WEBVTT 1 00:00:17.960 --> 00:00:24.239 Hello, and welcome to Western CIV. Episode two hundred and seventy three Galileo, 2 00:00:24.399 --> 00:00:29.239 Part five. We've talked a lot about Galileo and his role in modernizing 3 00:00:29.280 --> 00:00:35.960 science in the West. Galleo probably would not have qualified as an experimental scientist 4 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:40.600 in our sense of the term, but certainly he was the first real experimental 5 00:00:40.640 --> 00:00:45.560 scientist in the West if we compare him to everyone who came before him. 6 00:00:45.920 --> 00:00:52.759 It is the break with the past that matters with Galileo, and when talking 7 00:00:52.880 --> 00:01:00.920 about Galileo, that break is huge. Today we get more into the nuts 8 00:01:00.920 --> 00:01:07.159 and bolts of why we all know the name Galileo. Today we start to 9 00:01:07.159 --> 00:01:15.920 look at Galileo and Copernicanism and how his publications drew the ire of the church, 10 00:01:15.879 --> 00:01:33.000 and how that conflict shaped the future of science in so many ways. 11 00:01:34.400 --> 00:01:41.200 Between sixteen eleven and sixteen thirteen, Galileo attempted the impossible. He wanted to 12 00:01:41.280 --> 00:01:47.959 try to bring science and religion together. Today many churches do this and do 13 00:01:48.040 --> 00:01:55.040 this very effectively. Many denominations don't take the Bible literally. They see sciences 14 00:01:55.079 --> 00:02:01.079 explaining the how how did God create? Not the why. The why remains 15 00:02:01.120 --> 00:02:08.560 the realm of the mystical. But in the seventeenth century this division just wasn't 16 00:02:08.560 --> 00:02:16.960 a thing. It was assumed that science should be firmly subordinated to script Scripture, 17 00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:23.960 which was to be read literally. From sixteen thirteen to the end of 18 00:02:23.960 --> 00:02:30.000 his life, Galileo would try to separate religion and science, but that doesn't 19 00:02:30.000 --> 00:02:37.199 mean that we should ignore the preceding two years when he really tried to become 20 00:02:37.960 --> 00:02:46.759 the world's foremost Catholic scientist. To understand this strategy, it's crucial to understand 21 00:02:46.759 --> 00:02:53.400 that Galleo's adversaries were not at this point the entirety of the Church. Really, 22 00:02:53.560 --> 00:03:01.639 his only enemies were ardent Aristotelians believed that these men were nothing more than 23 00:03:01.800 --> 00:03:13.199 slaves. Blindly following everything Aristotle wrote, Aristotelians only looked at the paper world 24 00:03:13.360 --> 00:03:19.680 constructed by Aristotle and they assumed it was true, completely ignoring the supreme level 25 00:03:19.680 --> 00:03:28.719 of contradiction with the real world that they were experiencing. Every educated person knew 26 00:03:28.759 --> 00:03:34.919 that Aristotle was not easy to reconcile with Christianity. According to the most reputable 27 00:03:34.919 --> 00:03:39.960 authorities, Aristotle regarded the universe as having always existed. In other words, 28 00:03:40.719 --> 00:03:47.159 this denied creationism. He denied the immorality of the soul, and he left 29 00:03:47.159 --> 00:03:53.719 no conceptual space for miracles. Galeo would have been a well aware of the 30 00:03:53.759 --> 00:04:01.759 deep suspicion with which the Church regarded the teaching of strict Aristotelian philosophers. It 31 00:04:01.840 --> 00:04:10.039 was thus natural for any opponent of Aristotelian philosophy to wonder if an alternate philosophy 32 00:04:10.599 --> 00:04:16.079 might be easier to reconcile with Christianity. Galileo not only thought about this, 33 00:04:17.079 --> 00:04:23.439 but also took advice, and the advice was that he should emphasize the creation 34 00:04:23.600 --> 00:04:29.519 of the world and the mutability of the heavens. Both of these were denied 35 00:04:29.560 --> 00:04:36.800 by Aristotle but asserted by the scriptures. Thus Galileo was not only interested in 36 00:04:36.839 --> 00:04:45.560 forming a close alliance with the Jesuits, in building ties with such key cardinals 37 00:04:45.600 --> 00:04:53.759 as