. Meanwhile the third finger, which is the middle finger right hand, was part of the exposition of many Italian museums. The stolen vertebra ended up at the University of Padua, where Galileo taught from 1592 to 1610.
In 1989, NASA and a team from Germany launched spaceship named after Galileo. Arriving at Jupiter in 1995, the spacecraft became the first to study the planet and its moons for an extended period of time.
In 1979, Pope John Paul II initiated an investigation into the condemnation of Galileo by the Catholic Church. Thirteen years later and 359 years after the trial of the Inquisition, the Pope closed the investigation and issued an official apology, in which he acknowledged the mistakes made by the judges during the trial.
Date of birth: February 15, 1564
Date of death: January 8, 1642
Birthplace: Pisa, Tuscany region, Duchy of Florence, Italy
Galileo Galilei- scientist, physicist and astronomer. Galileo Galilei, who owns, perhaps, one of the most important discoveries in the field of astronomy, is less known for his achievements in the fields of mathematics, mechanics and philosophy.
Born February 15, 1564 in Pisa (Italian Duchy of Florence) in a poor noble family. His father, Vincenzo, was a musical theorist and lute player. Mother's name was Julia. The family was large: six children, and Galileo was the oldest of them.
Galileo studied at the monastery of Vallombrosa. Ros exemplary, was the best in academic performance in his class. As soon as he graduated, he seriously thought about the future of the priest, but his father was categorically against it.
At the age of 17 he entered the University of Pisa. Interested in mathematics. Studying medicine. However, after 3 years of study, his father finds himself in a very bad state. financial condition, and the family can no longer pay for Galileo's education. For especially talented students, there was a benefit that allowed them not to pay tuition. They applied for it, but were flatly refused. Galileo never received his degree. Returned to Florence.
Galileo was very lucky, and he met a true connoisseur of research and scientific discoveries. It was the Marquis Guidobaldo del Monte. They were friends and the marquis sponsored many of Galileo's discoveries. It was thanks to the Marquis that in 1589 Galileo returned to the University of Pisa, but now as a professor of mathematical sciences. In 1590 he wrote a scientific work that turned the world of physics upside down. It was a treatise on motion.
In 1591, his father dies, and the young scientist takes full responsibility for the family on his shoulders. A year later, he quits his first job and goes to the Venetian University of Padua, where Galileo was offered a decent wage for his work. In addition to mathematics, here he teaches astronomy and mechanics. The students were happy to attend his lectures, and the Venetian government constantly orders various kinds of technical devices from him. He corresponds with Kepler and other authorities from the world of science and technology.
His next treatise is Mechanics. Galileo also designs the world's first telescope, which changes the whole idea of environment. A serious step in science and further research. At that time, it was a real sensation, and all wealthy people began to massively order telescopes for themselves, because Galileo's stories about the celestial space seen through a telescope looked like a fantastic fiction, and everyone wanted to see it with their own eyes.
Unfortunately, he did not make much money from this, as he was forced to give money as a dowry when his two sisters got married. Galileo finds himself in debt and accepts an invitation to work as an adviser to the Tuscan court from Duke Cosimo II de Medici. So, in the life of a scientist, a turning point comes not at all in better side, as he moves from Venice, in which the Inquisition was powerless, to the less hospitable Florence.
In general, the move to Florence itself did not promise any danger. The work of an adviser was very quiet and calm. But in 1611 the scientist leaves Florence and travels to Rome in order to intercede for Copernicus. He is trying to convince the Pope that the discoveries of Copernicus are a very important and useful contribution to the development of mankind. The priests organized a warm welcome, even approved the recent invention of Galileo - his sensational telescope.
After 2 years, Galileo continues to defend the point of view of Copernicus. He publishes several of his writings, which do not covertly hint that the church is intended to save the soul, and not to make or stop scientific discoveries. This greatly agitated the Roman clergy.
In 1615, Rome openly accuses Galileo of heresy, and a year later completely prohibits heliocentrism. Instead of not heating up the situation, he releases another mockery, after which the Inquisition begins a legal case against Galileo Galilei.
