Cb20 2016Lect12aftermath Midtermreview to Post.Pdf
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For Friday’s Conversations with Galileo ! Conversation I: Galileo (I), Ludovico delle Colombe, and Tycho Brahe on the pros and cons of different cosmological systems ! Conversation II: Galileo (II) and Bellarmine on biblical interpretation ! =5 different figures, portrayed by two students each ! After the midterm: ! starting on the final paper —see handout and come see us! ! Please sign up on course website for extra office hours on Thurs Oct 13, 11-12 and 2:15-4:30pm ! “History at Harvard and Beyond” - Alumni Panel Event Thursday, October 13, 2016, 6PM Robinson Hall, Lower Library Interested in the History ConcentraIon? Come hear current students discuss their experiences studying history and history alumni talk about their careers a7er Harvard. Prof. Ann Blair, History DUS, will also give a brief overview of the various History 97s. “What is the “What is History of History?” Environmental history?” “What is Imperial History?” Lecture 12: aftermath of the Galileo Affair +review for the midterm Interpreting Galileo ! 1. he was thumbing his nose at the Church throughout and said as he recanted under his breath “And yet it moves...” ! 2. he had a little fun at the expense of the Church but was sincerely dismayed by the outcome of the trial and recanted honestly ! 3. he really meant to defend the Church’s decree of 1616 and never intended to support heliocentrism as more than a hypothesis ! 4. something else? This book of 1987 argued that Galileo was really condemned for something so shocking that the Church didn’t want to mention it explicitly --atomism. ! Problem: not much evidence... and a lot of evidence for the “obvious” explanation... ! Question to practice for the midterm: Was the condemnation of Galileo inevitable? ! Arguments for inevitability ! Arguments against inevitability--what might have gone differently? ! Your conclusion, lining up arguments and addressing counterarguments Three kinds of causes: ! long-term preconditions ! precipitants (medium-term causes) ! triggers (short-term causes) cf Lawrence Stone, Causes of the English Revolution Long-term preconditions Long-term preconditions ! -those lines in the Bible and the traditional interpretation of them ! -the hierarchy of the disciplines: astro<<physics<<theology ! -the synthesis of Aristotelian physics and Ptolemaic astronomy: familiar and works well! Medium-term precipitants Medium-term precipitants ! -Reformation and Counter-Reformation trigger a conservative stance in the Catholic Church re traditional interpretation as essential ! -Galileo makes enemies of his philosopher colleagues and of Jesuit astronomers ! -condemnation of 1616 but it is also vague, setting the stage for Galileo and the censors to be unclear on its limits Short-term triggers: ! -Galileo’s friend elected pope ! -Galileo is excited about his new observations and arguments ! -Galileo writes in Italian with a sharp pen ! -Urban VIII is sensitive about his image What if: Copernicus hadn’t delayed OR Luther had started later =what if Galileo had written before Trent? ! Galileo hadn’t alienated the Jesuits; OR didn’t have wild allies like Giordano Bruno and Antonio Foscarini =what if Galileo had had strong support from within the Church? and hadn’t been denounced in 1615? ! -Galileo hadn’t written in Italian, hadn’t been so aggressive in the Dialogue or had been Protestant =maybe the Church would not have reacted at all ! -Newton had come along a little earlier creating consensus around Copernicanism =maybe heliocentrism would be considered “proven” But some arguments for inevitability: ! -Copernicus was worried about Church reaction even before Reformation ! -first Church reaction was negative (Tolosani, 1544) ! -long-standing consensus on biblical interpretation and physics/astronomy was hard to overturn ! -it was impossible to demonstrate motion of the earth in the 17th century ! -astronomy was low-ranked in the disciplinary hierarchy of the time Impacts of the trial of 1633: ! on Galileo ! on practice of astronomy by Catholics ! on efforts to rehabilitate Galileo/ overturn the condemnation Where Galileo abjured: Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome--at the time headquarters of the Dominican order Galileo under house arrest at his villa in Arcetri 17th ct depiction of Galileo at Arcetri The Two New Sciences (1638)— dialogue of same 3 men ! -cohesion of materials -inclined plane and projectile motion Vincenzo Viviani (1622-1703) assistant to Galileo at Arcetri (until 1642), raises support and money for Galileo’s memory Impacts of 1616: ! Copernican