Mifeo Babini and with prominent pious layman also publishing in Rome. He was 38 00:04:53.800 --> 00:05:00.000 also committed to claiming that the new astronomy was also more Christian than the old 39 00:05:00.079 --> 00:05:09.319 astronomy. That Agossi produced a substantial theological argument to this effect, one that 40 00:05:09.399 --> 00:05:15.879 he hoped would be published alongside Galileo's letters on Sunspots and the Letters on Sunspots 41 00:05:15.199 --> 00:05:24.120 contained an important passage where Galileo insisted that the sun spots demonstrated against Aristotle that 42 00:05:24.160 --> 00:05:30.800 the heavens were mutable, and that this corresponded with the teaching of Holy Scripture. 43 00:05:32.079 --> 00:05:35.959 When the text was submitted to the censors, however, this was one 44 00:05:35.959 --> 00:05:44.920 of three passages that were struck out. The censors adamantly refused to allow any 45 00:05:44.959 --> 00:05:50.160 theological discussion in the Book on Sunspots and insisted that the question about whether the 46 00:05:50.199 --> 00:05:56.959 Bible was compatible with Aristotelian teaching on the immutability of the heavens was far from 47 00:05:57.000 --> 00:06:02.959 straightforward, and in any case it was a matter for theologians, not mathematicians. 48 00:06:04.279 --> 00:06:11.120 Galleo tried repeatedly to retain his core argument while revising his text, but 49 00:06:11.199 --> 00:06:15.519 no compromise could be reached. This was, in a sense lucky for Galleo. 50 00:06:16.519 --> 00:06:20.160 It meant that later when he claimed that he was interested only in discussing 51 00:06:20.199 --> 00:06:26.439 science, not religion, there was no obvious evidence to contradict him, and 52 00:06:26.480 --> 00:06:30.519 the result is that the logic of his activities in these years became invisible to 53 00:06:30.600 --> 00:06:38.600 the modern reader. Now, Galileo was full of confidence as he sat down 54 00:06:39.360 --> 00:06:45.600 to write his work on sun spots in May of sixteen twelve, And why 55 00:06:45.680 --> 00:06:50.920 shouldn't dp He had proof that sun spots were real. The sun did change. 56 00:06:50.959 --> 00:06:56.839 The proof was right there, you could see it. Hence Aristotle's position 57 00:06:57.319 --> 00:07:01.759 that the heavens didn't change was wrong. All you had to do was look, 58 00:07:01.920 --> 00:07:08.720 and you'd be forced to agree. Galileo truly believed in the summer fall 59 00:07:08.720 --> 00:07:12.879 and early winter of sixteen twelve that this was it. This was the end 60 00:07:12.959 --> 00:07:17.839 of the line for Aristotelian logic. His letter on sun spots would prove to 61 00:07:17.839 --> 00:07:26.319 be its death blow. With hindsight, we know that Galileo badly misjudged the 62 00:07:26.399 --> 00:07:31.199 situation. Sixteen twelve would prove to be the high point of his relationship with 63 00:07:31.279 --> 00:07:38.199 the Church, would be all downhill from here, But of course Galileo did 64 00:07:38.240 --> 00:07:44.720 not know that in sixteen twelve. By December of sixteen twelve, Galileo had 65 00:07:44.800 --> 00:07:50.319 virtually completed his career as a practicing scientist. Every important discovery that he was 66 00:07:50.360 --> 00:07:56.360 going to make he had now made, and one great discovery had slipped through 67 00:07:56.399 --> 00:08:01.199 his grasp. He had noticed one night that once a small star seemed to 68 00:08:01.199 --> 00:08:05.839 be further from its nearest neighbor than it had been the night before. What 69 00:08:05.920 --> 00:08:09.319 he had actually seen, though, was a new planet, Neptune, a 70 00:08:09.360 --> 00:08:16.240 planet which was not properly discovered until eighteen forty six. But the idea of 71 00:08:16.240 --> 00:08:20.199 a new planet had not occurred to Galileo, so he did not linger over 72 00:08:20.240 --> 00:08:26.920 this abnormality. He continued to work on tables of Jupiter's moons, but otherwise 73 00:08:26.959 --> 00:08:33.200 he stopped exploring the heavens. In his discourse on Floating Bodies, he had 74 00:08:33.200 --> 00:08:41.159 published a major illustration of the experimental method. He went on experimenting now and 75 00:08:41.200 --> 