By examining the pressing questions the supernova of 1604 prompted, Kepler's New Star traces the enduring impact of Kepler and his star on the course of modern science.
The Copernican question Westman, Robert S
The Copernican question: prognostication, skepticism, and celestial order,
2011., 20110702, 2011, c2011., 2011-07-28, 20110101
eBook
In 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus publicly defended his hypothesis that the earth is a planet and the sun a body resting near the center of a finite universe. But why did Copernicus make this bold ...proposal? And why did it matter? The Copernican Question reframes this pivotal moment in the history of science, centering the story on a conflict over the credibility of astrology that erupted in Italy just as Copernicus arrived in 1496. Copernicus engendered enormous resistance when he sought to protect astrology by reconstituting its astronomical foundations. Robert S. Westman shows that efforts to answer the astrological skeptics became a crucial unifying theme of the early modern scientific movement. His interpretation of this "long sixteenth century," from the 1490s to the 1610s, offers a new framework for understanding the great transformations in natural philosophy in the century that followed.
In Measuring Shadows , Raz Chen-Morris demonstrates that a close study of Kepler’s Optics is essential to understanding his astronomical work and his scientific epistemology. He explores ...Kepler’s radical break from scientific and epistemological traditions and shows how the seventeenth-century astronomer posited new ways to view scientific truth and knowledge. Chen-Morris reveals how Kepler’s ideas about the formation of images on the retina and the geometrics of the camera obscura, as well as his astronomical observations, advanced the argument that physical reality could only be described through artificially produced shadows, reflections, and refractions.
Breaking from medieval and Renaissance traditions that insisted upon direct sensory perception, Kepler advocated for instruments as mediators between the eye and physical reality, and for mathematical language to describe motion. It was only through this kind of knowledge, he argued, that observation could produce certainty about the heavens. Not only was this conception of visibility crucial to advancing the early modern understanding of vision and the retina, but it affected how people during that period approached and understood the world around them.
Spanning the course of his career, this book brings new light to Kepler's vitalistic views and their central place in his world picture. It challenges our view of Kepler as a nascent mechanical ...philosopher who fell back on an older form of physics.
In Measuring Shadows , Raz Chen-Morris demonstrates that
a close study of Kepler's Optics is essential to
understanding his astronomical work and his scientific
epistemology. He explores Kepler's ...radical break from scientific
and epistemological traditions and shows how the
seventeenth-century astronomer posited new ways to view scientific
truth and knowledge. Chen-Morris reveals how Kepler's ideas about
the formation of images on the retina and the geometrics of the
camera obscura, as well as his astronomical observations, advanced
the argument that physical reality could only be described through
artificially produced shadows, reflections, and refractions.
Breaking from medieval and Renaissance traditions that insisted
upon direct sensory perception, Kepler advocated for instruments as
mediators between the eye and physical reality, and for
mathematical language to describe motion. It was only through this
kind of knowledge, he argued, that observation could produce
certainty about the heavens. Not only was this conception of
visibility crucial to advancing the early modern understanding of
vision and the retina, but it affected how people during that
period approached and understood the world around them.
A contemporary of Galileo and a forerunner of Isaac Newton, Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) was a pioneering German scientist and a pivotal figure in the history of astronomy. This colorful, ...well-researched biography brings the man and his scientific discoveries to life, showing how his contributions were every bit as important as those of Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton.It was Kepler who first advocated the completely new concept of a physical force emanating from the sun that controls the motion of the planets--today we call this gravity and take it for granted. He also established that the orbits of the planets were elliptical in shape and not circular. And his three laws of planetary motion are still used by contemporary astronomers and space scientists.The author focuses not just on these and other momentous breakthroughs but also on Kepler's arduous life, punctuated by frequent tragedy and hardships. His first wife died young, and eight of the twelve children he fathered succumbed to disease in infancy or childhood. He was frequently caught up in the religious persecutions of the day. His mother narrowly escaped death when she was accused of being a witch.Intermingling historical and personal details of Kepler's life with lucid explanations of his scientific research, this book presents a sympathetic portrait of the man and underscores the critical importance of Kepler's discoveries in the history of astronomy.
The extraordinary tale of Johannes Kepler, one of the most admired astronomers of all time, and the six long years spent defending his mother from her neighbours' accusations of witchcraft. A story ...which takes us to the heart of Kepler's changing world.
Johannes Kepler contributed importantly to every field he addressed. He changed the face of astronomy by abandoning principles that had been in place for two millennia, made important discoveries in ...optics and mathematics, and was an uncommonly good philosopher. Generally, however, Kepler's philosophical ideas have been dismissed as irrelevant and even detrimental to his legacy of scientific accomplishment. Here, Rhonda Martens offers the first extended study of Kepler's philosophical views and shows how those views helped him construct and justify the new astronomy.