works published in Catholic places only with excisions and changes ! Copernican works published in Protestant places have to be expurgated post-publication if owned by Catholics ! But Protestants publish and support Copernicanism all they want Copernicus, De Rev, Amsterdam, 1617 (with notes by Nicolaus Mulerius) ! the “babblers” passage in Copernicus’s preface --censored in this copy owned by a Catholic A photographic facsimile (reduced) of a page from Mulier's edition (1617) of the De Revolutionibus as "corrected" according to the Monitum of the Congregations in 1620. The first writer underlined the passages to be deleted or altered with marginal notes indicating the changes ordered; the second writer scratched out these passages, and wrote out in full the changes the other had given in abbreviated form. The Notæ are Mulier's own, and so were not affected by the order. The effect of the page is therefore somewhat contradictory! Jesuit astronomy after 1633: e.g. Giovanni Battista Riccioli, Novum Almagestum (1651) --a massive synthesis of astro 1. the celestial sphere and subjects such as celestial motions, the equator, ecliptic, zodiac, etc.; 2. the earth and its size, gravity and pendulum motion, etc.; 3. the sun, its size and distance, its motion, observations involving it, etc.; 4. the moon, its phases, its size and distance, etc. (detailed maps of the moon as seen through a telescope were included); 5. lunar and solar eclipses; 6. the fixed stars 7. the planets and their motions, etc. (representations of each as seen with a telescope were included); 8. comets and "new stars" (novae); 9. the structure of the universe—heliocentric and geoheliocentric theories. In Book 9 Riccioli discusses 126 arguments concerning Earth's motion—49 for and 77 against. 10.calculations related to astronomy. Blaise Pascal (1623-62), a French Catholic: ! "It will take more than that condemnation to prove that the earth keeps still and if there were consistent observations proving that it the earth that goes around, all the men in the world put together could not stop it turning or themselves turning with it." Provinciales, letter xviii René Descartes (1596-1650): prudence letter to Mersenne, Feb 1634 Galileo reburied in 1737 with this funerary monument in Basilica Santa Croce, Florence Galileo’s finger on display at the Museo di Storia della Scienza in Florence. It was detached when Galileo’s remains were transferred in 1737 from the chapel of Sts Cosmas and Damian (where he had been buried alongside his daughter) to the main body of the Church of Santa Croce form of a Catholic reliquary finger of St John the Baptist The long process of reversing the condemnation of Galileo: ! 1737 Florence erects a monument to Galileo, one of their most famous residents ! 1757 some Copernican books are removed from the Index of Forbidden Books (but not De Rev itself) [pope Benedict XIV favors this, the Congregation of the Index resists] ! 1822 Copernican books are no longer added to the Index ! 1835 Copernicus’ De Rev removed from the Index 1838 stellar parallax observed ! 1870 publication of documents of Gal’s trial ! 1979 Pope John Paul II: “The Greatness of Galileo is Known to All” The “Second Galileo Affair” ! =attacking the Church for its role in the first one… ! mid 19th ct anti-clericalism/ anti-Catholicism Joseph Nicolas Robert Fleury (1797-1890), “Galileo before the Holy Office” (1847), Joseph Nicolas Robert Fleury (1797-1890): conversation with Bellarmine J. N. R. Fleury, Galileo in prison Impact on historiography, on writing the history of the relations between science and religion in 19th and 20th ct A special connection between Protestantism and science?? ! Max Weber (1864-1920): The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism ! Robert Merton (1910-2003): Science, Technology and Society in Seventeenth-century England ! GENERAL REVIEW Some surprises so far re hist of Christianity: ! -literal reading of Bible not a big concern of Church fathers (Augustine likes allegoresis); new with Luther who favors the literal meaning “wherever possible” ! -medieval Church is not particularly “conservative”--harbors a number of views on reason and faith as long as the two agree (but excludes the idea of a double truth) ! -e.g. there are vernacular Bibles in the middle ages: not widespread but not a problem, until Protestantism makes vernacular Bibles seem dangerous OT --Jewish canon formation Jesus of Nazareth (ca. 5-30CE) NT canon formation 4th- Vulgate: OT (largely from Septuagint) + NT 16th ct Christian humanism: polyglot Bibles printed Erasmus makes new tr’n of NT--banned Prots make vernacular Bibles that separate apocrypha from OT.