00:08:46.320 again that all of his important experiments were in the past. He was about 76 00:08:46.320 --> 00:08:50.519 to turn forty nine years old, and he already had a sense of himself 77 00:08:50.559 --> 00:08:54.519 as being old and of time being short. What he needed to do now 78 00:08:54.559 --> 00:09:00.919 was publish the work he already had in hand. But this was not to 79 00:09:01.000 --> 00:09:11.240 prove straightforward. Of course, everything that happens from sixteen thirteen onward depends not 80 00:09:11.279 --> 00:09:20.080 necessarily on Galileo but on Copernicus. The first indication that Galileo's position might be 81 00:09:20.159 --> 00:09:24.159 deteriorating, rather than improving, came in the morning of the twelfth of December 82 00:09:24.559 --> 00:09:31.200 sixteen thirteen, Benedito Castilli had breakfast with the Grand Duke, the Duchess, 83 00:09:31.559 --> 00:09:37.000 and the Grand Duke's mother, Christina of Lorraine, who were on one of 84 00:09:37.039 --> 00:09:43.240 their periodic visits to Pisa. Also present, amongst others was a piece an 85 00:09:43.279 --> 00:09:52.639 Aristotelian philosopher Cosmo Bascali. Castili, as one might expect, had spoken up 86 00:09:52.639 --> 00:10:00.879 in praise of Galileo's latest scientific discoveries. Buscallo had conceded that galiles those telescopic 87 00:10:00.919 --> 00:10:05.519 discoveries were indeed to be trusted, but he rejected the idea of a moving 88 00:10:05.559 --> 00:10:11.399 Earth, which he said was contrary to scripture. Castilli finished his meal and 89 00:10:11.519 --> 00:10:16.000 left, but just as he had emerged from the palace, porter came chasing 90 00:10:16.039 --> 00:10:20.759 after him to summon him back to Christina's room. There he found the group 91 00:10:20.799 --> 00:10:28.279 from breakfast had gathered, and Christina had set about to prove that Copernicanism was 92 00:10:28.399 --> 00:10:35.279 contrary to the Bible. Castilian reply defended Copernicanism and had the support of everyone 93 00:10:35.399 --> 00:10:43.639 present apart from Christina and Bascalini. Galileo, having received a detail account of 94 00:10:43.679 --> 00:10:48.799 the discussion from the two sources, wrote a letter back to Castilli on the 95 00:10:48.840 --> 00:10:54.480 twenty first of December, copies of which were soon in circulation. Now there 96 00:10:54.519 --> 00:11:00.879 was nothing particularly alarming about the debate in the Ducal Palace on December twelfth, 97 00:11:00.879 --> 00:11:05.600 sixteen thirteen, but a year after Galileo had written to Castilli. On the 98 00:11:05.639 --> 00:11:13.200 twenty first, a Dominican preacher in Florence, Tomaso Cassini, whose text for 99 00:11:13.240 --> 00:11:18.240 the day was a passage in the Old Testament about the sun standing still during 100 00:11:18.320 --> 00:11:24.840 Joshua's battle against the Amorites, he publicly attacked Copernicanism. In fact, his 101 00:11:24.960 --> 00:11:31.639 goal was to get the Inquisition to open a formal investigation into Galileo. Galleo 102 00:11:31.799 --> 00:11:37.120 evidently got word of these intentions. On the sixteenth of February. He sent 103 00:11:37.159 --> 00:11:41.039 a letter in his own defense to Piero Dini, a sympathetic Roman clergyman, 104 00:11:41.799 --> 00:11:46.519 suggesting that he might pass it on to the leading mathematician of the Jesuit order 105 00:11:48.320 --> 00:11:54.600 and to the leading theologian on the Inquisition, Cardinal Betamini, which Dini promptly 106 00:11:54.639 --> 00:12:00.200 did. In the end, what Galileo was hoping to do was to take 107 00:12:00.240 --> 00:12:05.399 advantage of a rift between the Jesuit order and the Dominican order within the Catholic 108 00:12:05.480 --> 00:12:11.000 Church. His hope was that the Jesuits would take his side against his Dominican 109 00:12:11.039 --> 00:12:20.080 opponents. Now, meanwhile, the Archbishop of Pisa warned Castili against Copernicanism, 110 00:12:20.399 --> 00:12:24.440 and Castily told the bishop that he had returned the letter to Galileo, but 111 00:12:24.519 --> 00:12:30.240 that he would ask him for a copy. Castili promptly wrote to Galleo, 112 00:12:30.360 --> 00:12:35.279 urging him to take this opportunity