In 1633, the scientist was arrested and put on trial. The death penalty was coming, but it was canceled, given the fact that Galileo is an old and sick man who voluntarily renounced own discoveries. Most likely, he was tortured to make him do it. One way or another, soon the old scientist was sent to Archetri (on its territory there was a monastery with daughters). Last years Galileo were held there under house arrest.
Throughout his life, Galileo was so busy with his discoveries that he practically did not devote time to his personal life. He did not even marry Marina Gamba, although she bore him a son and two daughters.
On January 8, 1642, the world famous scientist died, who made a real revolution in the world of astronomy and physics. He was not properly buried, but in 1737 his ashes were transferred to the Basilica of Santa Croce.
Achievements of Galileo Galilei:
The first astronomer who invented and used the telescope, making discoveries completely unknown at that time. He saw spots on the Sun, mountains on the Moon, moons of Jupiter, stars in Milky Way, the rotation of the Sun, the phases of Venus and much more.
preached heliocentric system peace.
He founded experimental physics, laid the foundation for classical mechanics.
Invented not only the telescope, but also the thermometer, microscope, compasses and hydrostatic balances.
Described the law of indestructibility of matter.
Dates from the biography of Galileo Galilei:
1564 - birth.
From 1581 to 1585 - studying at the University of Pisa.
1586 - Invented the hydrostatic balance.
1589 - returns as a professor at the University of Pisa.
1590 - published scientific work"About the Movement".
1591 Galileo's father dies.
From 1592 to 1610 he worked at the University of Padua (Venetian period).
1592 - invented the thermometer (at that time it was without a scale).
1602 - Invented the microscope.
1606 - invented the compass.
1609 - Invented the telescope.
1610 - leaves for Florence (1610-1632 - Florentine period).
1611 - visits the Pope for the first time to petition for Copernicus.
1613 - writes works that are designed to protect the interests of Copernicus.
1615 - Roman priesthood accuses Galileo of heresy.
1616 - heliocentrism is prohibited.
From 1633 - arrest, trial, prison, later - house arrest.
1642 - death.
Interesting Galileo Galilei Facts:
When Galileo carefully observed the rings of Saturn, he thought that these were his satellites. This discovery was encrypted as an anagram. Kepler deciphered it incorrectly, deciding that we are talking about the satellites of the planet Mars.
Galileo himself gave his daughters to the monastery when they were 12 and 13 years old. One of the daughters, Livia, did not want to put up with the fate of the nun, but Virginia accepted this fate humbly.
The grandson of the scientist (the son of his only son) grew up to be a real religious fanatic. He was of the opinion that all the works of his grandfather were heresy, and as a result, he burned all the manuscripts of Galileo.
The Vatican only admitted they were wrong about Galileo in 1981, and agreed that the Earth does indeed revolve around the Sun.
GALILEO(galilei)Galileo
The Italian physicist, mechanic and astronomer, one of the founders of natural science, poet, philologist and critic Galileo Galilei was born in Pisa into a noble but impoverished Florentine family. His father, Vincenzo, a famous musician, had a great influence on the development and formation of Galileo's abilities. Until the age of 11, Galileo lived in Pisa, attended school there, then the family moved to Florence. Galileo received further education in the monastery of Vallombros, where he was accepted as a novice in a monastic order.
Here he got acquainted with the works of Latin and Greek writers. Under the pretext of a serious eye disease, the father took his son from the monastery. At his father's insistence, in 1581 Galileo entered the University of Pisa, where he studied medicine. Here he first became acquainted with the physics of Aristotle, which from the very beginning seemed unconvincing to him. Galileo turned to reading the ancient mathematicians - Euclid and Archimedes. Archimedes became his real teacher. Fascinated by geometry and mechanics, Galileo abandoned medicine and returned to Florence, where he spent 4 years studying mathematics. The result of this period of Galileo's life was a small essay "Little Scales" (1586, ed. 1655), which describes the hydrostatic balance built by Galileo for quickly determining the composition of metal alloys, and a geometric study on the centers of gravity of bodily figures.
These works brought Galileo his first fame among Italian mathematicians. In 1589 he received the chair of mathematics in Pisa, continuing his scientific work. His “Dialogue on Motion”, written in Pisa and directed against Aristotle, has been preserved in manuscripts. Some of the conclusions and arguments in this work are erroneous, and Galileo subsequently abandoned them. But already here, without naming the name of Copernicus, Galileo gives arguments refuting Aristotle's objections to the daily rotation of the Earth.
