re: #55 SanFranciscoZionist

re: #55 SanFranciscoZionist

And after the embarrassment with the heliocentrism thing, have determined not to get caught lagging on the scientific acceptance again…

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Well, even the Galileo affair is something of a red herring. In fact, the Church was ambivalent over heliocentrism at the time. Their disagreement with Galileo was over his unflattering portrayal of the Pope in his Two New Sciences, where he was cast as a stereotypical fool, and his violation of the terms of his imprimatur, the license to publish issued by the Church, which plainly allowed him to publish evidence supporting heliocentrism but which forbade him to favor one side - or the other - in the argument over which was correct, a restriction which Galileo rather flagrantly ignored.

For more details on this fascinating episode, see Dava Sobel’s excellent Galileo’s Daughter, which examines historical documents concerning Galileo’s persecution in detail, and which has an especially heartwarming “surprise” ending.