to make final revisions to his text. In 113 00:12:35.360 --> 00:12:39.840 fact, Galileo already suspected that he had been denounced to the Inquisition in Rome, 114 00:12:41.840 --> 00:12:45.600 and so on the sixteenth of February he had sent Deni a copy of 115 00:12:45.600 --> 00:12:50.360 the letter, drawing attention to the possibility that this text might differ from that 116 00:12:50.399 --> 00:12:56.159 being circulated by his opponents. What this strongly suggests is that Galileo altered the 117 00:12:56.240 --> 00:13:03.559 text, and that the new text was a lot less aggressive than the prior 118 00:13:03.639 --> 00:13:07.240 one. In the end, he didn't really have to be worried. The 119 00:13:07.240 --> 00:13:13.919 Inquisition looked at the version supplied by the informants, thought the wording was sometimes 120 00:13:15.039 --> 00:13:22.200 unfortunate, but that the arguments by and large were unexceptional. Galleo's fundamental premise 121 00:13:22.679 --> 00:13:28.600 in his open letter to Castili was straightforward. The Bible is the word of 122 00:13:28.639 --> 00:13:33.919 God, but it is adapted to human capacities. So are there are plenty 123 00:13:33.919 --> 00:13:37.879 of statements in the Bible that we're not supposed to take is literally true. 124 00:13:39.200 --> 00:13:43.240 Those are God's way of communicating, not with philosophers but with ordinary people. 125 00:13:45.679 --> 00:13:48.879 Nature is, like the Bible, a book in which we can trace God's 126 00:13:48.879 --> 00:13:54.039 doing. But nature is not adapted or modified in order to be understood by 127 00:13:54.120 --> 00:14:00.279 us. So when it comes to scientific questions, our direct knowledge of nature 128 00:14:00.840 --> 00:14:05.559 must always take priority over whatever the Bible may have to say on the subject, 129 00:14:05.240 --> 00:14:11.399 because there are always grounds for uncertainty as to quite how the Bible is 130 00:14:11.440 --> 00:14:16.000 to be interpreted. Now, honestly, matters might have just ended there. 131 00:14:16.759 --> 00:14:22.240 Galileo had been denounced and he had been cleared. In addition, he had 132 00:14:22.240 --> 00:14:30.120 protested his personal piety and willingness to obey. But the inquisition was now interested 133 00:14:30.120 --> 00:14:37.600 in two questions. First, what else could be discovered about Galleo? And 134 00:14:37.799 --> 00:14:45.279 second, probably the more important question, was Copernicanism itself, now to be 135 00:14:45.399 --> 00:14:52.600 regarded as heretical in all cases. Tamaso Cassini shows up in the Galileo story 136 00:14:52.639 --> 00:14:58.679 again in March of sixteen fifteen. There we find him summoned to Rome to 137 00:14:58.720 --> 00:15:07.600 provide supporting testimony against Galileo. He alleged that Galileo preached three things. One 138 00:15:07.639 --> 00:15:13.039 God is not a substance but an accident. Two God must be a physical 139 00:15:13.159 --> 00:15:18.480 entity because he has senses, and number three, there are simply no such 140 00:15:18.559 --> 00:15:26.360 things as miracles. At the time, all these allegations did next to nothing. 141 00:15:26.480 --> 00:15:33.360 None of them were actually new allegations, and swiftly everyone assumed that Galileo 142 00:15:33.399 --> 00:15:39.399 would be cleared of all charges. The Florentine inquisitor uncovered some evidence that Galileo 143 00:15:39.559 --> 00:15:45.399 was an atomist, a natural philosophy proposing that the physical universe is composed of 144 00:15:45.440 --> 00:15:50.519 fundamental, indivisible components known as atoms, but even that didn't gain much traction. 145 00:15:52.720 --> 00:15:54.559 In fact, this whole line of inquiry just tended to go nowhere. 