In 1592, Galileo took the chair of mathematics in Padua. The Padua period of Galileo's life (1592-1610) is the time of the highest flowering of his activity. During these years, his static research on machines arose, where he proceeds from the general principle of equilibrium, coinciding with the principle of possible displacements, his main dynamic works about the laws of free fall of bodies, about falling on an inclined plane, about the motion of a body thrown at an angle to the horizon, about the isochronism of pendulum oscillations. The same period includes research on the strength of materials, on the mechanics of animal bodies; finally, in Padua, Galileo became a completely convinced follower of Copernicus. However, Galileo's scientific work remained hidden from everyone except his friends. Galileo's lectures were read according to the traditional program, they expounded the teachings of Ptolemy. In Padua, Galileo published only a description of a proportional compass, which allows you to quickly make various calculations and constructions.
In 1609, on the basis of the information that had come down to him about the spotting scope invented in Holland, Galileo built his first telescope, giving approximately 3-fold magnification. The work of the telescope was demonstrated from the tower of St. Mark in Venice and made a huge impression. Soon Galileo built a telescope with a magnification of 32 times. The observations made with its help destroyed the "ideal spheres" of Aristotle and the dogma of the perfection of celestial bodies: the surface of the Moon turned out to be covered with mountains and pitted with craters, the stars lost their apparent size, and for the first time their colossal remoteness was comprehended. Jupiter discovered 4 satellites, a huge number of new stars became visible in the sky. The Milky Way has broken up into individual stars. Galileo described his observations in The Starry Messenger (1610-1611), which made a stunning impression. At the same time, a fierce controversy began. Galileo was accused of the fact that everything he saw was an optical illusion, they also argued simply that his observations contradict Aristotle, and therefore are erroneous.
Astronomical discoveries served as a turning point in the life of Galileo: he freed himself from teaching and, at the invitation of Duke Cosimo II de Medici, moved to Florence. Here he becomes the court "philosopher" and the "first mathematician" of the university, without the obligation to lecture.
Continuing telescopic observations, Galileo discovered the phases of Venus, sunspots and the rotation of the Sun, studied the motion of Jupiter's satellites, and observed Saturn. In 1611, Galileo traveled to Rome, where he was given an enthusiastic reception at the papal court and where he struck up a friendship with Prince Cesi, the founder of the Accademia dei Lincei ("Academy of the Lynx-eyed"), of which he became a member. At the insistence of the duke, Galileo published his first anti-Aristotelian essay, Discourse on Bodies in Water and Those Moving in It (1612), where he applied the principle of equal moments to the derivation of equilibrium conditions in liquid bodies.
However, in 1613 Galileo's letter to Abbot Castelli became known, in which he defended the views of Copernicus. The letter served as a pretext for a direct denunciation of Galileo to the Inquisition. In 1616, the Jesuit congregation declared the teachings of Copernicus heretical, the book of Copernicus was included in the list of banned books. The name of Galileo was not named in the decree, but he was privately ordered to refuse to defend this doctrine. Galileo formally obeyed the decree. For several years he was forced to remain silent about the Copernican system or to speak about it in hints. Galileo's only major work during this period was The Assayer (1623), a polemical treatise on the three comets that appeared in 1618. In terms of literary form, wit, and refinement of style, this is one of Galileo's most remarkable works.
In 1623, a friend of Galileo, Cardinal Maffeo Barberini, entered the papal throne under the name of Urban VIII. For Galileo, this event seemed tantamount to liberation from the bonds of the interdict (decree). In 1630, he arrived in Rome with the finished manuscript of the Dialogue on the Ebb and Flow (the first title of the Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World), in which the systems of Copernicus and Ptolemy are presented in the conversations of three interlocutors: Sagredo, Salviati and Simplicio.
