scholarly journals 'Absurd' Rationalist Cosmology: Copernicus, Kepler, Descartes and the Religious Basis for the end to Aristotelian Dogma

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Nicholas Smit-Keding
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Rene Descartes ◽  
World View ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
Johannes Kepler ◽  
René Descartes ◽  
History Of ◽  
Nicholas Copernicus ◽  
The Universe

Current popular narratives regarding the history of astronomy espouse the narrative of scientific development arising from clashes between observed phenomena and dogmatic religious scripture. Such narratives consider the development of our understandings of the cosmos as isolated episodes in ground-breaking, world-view shifting events, led by rational, objective and secular observers. As observation of astronomical development in the early 1600s shows, however, such a narrative is false. Developments by Johannes Kepler, for instance, followed earlier efforts by Nicholas Copernicus to refine Aristotelian-based dogma with observed phenomena. Kepler's efforts specifically were not meant to challenge official Church teachings, but offer a superior system to what was than available, based around theological justifications. Popular acceptance of a heliocentric model came not from Kepler's writings, but from the philosophical teachings of Rene Descartes. Through strictly mathematical and philosophical reasoning, Descartes not only rendered the Aristotelian model baseless in society, but also provided a cosmological understanding of the universe that centred our solar system within a vast expanse of other stars. The shift than, from the Aristotelian geocentric model to the heliocentric model, came not from clashes between theology and reason, but from negotiations between theology and observed phenomena. 

Benjamin Apthorp Gould and the Founding of the Argentine National Observatory

1971 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 152-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
John E. Hodge
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Solar System ◽  
Major Change ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
National Observatory ◽  
Great Work ◽  
History Of ◽  
Entire History ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Shape And Size

The nineteenth century witnessed the first major change in astronomy since the birth of the science in antiquity. With the exception, in the eighteenth century, of William Herschel's great work in the course of which he speculated on the origin, composition and shape of the universe itself, man's concern with the heavens had been limited to plotting and cataloguing the positions and the movements of the stars and planets. The entire history of astronomy had consisted of more and more accurate observations of the solar system and the stars within our own galaxy, although only the haziest notions of the shape and size of that “island universe” were entertained by thoughtful astronomers.

From Dust to Life

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Chambers ◽  
Jacqueline Mitton
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Extrasolar Planets ◽  
Planetary Systems ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
Human Origins ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Emergence Of Life

The birth and evolution of our solar system is a tantalizing mystery that may one day provide answers to the question of human origins. This book tells the remarkable story of how the celestial objects that make up the solar system arose from common beginnings billions of years ago, and how scientists and philosophers have sought to unravel this mystery down through the centuries, piecing together the clues that enabled them to deduce the solar system's layout, its age, and the most likely way it formed. Drawing on the history of astronomy and the latest findings in astrophysics and the planetary sciences, the book offers the most up-to-date and authoritative treatment of the subject available. It examines how the evolving universe set the stage for the appearance of our Sun, and how the nebulous cloud of gas and dust that accompanied the young Sun eventually became the planets, comets, moons, and asteroids that exist today. It explores how each of the planets acquired its unique characteristics, why some are rocky and others gaseous, and why one planet in particular—our Earth—provided an almost perfect haven for the emergence of life. The book takes readers to the very frontiers of modern research, engaging with the latest controversies and debates. It reveals how ongoing discoveries of far-distant extrasolar planets and planetary systems are transforming our understanding of our own solar system's astonishing history and its possible fate.

Discovery of the Universe: An Outline of the History of Astronomy from the Origins to 1956

Physics Today ◽  
1957 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 38-40
Author(s):  
Gérard de Vaucouleurs ◽  
C. C. Kiess
Keyword(s):  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe

Spinoza, Platonism and Naturalism

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
MICHAEL AYERS
Keyword(s):  
Rene Descartes ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
Hierarchical System ◽  
René Descartes ◽  
The Universe

This chapter examines the strands of Platonism and naturalism in philosopher Baruch Spinoza’s metaphysics. It argues that Spinoza’s hierarchical system of substance, attribute, immediate and mediate infinite modes, and finite modes matches in some surprising respects Neoplatonist accounts of the emanation of the universe from God. It suggests that Spinoza’s perception of universal and necessary principles are more related to that of Thomas Hobbes than to Plato or Rene Descartes.

Redefining the Role of Experiment in Bacon's Natural History: How Baconian was Descartes before Emerging from His Cocoon?

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 158-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mădălina Giurgea ◽  
Laura Georgescu
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
Rene Descartes ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Francis Bacon ◽  
René Descartes ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way

AbstractIn this article we argue that the views that Francis Bacon and René Descartes held about the role of experiments in the process of discovery are closer than previously accepted. Looking at the way experiments and the heuristics of experimentation are embedded in Bacon's posthumous History of Dense and Rare and Descartes' Discourses 8, 9, 10 of the Meteorology, we will show that experiments help the investigator both in solving specific problems that could not have otherwise been foreseen and in generating relevant information that advances the scope of the investigation.

Discovering the Universe. A History of Astronomy. Colin A. Ronan

Isis ◽  
1972 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-110
Author(s):  
Victor E. Thoren
Keyword(s):  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Universe
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