146 00:15:56.279 --> 00:15:58.159 Indeed, in the eyes of the Florentine inquisitor, it was convenient that it 147 00:15:58.200 --> 00:16:03.440 should. The Archbishop of Pisa had vouched for Castilli, insisting there was nothing 148 00:16:03.480 --> 00:16:08.480 suspicious in his claim that he no longer possessed Galileo's letter. The inquiry had 149 00:16:08.480 --> 00:16:12.960 been delayed, and everyone had been gently reminded that Galileo was under the protection 150 00:16:14.000 --> 00:16:17.399 of the Medici family in Rome. They could see that there was no point 151 00:16:17.440 --> 00:16:21.759 in banging their heads against a brick wall. But we need not be as 152 00:16:21.840 --> 00:16:26.639 quick as they were. Its lego of these questions for the conversations of Galileo's 153 00:16:26.039 --> 00:16:33.600 disciples are interesting. The charge of atomism was certainly well founded. Both Galileo 154 00:16:33.639 --> 00:16:38.240 and his closest disciples were atomists. Soon after his return to Florence in sixteen 155 00:16:38.399 --> 00:16:45.440 ten, for example, Galleo converted the young Giovanni Camillie to atomism, a 156 00:16:45.480 --> 00:16:51.399 doctrine Camillii remained firmly attached to for the rest of his life, and Galleo's 157 00:16:51.399 --> 00:16:53.960 own account of his position seemed to leave no room at all for belief in 158 00:16:55.080 --> 00:17:00.639 miracles, which suggests that the rumors that his disciples were moving around was accurate. 159 00:17:02.600 --> 00:17:06.039 Moreover, we know things now today that the Inquisition simply didn't know. 160 00:17:06.799 --> 00:17:11.319 We know much more about Galleo than they did. It's really a striking fact 161 00:17:11.359 --> 00:17:15.839 that in the hundreds of letters written by Galileo that survived, there's absolutely no 162 00:17:15.000 --> 00:17:22.000 spontaneous expressions of piety. Such expressions occur only when he has himself been charged 163 00:17:22.000 --> 00:17:26.559 with impiety and This was really against the norm. And I have to stress 164 00:17:26.599 --> 00:17:33.599 that if you look at all the correspondences from people throughout the early modern period, 165 00:17:33.440 --> 00:17:41.160 expressions of piety, spontaneous expressions of piety extremely common. In fact, 166 00:17:41.200 --> 00:17:47.200 there was no attempt to invoke the ordinary, almost routine miracles that formed a 167 00:17:47.200 --> 00:17:55.200 part of counter Reformation spirituality. Now this is actually in opposition to Benedicto Castilli. 168 00:17:55.960 --> 00:17:59.559 Castilli was a scientist. He was both a Copernican and an atomist, 169 00:17:59.599 --> 00:18:04.680 but he was also a monk who was extremely pious. When he was seasick 170 00:18:06.119 --> 00:18:10.119 and feared drowning, he asked that his abage should be told so that he 171 00:18:10.200 --> 00:18:14.720 can pray for him. When Castily was ill, we have writings where he 172 00:18:14.839 --> 00:18:19.200 was praying to Saint Philip Needy and the saint, according to him, here's 173 00:18:19.279 --> 00:18:26.279 him in church. He writes how he sometimes hears sermons that feed his soul. 174 00:18:26.799 --> 00:18:34.880 If you're looking for evidence that you can be an early modern scientist and 175 00:18:36.039 --> 00:18:42.880 a pious Catholic, then Adito Castily is that evidence. And the problem that 176 00:18:42.920 --> 00:18:48.960 we get into with Galleo a lot of times is that so many, especially 177 00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:56.359 early modern biographers, want to desperately prove that he was a good Catholic in 178 00:18:56.400 --> 00:19:03.119 addition to being a great scientist. Now the problem, of course in all 179 00:19:03.200 --> 00:19:11.039 of this is Galileo is not, and never was Beneditto Castilli. We have 180 00:19:11.200 --> 00:19:17.480 no evidence of Galileo praising preachers, or praying to saints, or even purchasing 181 00:19:17.559 --> 00:19:23.359 indulgences. Only rarely does he ask others to pray for him. Frankly, 182 00:19:25.039 --> 00:19:27.960 this might be one of those times when the lack of evidence becomes evidence. 