ASTR 380 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Apparent Retrograde Motion, Friedrich Bessel, Geocentric Model
27 Oct 2018
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2. 1 the ancient debate about life beyond earth. Scholars in ancient greece sought rational explanations for the universe: thales (origin of science) first questioned what the universe was made of (decided water, plato and aristotle went on to question. Developments in greek thought: did not resort to supernatural explanations and debated one another, developed geometry (pythagoras and euclid, discarded explanations that disagreed with observed facts. During the dark ages, islamic scholars saved greek work, invented algebra and new techniques for astronomical observation: when the byzantine empire fell, many eastern scholars went west, igniting the. Tycho brahe built observatories and measured planets positions over 30 years. Problems with accepting kepler"s laws: due to aristotle"s fallacies, believed earth must be, still (or else things would be left behind, circular orbits (perfect, heavens unchangeable, stellar parallax was not yet detected. 1630s = most adopted heliocentric and kepler"s laws.
