His discoveries of the laws of motion and telescope improvements are still considered the foundations of many scientific beliefs today.
Galileo worked extensively with weights to counter and disprove Aristotle's theory about weight. He found that all weights fell at the same speed regardless of their mass. It is sometimes thought that Galileo actually invented the telescope, but the truth is that he took an invention already in place and improved it. Galileo also made several advances in scientific fields and inventions which are still relied upon in some form or another to this day.
During Galileo's time the main way in which science was practiced still leaned heavily on "authority," meaning that whoever was the leading authority of that region provided the answers, and the public at large were expected to agree based mainly on faith. Galileo did not take statements at face value and investigated the causal effects of different variables.
In effect, Galileo designed how experimentation would be carried out in the future. Galileo changed the way mathematics was perceived by stressing that it was, in fact, the key to understanding how the world actually worked. His pioneering in this field allowed scientists like Sir Isaac Newton to build upon his work. Newton specifically used Galileo's work to help formulate his own laws of motion and explain how gravity works and affects objects. While Galileo did not invent the first telescope, he did refine it to the point that he was able to see farther than any telescope of its time.
This allowed him to see into outer space as well as set the basis for the kinds of powerful telescopes that we use today. While Galileo was not the first scientist to posit that the earth actually revolved around the sun — along with the other planets — he is credited as being the one man who proved Copernicus' theory beyond a reasonable doubt. Galileo Galilei was born in Pisa in , the first of six children of Vincenzo Galilei, a musician and scholar. In he entered the University of Pisa at age 16 to study medicine, but was soon sidetracked by mathematics.
He left without finishing his degree yes, Galileo was a college dropout! In he made his first important discovery, describing the rules that govern the motion of pendulums. From to , Galileo was chair of mathematics at the universities of Pisa and then Padua. During those years he performed the experiments with falling bodies that made his most significant contribution to physics.
In Galileo built his first telescope, improving upon a Dutch design. Cosimo II appointed him mathematician and philosopher to the Medicis , offering him a platform for proclaiming his theories and ridiculing his opponents. Galileo was summoned before the Roman Inquisition in At first he denied that he had advocated heliocentrism, but later he said he had only done so unintentionally. Nearly 70 at the time of his trial, Galileo lived his last nine years under comfortable house arrest, writing a summary of his early motion experiments that became his final great scientific work.
He died in Arcetri near Florence, Italy on January 8, at age 77 after suffering from heart palpitations and a fever. His inventions, from compasses and balances to improved telescopes and microscopes, revolutionized astronomy and biology. His penchant for thoughtful and inventive experimentation pushed the scientific method toward its modern form.
In his conflict with the Church, Galileo was also largely vindicated. Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire used tales of his trial often in simplified and exaggerated form to portray Galileo as a martyr for objectivity.
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