183 00:19:30.039 --> 00:19:36.640 Galileo is utterly silent on religion. One contemporary wrote, quote, Galileo never 184 00:19:36.799 --> 00:19:41.880 spoke of Jesus end quote. There's no direct evidence as to what he thought 185 00:19:41.920 --> 00:19:47.759 about Christ. So, like other men of his age, I mean recall 186 00:19:47.920 --> 00:19:52.480 neither Cortes nor pis Ro wrote about their piety, we might have considered him 187 00:19:53.119 --> 00:19:59.880 quite agnostic. Galileo, unlike many of his contemporaries, seems to have been 188 00:20:00.240 --> 00:20:04.519 quite unwilling to admit that God would or even could intervene in historical time. 189 00:20:06.839 --> 00:20:12.079 And there are more examples of Galileo's alleged impiety. In sixteen twelve, Julius 190 00:20:12.119 --> 00:20:17.200 Caesar le Galla had argued that, if it were up to nature, the 191 00:20:17.359 --> 00:20:21.960 entire surface of the world would be covered with water, but God, by 192 00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:27.039 his peculiar providence, had arranged for there to be dry land. Galileo's response 193 00:20:27.119 --> 00:20:32.599 to this was not pious in the least. He wrote, quote, if 194 00:20:32.640 --> 00:20:36.920 water does not cover the entire surface of the globe because providence of the divine 195 00:20:37.039 --> 00:20:41.799 architect, then you should not say that it would be more in accord with 196 00:20:41.880 --> 00:20:45.359 nature if water covered the entire surface of the globe. For this Providence has 197 00:20:45.400 --> 00:20:51.319 imposed much better laws on parts of the universe than that nature. Assuming that 198 00:20:51.480 --> 00:20:56.279 is that it is appropriate to distinguish providence from nature in this way end quote. 199 00:20:56.359 --> 00:21:03.119 Galleo is saying two things here. First, providence only operates through general 200 00:21:03.200 --> 00:21:07.079 laws. There's no such thing as a particular providence, of which Lagala writes 201 00:21:07.880 --> 00:21:11.759 this is one hundred percent heretical, by the way, so we should not 202 00:21:11.799 --> 00:21:18.480 be surprised if it's implicit rather than explicit in Galleo's comment. And second, 203 00:21:18.880 --> 00:21:23.039 if providence only operates through general laws, then there's no meaningful distinction between providence 204 00:21:23.079 --> 00:21:29.640 and nature, between divine decree and natural regularity. In other words, the 205 00:21:29.799 --> 00:21:34.880 entire concept of God itself becomes superfluous. Now. Frankly, at this point 206 00:21:36.240 --> 00:21:40.920 it looks like the Florentine inquisition was probably right. The fact that the case 207 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:45.279 was dropped ultimately for a lack of evidence doesn't mean that the charges were mistaken. 208 00:21:48.279 --> 00:21:52.160 But the Roman inquisition, unable to proceed further, simply returned to an 209 00:21:52.240 --> 00:21:56.799 earlier claim that Copernicanism should be regarded as heresy, and if Galleos says anything 210 00:21:56.839 --> 00:22:02.240 about Copernicanism, then that's it, end of story. According to some, 211 00:22:02.440 --> 00:22:07.200 Galileo had avowed his Copernicanism in his letter on Sunspots, so the inquisition ordered 212 00:22:07.200 --> 00:22:11.920 that a copy of the text should be supplied to a panel of theologians on 213 00:22:12.160 --> 00:22:18.160 the February twenty fourth, sixteen sixteen. These theologians proceeded to condemn to propositions 214 00:22:18.960 --> 00:22:23.000 number one that the sun does not move, which they held to be quote 215 00:22:23.359 --> 00:22:30.599 foolish and absurd in philosophy, and formally heretical, since it explicitly contradicts in 216 00:22:30.680 --> 00:22:34.400 many places the sense of the Holy Scripture, according to the literal meaning of 217 00:22:34.480 --> 00:22:38.359 the words, and according to the common interpretation and understanding of the Holy Fathers 218 00:22:38.640 --> 00:22:44.440 and the doctrine of theology. End quote. That the earth moves and rotates 219 00:22:44.440 --> 00:22:48.359 once a day, which was held, if not heretical to be quote, 220 00:22:48.559 --> 00:22:53.599 at least erroneous in faith end quote. To put it bluntly, this condemnation 221 00:22:53.920 --> 00:23:00.799 was inevitable. Yet even staunch Jesuits were not interested in totally bad discussions of 222 00:23:00.799 --> 00:23:07.000 Copernicanism. They were happy to admit that Copernicus's calculations offered mathematicians a superior model 223 00:23:07.000 --> 00:23:11.960 for calculating the positions of the heavenly bodies. You could do all that without 224 00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:18.640 saying that Copernicus's conclusions were true. What we have going on at the start 225 00:23:18.680 --> 00:23:25.920 of the seventeenth century is this kind of i'll say, uneasy truths. The 226 00:23:26.039 --> 00:23:32.240 Church could not ignore that Copernicus's math was correct, but it refused to admit 227 00:23:32.720 --> 00:23:37.240 that his conclusions were correct, a bizarre status quota, said the least. 