Mathematics PreMay Seminar

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Mathematics Pre-May Seminar

• 2 March 2009

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Michelangelos Tomb in Firenzes Basilica of
Santa Croce
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Galileos Tomb, Santa Croce
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Michelangelos Giudizio Universale(Last
Judgment), Cappella Sistina, Vatican
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Detail from Giudizio Universale in the Cappella
Sistina
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Another Detail from Giudizio
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More Delicious Detail from Giudizio
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Four Copernican Heresies

• Heliocentrism
• Heliostatism
• Geokineticism
• Nongeocentrism
• The doctrine that the sun is motionless and at
  the center of the universe, and the earth moves
  around it is both false and contrary to scripture.

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Accusations of Galileo (Finocchiaro, page 8)

• Holding truth of earths motion
• Corresponding about this doctrine with German
  mathematicians
• Publishing Sunspot Letters that explained truth
  of the doctrine
• Answering scriptural objections against the
  doctrine with personal interpretations of
  Scripture
• Writing a letter to a disciple with propositions
  against the correct meaning of Scripture

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Books banned by the Index, 1616

• Copernicus De revolutionibus orbium coelestium
  (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres)
• Diego de Zuñiga Commentary on Job
• Paolo A. Foscarini Letter on the Pythagorean
  Option

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Historical Timeline

• 1517 Martin Luther announces his 95 Theses
• 1543 Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres
  Copernicus
• 1545-1563 Council of Trent
• 1564 Michelangelo dies, Galileo Galilei is born
• 1600 Giordano Bruno burned at the stake
• 1616 Index bans Copernican books
• 12 April 1633 G denies receiving special
  injunction
• 30 April 1633 G admits receiving warning (plea
  deal?)
• 1633 G guilty of vehement suspicion of heresy
  by Roman Inquisition
• 1634 Sister Maria Celeste dies
• 1642 Galileo dies
• 1664 Descartes works placed on the Index

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Historical Timeline Continued

• 1737 Galileo reburied in Santa Croce, Firenze
• 1792 Girolamo Tiraboschi lectures that Galileo
  was too aggressive, zealous, rash
• 1810 Napoleon transfers the Vatican archives to
  France
• 1814 Vatican archives returned to Rome, but not
  Galileos trial proceedings
• 1822 Inquisition rules Catholics can accept
  earths motion as a fact after Settele affair at
  La Sapienza University
• 1835 Galileo and Copernicus removed from Index
• 1867-1878 Trial proceedings gradually published
• 1893 Pope Leo XIIIs encyclical Providentissimus
  Deus

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Historical Timeline Continued

• 1937-1939, 1945-1947, etc Bertold Brechts
  Galileo
• 1959 Arthur Koestler publishes The Sleepwalkers
• 1992 Vatican settles Galileo affair
• 1999 Dava Sobels Galileos Daughter published,
  becomes international best seller
• 2004 William R. Shea and Mariano Artigas publish
  Galileo in Rome Rise Fall of a Troublesome
  Genius
• 2005 Maurice A. Finocchiaros Retrying Galileo,
  1633-1992 published
• 2008 Richard J. Blackwell publishes Behind the
  Scenes at Galileos Trial
• 2008 Pope Benedict XVI cancels at La Sapienza
  Univ.

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Key Issues in the Galileo Affair

• Scientific question of the reality of the earths
  motion
• Theological question of Scriptures authority in
  natural philosophy
• Methodological question of the earths motion
• Historical question of whether Copernicanism was
  declared heretical or just contrary to Scripture
• Question of whether Simplicio in the Dialogo was
  a mockery of Pope Urban VIII
• Did Galileo receive the special injunction, or
  just Bellarmines warning?
• What was the actual rigorous examination of
  Galileo?

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Quote, French Jesuit Honore Fabri, 1661

• It has been more than once asked of your leaders
  whether they had a demonstration for asserting
  the motion of the earth. They have never affirmed
  they had. Therefore, nothing hinders that the
  Church may understand those Scriptural passages
  that speak of this matter in a literal sense, and
  declare that they should be so understood as long
  as the contrary is not evinced by any
  demonstration if perhaps it should be found out
  by you (which I hardly believe it will), in this
  case the Church will not at all scruple to
  declare that those passages are to be understood
  in a figurative and improper sense, according to
  that of the poets the land and the cities slip
  backward.

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Quote, Adrien Auzout in response to Fabri, 1665
(Finocchiaro, p 95)

• It does not appear at all that God has wanted to
  teach us anything in particular about nature on
  the contrary, almost all who have wanted to find
  the principles of their philosophy in Scripture
  have fallen into untenable errors in it we
  should only look for the maxims of religion and
  morality, and not for the principles of physics
  or astronomy, which are as useless for the other
  life as they are useful for this one.

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Quote, Maurice A. Finocchiaro (2005)

• A related compromise was the suggestion that
  either Galileos biblical critics should be
  prevented from using scriptural passages against
  his physical theories, or he should be allowed to
  answer them but that it was quite improper to
  allow them free rein while silencing him and his
  supporters. (page 312)

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Galileo, quoting Cardinal Cesare Baronio

• The Bible shows the way to go to heaven, not the
  way the heavens go

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Galileo Bibliography

• Maurice A. Finocchiaro, Retrying Galileo,
  1633-1992 (2005)
• Dava Sobel, Galileos Daughter A Historical
  Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love (2000)
• Peter Machamer, editor, The Cambridge Companion
  to Galileo (1998)
• Galileo Affair, Wikipedia http//en.wikipedia.org/
  wiki/Galileo_affair