Pope Urban VIII agreed to the publication of a book in which the teachings of Copernicus would be presented as one of the possible hypotheses. After lengthy censorship ordeals, Galileo received the long-awaited permission to print the Dialogue with some changes; the book appeared in Florence in Italian in January 1632. A few months after the publication of the book, Galileo received an order from Rome to stop further sales of the edition. At the request of the Inquisition, Galileo was forced in February 1633 to come to Rome. A process was initiated against him. During four interrogations - from April 12 to June 21, 1633 - Galileo renounced the teachings of Copernicus and on June 22 brought public repentance on his knees in the church of Maria Sopra Minerva. "Dialogue" was banned, and Galileo was officially considered a "prisoner of the Inquisition" for 9 years. At first he lived in Rome, in the ducal palace, then in his villa Arcetri, near Florence. He was forbidden to talk with anyone about the movement of the Earth and to print works. Despite the papal interdict, a Latin translation of the Dialogue appeared in Protestant countries, and Galileo's discourse on the relationship between the Bible and natural science was printed in Holland. Finally, in 1638, one of the most important works of Galileo was published in Holland, summing up his physical research and containing the substantiation of dynamics - "Conversations and mathematical proofs concerning two new branches of science ..."
In 1637 Galileo went blind; he died on January 8, 1642. In 1737, the last will of Galileo was fulfilled - his ashes were transferred to Florence in the church of Santa Croce, where he was buried next to Michelangelo.
Galileo's influence on the development of mechanics, optics and astronomy in the 17th century. invaluable. His scientific activity, the great importance of the discovery, scientific courage were of decisive importance for the victory of the heliocentric system of the world. Especially significant is the work of Galileo on the creation of the basic principles of mechanics. If the basic laws of motion were not expressed by Galileo with the clarity with which Isaac Newton did, then in essence the law of inertia and the law of addition of motions were fully realized by him and applied to solving practical problems. The history of statics begins with Archimedes; the history of dynamics is discovered by Galileo. He was the first to put forward the idea of the relativity of motion, he solved a number of basic mechanical problems. These include, first of all, the study of the laws of free fall of bodies and their fall along an inclined plane; the laws of motion of a body thrown at an angle to the horizon; establishing the conservation of mechanical energy during the oscillation of the pendulum. Galileo dealt a blow to the Aristotelian dogmatic ideas about absolutely light bodies (fire, air); in a series of witty experiments, he showed that air - heavy body and even determined its specific gravity in relation to water.
The basis of Galileo's worldview is the recognition of the objective existence of the world, i.e. its existence outside and independent of human consciousness. The world is infinite, he believed, matter is eternal. In all processes occurring in nature, nothing is destroyed or generated - only a change occurs relative position bodies or their parts. Matter consists of absolutely indivisible atoms, its movement is the only universal mechanical movement. The heavenly bodies are similar to the Earth and obey the same laws of mechanics. Everything in nature is subject to strict mechanical causality. Galileo saw the true goal of science in finding the causes of phenomena. According to Galileo, knowledge of the inner necessity of phenomena is the highest level of knowledge. Galileo considered observation as the starting point for the knowledge of nature, and experience as the basis of science. Rejecting the attempts of the scholastics to extract the truth from a comparison of the texts of recognized authorities and through abstract reasoning, Galileo argued that the task of the scientist is "... this is to study the great book of nature, which is the real subject of philosophy." Those who blindly adhere to the opinion of authorities, not wanting to independently study the phenomena of nature, Galileo called "servile minds", considered them unworthy of the title of philosopher and branded them as "doctors of cramming." However, limited by the conditions of his time, Galileo was not consistent; he shared the theory of dual truth and allowed for a divine first impulse.
Galileo's talent was not limited to the field of science: he was a musician, artist, art lover and a brilliant writer. His scientific treatises, most of which were written in vernacular Italian, although Galileo was fluent in Latin, can also be classified as works of art in their simplicity and clarity of presentation and the brilliance of their literary style. Galileo translated from Greek into Latin, studied the ancient classics and poets of the Renaissance (the works “Notes to Ariosto”, “Criticism of Tasso”), spoke at the Florence Academy on the study of Dante, wrote the burlesque poem “Satire on those wearing toga”. Galileo is a co-author of A. Salvadori's canzone "On the stars of the Medici" - satellites of Jupiter, discovered by Galileo in 1610.
