Galileo life and his book
Introduction
Interviewer. Dear readers, with the wings of the imagination to move through time and space, on January 6, 1642, and Arcetri, Florence, Italy. We will arrive at the house of a great scientist, who knew how to give a strong impulse to science and technology and have proposed a method to do scientific research. He is Galileo Galilei, originally from Pisa, Italy.
Developing
Interviewer. Good afternoon, Mr. Galileo.
Galileo. Buona will be, Caro Amico.
- I am a reporter for El Messenger, a newspaper of the scientific community of the Lagunera region. I request an interview for said newspaper. I clarify that I went back in time since 2020.
- How surprising time travel! Then tell me how it is done. With piacer molto I accept this interview;But first, where is the Lagunera region where is? Sorry for my ignorance.
- Mexico is part of what New Spain was, near the province of the new Biscay. In northwestern Mexico.
- Ah, I remember the new Biscay very well because it was founded a year before my birth.
- What did the Magi brought this day?
- I was born on February 15, 1564. In two more years I will fulfill the 80s. The Magi gave me tranquility. The more I approach death I am more serene.
- Master, what studies did you do?
- I studied medicine at the University of Pisa. I consider myself too curious, observer and analytical and that helped me to advance in the scientific and technological field.
For example, once I was in Mass in the cathedral of my hometown;Well, "I was in everything, except in Mass," I could see that the temple lamp was rocked by a burst of wind, moved from one place to another uniformly and I could verify that it always ran the same distance at the same time at the same time. From here I got to the idea of the pendulum, useful to measure time.
- Indeed, teacher, because some years after you another scientist, Christian Huygens would have invent the pendulum clock. Did you make some other inventions, you?
- On one occasion they told me that a general used an instrument on the battlefield, a tube with lenses inside, arranged in such a way that I could see more clearly the movements of the enemy.
With that talk I started building telescopes of those until I fabried the first astronomical telescope, which extended the image thirty -two diameters. With this telescope I discovered that the moon is an opaque body with many craters. I also found that the Milky Way or Road of Santo Santiago is composed of innumerable stars.
I checked Copernicus that the earth revolves around the sun and not vice versa, as it was commonly believed in those days. I came to this conclusion because I could verify that Jupiter’s satellites revolve around this. I ask, favor, refrain from publishing the above, I will not get the Inquisition again.
I also invented a hydrostatic balance to determine the specific weights of the bodies as well as the bodies of the bodies.
- Since he mentioned the Inquisition, tell us how did he go with it when he disseminated his scientific knowledge? Because we know that said court.
- effectively. The Church did not accept at that time the statement that the Earth revolves around the Sun, because it interpreted that passage from the Bible when Joshua, seeing that the light of day was ending and lacked little to win the battle to his enemies,ordered by saying: "Stop Sun, Luna do not advance", as if the sun and the moon revolved around the earth. On this occasion the Inquisition only recommended that I retract my theory, and I, to not have problems, I did it. This happened in 1611, when it was Pope Pius V.
But in 1632, when he went up to Urban Papacy VIII, believing that the circumstances had changed, I published a "dialogue about the systems of the world", in which simplicio, Salgardo and Salviat intervened. Simplat was very naive and it was the one who refuted the new theory to Salviat. This theory was none other than heliocentrism, that is, the earth revolves around the sun.
Someone was ghipous with the Pope and told him that he was simplicio and I Salviat, so again the Inquisition imprisoned me. He demanded that he retract my theories and imposed the city of Rome as a prison. I immediately firm the retraction to save my bones.
- Do not have concern about the Inquisition, as I come from future time in relation to yours, I assure you that this court no longer exists and all the world’s scientists recognize him and give him all the reason regarding heliocentrism.
- Frankly, ecclesiastical authority does not worry me, because I have not written anything irreverent against the Holy Church, and his hierarchy has treated me with courtesy and consideration.
- Do you think Pope’s infallibility failed?
- In the specific case of mine the Pope did not speak ex cathedra ”to define a dogma. Then nothing had to do with pontifical infallibility, and it was the Inquisition and not the Pope who judged me.
- Now tell us how did you announce your inventions and discoveries?
- I wrote and published the trial, speech on comets, dialogue on the two main systems of the world: Ptolemaic and CopernicanReflux of the sea, I published a newspaper, which I titled "Sidereus nuntius", which is translated into Spanish: Messenger of heaven.
- You designed a method for scientific research. Tell us, please, this method.
- I consider this point extremely transcendent! How good that he asks me! I believe that to advance to safe in the field of science, a method is indispensable, the scientific method, which consists in managing observation, experimentation and verification as fundamental steps.
- How true is that you dropped two bodies of different weight from the top of the Piza Tower?
- I did not do it materially, but if I insisted that two bodies of different pesos fall simultaneously, contrary to those taught by Aristotle and the Peripathetic.
- To finish, Mr. Galileo do you really say the phrase attributed "and yet moves" when he was free from jail?
- No, I didn’t say it. I showed submission to the ecclesiastical court, signed the retraction and chose to remain silent, obeying the Inquisition in everything;What was you looking for more. Some funny added it there. So much so that feeling sick I asked to change residence to Florence instead of Rome, which was granted to me;If I had said that nothing would have authorized me.
- Thank you very much, teacher, for your comments. Be sure that the youth of the Lagunera region will appreciate you more and as a tribute they will study with greaterness and enthusiasm science and technology with which the development of the region and the country will come: Mexico: Mexico.
- I remain at your service. goodbye.
- This was an interview with the scientist Galileo Galilei for you the reporter.
conclusion
The cold morning of January 9, 1642, Galileo died in Arcetri, near Florence. Bertrand Russell explains that Galileo really promoted science, and from this impulse inventions and discoveries multiply more and more quickly. The ancients saw the world more as poets than as scientists.
It’s so cold! That is their home. You can see modest, but you breathe tranquility in it. The teacher shows straight and wide nose, wide front, face furrowed by the wrinkles of the years, his deformed hands as a result of arthritis, wears white hair and beard;He is already his years, he looks like an octogenarian. His gaze is penetrating, with his big lively eyes, although already with difficulties to see, which states a lot of peace, the inner peace that only gives the wisdom of living dignity.
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