Galileo Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642)
Thanks to his intuition as a brilliant physicist and by relying on different arguments, Galileo, who practically invented the experimental method, understood why only the sun could function as the centre of the world, as it was then known, that is to say, as a planetary system. The error of the theologians of the time, when they maintained the centrality of the Earth, was to think that our understanding of the physical world’s structure was, in some way, imposed by the literal sense of Sacred Scripture…” – Pope John Paul II, L’Osservatore Romano N. 44 (1264) – 4th November, 1992
Italian physicist, astronomer, mathematician and philosopher Galileo Galilei was one of the foundational figures of modern science. His achievements include the first systematic studies of uniformly accelerated motion, improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations. But his status as a “saint” of the modern world hinges on his persecution by the Catholic Church for courageously championing the Copernican theory that the earth revolved around the sun, in contradiction to scripture, church tradition and the ancient authority of Aristotle and Ptolemy.
The controversy over Galileo’s position stretched more than a decade, but culminated in his trial and conviction as a heretic in 1633. Throughout the ordeal, Galileo maintained his devout faith and firm commitment to the authority of the church, and formally renounced his heretical views immediately upon the court’s decision. Convinced of his sincere repentance, the Holy Court commuted his sentence of imprisonment to house arrest in Florence where he was allowed to continue his scientific work until his death in 1642. Galileo’s offending work (Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (1632)) was banned by the Church.
Although the Galileo affair is often cited as evidence that science and Catholic doctrine are inevitably antagonistic, most of Galileo’s scientific findings were in fact embraced by the church as early as 1741, when Pope Benedict XIV granted an imprimatur to publication of a Complete Works of Galileo, but certainly by 1822 when his work was removed from the Index of banned books. In fact, it seems clear that the Galileo affair was part of a sea change in the Church’s understanding of the relationship between science and religion. The famous statement by Cardinal Baronius in defense of Galileo — “the bible teaches the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go” — came quickly to be the Catholic Church’s essential position in the wake of the scientific revolution. But Galileo was not fully vindicated until 1992 when, upon the recommendation of a papal commission that reviewed his trial and condemnation, Pope John Paul II formally absolved Galileo and acknowledged the error of the church’s judgment (quoted above).
For Catholics, the Galileo case is worth remembering as a sign that the church is fallible, and that it can and should recognize and repent of its historic failings. Robert Ellsberg puts it very nicely:
There remains a tendency to claim that the church, as it was once said of the earth, cannot move. To this the legendary words ascribed to Galileo remain appropriate. In making his abjuration, he is said to have whispered under his breath, “Nevertheless, it moves.” — Robert Ellsberg, All Saints (1999).
Thanks for a good article. I struggle with folks every day over the rather silly notion that the Church never errs. Somehow some try to twist it all and make Galileo the guilty party rather than the Church, ignoring of course JPII’s 1992 statements I guess. Thanks for reminding us once again of the truth.
Spiritmeadow — Thanks. Interestingly, many of my avowedly secular colleagues at the public university where I teach are equally committed to the idea that the church does not change (and of course, pretty much always errs), wanting to believe that there is a simple and inevitable opposition between science and the Church. Need for more humility and understanding all around I think.
Oh, The Galileo myth.
Until the sixteenth century, the prevailing view was that the Sun, Moon, stars and planets circled the Earth (the geocentric system, based on the second century work of Ptolemy). Puzzled astronomers noticed that Mars, Jupiter and Saturn sometimes seemed to move backwards, but their motions were well within the predictions of Ptolemy’s theory. The moon was considered to have more freedom of movement.
Nicolaus Copernicus, published a model of the solar system De Revolutionibus in 1543, in which the earth and other planets circled the sun. The Catholic Church endorsed the book. The book’s preface (which was not written by Copernicus) argued that astronomical models have merit if they correctly predict observations, even if the underlying hypotheses cannot be proved. The scientific evidence was inconclusive.
However, pagan Greek thought was idolized at that time, and accepted by intellectuals as almost on par with the Bible itself.
It was not theologians who balked at Galileo’s ideas, but rather mathematicians at the University of Pisa who were so outraged that he had challenged Aristotle that they refused to even look through his telescope at the stars. Galileo wrote a privately-circulated pamphlet which argued that the Bible should be interpreted in the light of increasing knowledge, and warning that scientific opinion should not be treated as an article of faith. In this way he echoed Saint Augustine. Quoting another of the early church fathers Galileo wrote
“The intention of the Holy Ghost is to teach us how one goes to heaven, not how heaven goes.”
In 1613, one Dominican, Tommaso Caccini, preached a sermon against Galileo. A mangled version of Galileo’s writing was sent to Rome. Galileo heard of this and sent the full version. He was not terribly alarmed, knowing that many of the best minds in Italy, including the Vatican’s mathematicians, were convinced on the heliocentric universe that his works had help to substantiate. Caccini’s Dominican superior was so embarrassed that he sent a letter of apology to Galileo.
Caccini wasn’t through, however, and gave an unsolicited deposition to the Inquisition about Galileo’s views, which largely demonstrated his own ignorance on the subject. Nevertheless, the theologians who were given the case ruled that Galileo must only use Copernican concepts as a hypothesis for the sake of calculation, without claiming that they had been literally proven true.
Because Galileo had overstated the scientific case for the heliocentric theory and given some dubious theological arguments, the Inquisition ruling decided that:
(1) [Correctly] The immobility of the Sun at the center of the universe was absurd in philosophy and formally heretical, and that
(2) [Incorrectly] The mobility of Earth was absurd in philosophy and at least erroneous in theology.
The following month the Church required that nine sentences in Copernicus’s book be corrected.
It is hard to understand the decision, but in defense of the arbiters of that time, the view through Galileo’s telescope was nothing like the quality of telescopes today. To untrained laymen, it would be difficult to know what was being viewed. Also, the concept of stellar parallax, a condition that had to exist if Galileo was right, turned out to be completely false. (Parallax is real, but due to the incredibly far distances of the stars in relationship to the earth’s movement around the sun, it could not be detected until 1838, over 200 years later.)
Using the principle of falsifiability to improve the scientific method Galileo tested Aristotle’s theory that heavy objects fall faster than light ones and found it was a consequence of air resistance, not gravity. By making careful measurements he found he could use mathematics to measure the acceleration of gravity and predict the movements of pendulums and tides.
Galileo then got approval from Rome to write his book “Dialogue on the Tides”, which discussed both the Ptolemaic and Copernican hypotheses, as long as it discussed both systems and did not draw a conclusion that would make the heliocentric world view be viewed as fact instead of theory.
Rome changed the title to Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems and it was published in Florence in 1632. Unfortunately for Galileo, the work was not evenhanded.
Indeed, his fictitious Ptolemaic character, ‘Simplicius’, stumbled over his own errors and seemed quite foolish. Church officials found that Galileo had erred by advocating heliocentrism as scientifically proven. In 1633 he Galileo voluntarily submitted to Church authority and renounced his thesis, that Heliocentrism was a proven scientific fact.
Galileo went back to studying motion and mechanics in his private villa, receiving many prominent Ecclesiastical Scientists.
In 1741, Pope Benedict XIV bid the Holy Office grant an imprimatur to the first edition of the Complete Works of Galileo.
Well that’s how world has seen those who try to reveal the truth…………there are many others who tried in their own ways … Isaac Newton, Keplar , Copernicus and many who have been vanished in unknown ways.