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GALILEO CREATION and COSMOGONY a Study on the Interplay Between Galileo’S Science of Motion and the Creation Theme [M-STO/05, M-FIL/06]

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GALILEO CREATION and COSMOGONY a Study on the Interplay Between Galileo’S Science of Motion and the Creation Theme [M-STO/05, M-FIL/06] DOCTORAL DISSERTATION GALILEO CREATION AND COSMOGONY A Study on the Interplay between Galileo’s Science of Motion and the Creation Theme [M-STO/05, M-FIL/06] Ph.D. Candidate Ph.D. Coordinator IVAN MALARA Prof. ANDREA PINOTTI Registration number: R11933 JOINT PH.D. SUPERVISORS Università degli Studi di Milano Prof. LUCA BIANCHI Doctoral course in Philosophy and Human Sciences – XXXIII Cycle Prof. ELIO NENCI (Dipartimento di Filosofia “Piero Martinetti”) Gent Universiteit Prof. MAARTEN VAN DYCK Academic Year 2019/2020 È chiaro che il pensiero dà fastidio anche se chi pensa è muto come un pesce anzi è un pesce e come pesce è difficile da bloccare perché lo protegge il mare Com’è profondo il mare LUCIO DALLA, Com’è profondo il mare (1977) Non ’mbrischiare a calia ca ’nzudda (Calabrian saying) Table of contents Abstract English .........................................................................................................VII Italian ..........................................................................................................VIII Dutch.............................................................................................................IX Introduction .............................................................................................................XI PART ONE: CREATION I. Anno 1607: Galileo and Castelli 1. Galileo in 1607..............................................................................................3 2. Castelli in 1607. The epistulae Cavenses........................................................ 8 3. Castelli’s complaint.....................................................................................15 II. Creatio de Novo and Its (Un)Demonstrability 4. Agnostic reasons.........................................................................................21 5. Muzio Vitelleschi’s ‘anti-agnosticism.’ A new case study on the bull Apostolici regiminis (1513) .............................................................................23 6. Creatio de novo in Galileo’s Juvenilia...........................................................36 III. A Reappraisal of Castelli’s Letter 7. Castelli versus Aristotle ..............................................................................39 8. Castelli’s agnosticism .................................................................................45 9. Castelli on the eternity of the world and God’s existence ............................47 10. Galileo’s reception of Castelli’s letter ........................................................51 TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________ IV. Intermezzo on Creatio ex Nihilo 11. Creatio ex nihilo and early modern science ..................................................53 12. Creation, time, and beginning, in the Platonic tradition ...........................56 13. The ‘doctrinal core’ of creatio ex nihilo in early Christianity ......................59 14. Creatio ex nihilo and the Bible ...................................................................62 15. Creatio ex nihilo and God’s eternity ...........................................................64 16. Augustine and the relativizing of eternity .................................................66 17. Eternity and perpetuity in Boethius ..........................................................72 V. Creatio ex Nihilo and the Primum Ens 18. Aquinas and creatio ex nihilo ......................................................................75 19. Aquinas and the primum ens ......................................................................79 20. Creatio ex nihilo and the primum ens in the Late Renaissance. A few examples from natural philosophy ..................................................85 21. Creatio ex nihilo and the primum ens in Galileo’s Juvenilia .........................96 PART TWO: COSMOGONY VI. Introduction to Cosmogony as a Scientific Problem 22. Galileo, God’s creation, and the God of creation .....................................101 23. Cosmogony and God’s omnipotence ......................................................104 24. Cosmogony and the Bible .......................................................................112 25. Cosmogony and gravity ...........................................................................117 VII. Cosmogony as a Scientific Problem in the ‘Tradition’ 26. From creation tales to philosophical cosmogonies ...................................123 27. Aristotle versus cosmogony .....................................................................126 28. Cosmogony in the Pisan controversy on the motion of the elements. Girolamo Borro ......................................................................................130 29. Cosmogony in the Pisan controversy on the motion of the elements. Francesco Buonamici ..............................................................................138 30. Cosmogony, order, nature, and gravity ...................................................143 VIII. Intermezzo on Gravity 31. Preliminary remarks ................................................................................147 32. Δύναµις and βάρος in Aristotle’s fourth book of the De caelo ...................149 33. Βάρος and βαρύτης in Simplicius’s commentary on the fourth book of the De caelo ..........................................................................................154 34. Climbing the Tower of Babel. William of Moerbeke and gravitas ...........161 35. Climbing the Tower of Babel. Augustine and pondus ..............................166 36. Climbing the Tower of Babel. Averroes and gravitas ...............................171 37. Climbing the Tower of Babel. Buonamici and Borro on gravitas .............174 38. Anachronistic ambiguities. Weight and specific weight ..........................182 39. Copernicus and gravitas ..........................................................................185 – IV – TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________ IX. Galileo’s Geocentric Cosmogony 40. Introduction to the De motu antiquiora. Redefining ‘heavy’ and ‘light’....189 41. Gravitas and the science of motion ..........................................................198 42. Stabilizing gravitas .................................................................................204 43. Gravitas and cosmogony ........................................................................206 44. The narrative elements of Galileo’s geocentric cosmogony .....................214 45. Other interpretations of gravitas .............................................................219 X. Galileo’s Heliocentric Cosmogony 46. Gravity, free fall, and cosmogony ............................................................233 47. Cosmogony as a bridge between mechanics and cosmology ....................239 48. Reinterpreting cosmogony within a problem-solving frame ....................245 49. Galileo’s cosmogonic calculations ..........................................................249 50. Galileo’s ‘Platonic’ cosmogony ................................................................256 51. Cosmogony denied? ...............................................................................260 52. Cosmogony and theology ........................................................................273 Concluding Remarks ..............................................................................................277 Bibliography .......................................................................................................... 281 – V – Abstract (English) Galileo: Creation and Cosmogony. A Study on the Interplay between Galileo’s Sci- ence of Motion and the Creation Theme. The relationship between science and theology in Galileo’s work is usually studied with reference to the Copernican letters and the so-called ‘Galileo affair,’ ended with Galileo’s abjuration in 1633. This dissertation tackles the same subject, but from a different angle. Galileo’s approach to the creation theme does indeed allow us to inquiry into the relationship between science and theology while keeping Biblical exe- gesis and Galileo’s trial on the background. The dissertation is divided into two parts: (1) “Creation,” and (2) “Cosmogony.” In the first part, a series of primary sources are considered (Benedetto Castelli’s letter to Galileo of April the 1st, 1607; a few unpublished folios from the reportationes of Muzio Vitelleschi’s course on natural philosophy held at the Roman College in 1589-90; some passages of Galileo’s Juvenilia) which help us gauge, albeit indirectly, Gal- ileo’s attitude toward the possibility of demonstrating creatio de novo (the beginning of the world) and creatio ex nihilo (the existential dependence of creatures on God). Although some initial supporters of Galileo sought to demonstrate creatio de novo through his definition of motion, he never welcomed their attempt. He probably agreed with Castelli that the demon- stration of creatio de novo was beyond the reach of his science and, in general, of human knowledge (a position that, for the sake of convenience, I have referred to as ‘agnosticism’). As regards creation out of nothing, at Galileo’s time this notion was usually treated in light of a metaphysical understanding of the relationship between God and creatures – a relation- ship which entailed an understanding of God as primum ens (first being). This notion is also used in the Juvenilia, namely, a series of pages reporting standard arguments of Scho- lastic philosophy,
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