228 00:23:37.480 --> 00:23:44.079 Like the Aristotelian philosophers, they were more than happy to accept all of Galileo's 229 00:23:44.079 --> 00:23:51.839 telescopic discoveries. What they would not accept is that those discoveries proved that Copernicanism 230 00:23:51.960 --> 00:23:56.400 was true. What all this information conveyed to Caalleo, though, was that 231 00:23:56.440 --> 00:24:00.920 there was no real danger for him right now. Could keep doing what he 232 00:24:00.960 --> 00:24:03.720 was doing and making discoveries and that wasn't going to imperil his well being. 233 00:24:06.240 --> 00:24:11.240 That wasn't enough for Galileo. He balked at the suggestion that Copernicanism wasn't compatible 234 00:24:11.279 --> 00:24:18.079 with the scriptures. Galleo insisted it was. He wanted to prove that Copernicanism 235 00:24:18.160 --> 00:24:25.480 was true. It wasn't enough for Galileo to be allowed to make new discoveries. 236 00:24:26.640 --> 00:24:30.599 He wanted to be able to prove what those discoveries meant, and to 237 00:24:30.680 --> 00:24:37.920 do that he decided he would go to Rome. The Florentine ambassador to Rome 238 00:24:38.000 --> 00:24:41.759 nearly fell out of his chair when he heard the news. This was not 239 00:24:41.920 --> 00:24:48.279 the time. He frantically wrote to Galileo to try and get Roman authorities to 240 00:24:48.319 --> 00:24:56.400 adopt new ideas. The present pope was extremely conservative, but Galileo would not 241 00:24:56.480 --> 00:25:00.680 be dissuaded, and as soon as he rived in Rome, he felt like 242 00:25:00.759 --> 00:25:07.440 he was directly engaged with battle in his opponents, and his health improved everywhere 243 00:25:07.440 --> 00:25:11.920 he went. He announced that Copernicus had provided an account of the physical structure 244 00:25:11.920 --> 00:25:18.240 of the universe and not a mere mathematical model. Onlookers admired his performances, 245 00:25:18.759 --> 00:25:26.039 while completely unconvinced by his reasoning. By bringing the conflict out into the open 246 00:25:26.319 --> 00:25:30.839 by refusing to compromise, by insisting that matters be settled one way or the 247 00:25:30.880 --> 00:25:36.559 other. Galileo hoped to obtain one thing above all else, peace of mind, 248 00:25:37.480 --> 00:25:41.000 but it didn't do any good. He soon found that people who counted 249 00:25:41.279 --> 00:25:45.160 were willing to take delivery of written arguments, but not willing to enter into 250 00:25:45.200 --> 00:25:49.519 open discussions and debates. So Galileo shifted tax and he did put all of 251 00:25:49.559 --> 00:25:53.759 his arguments into writing. And it's a good thing too. Because he put 252 00:25:53.799 --> 00:25:57.240 all of his arguments into writing, we can reconstruct exactly what they were. 253 00:25:57.279 --> 00:26:03.880 And this is by far and away Galileo's strongest advocacy of Copernicanism. So he 254 00:26:03.960 --> 00:26:08.920 wrote five main claims. First, that Copernicus had never intended to provide an 255 00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:14.640 account of how the universe is really constructed, only to brought an aid in 256 00:26:14.720 --> 00:26:21.839 calculation. Second, Copernicus need not be taken seriously because there were hardly any 257 00:26:21.839 --> 00:26:27.440 Copernicans. If Copernicanism was right, would have general support. But Galleo insisted 258 00:26:27.440 --> 00:26:33.200 that there were more Copernicans than were generally recognized, particularly as many were cautious 259 00:26:33.240 --> 00:26:37.599 about declaring their views in public. But he also tried to turn a major 260 00:26:37.640 --> 00:26:44.880 weakness in his position into a strength. What was crucial was that every Copernican 261 00:26:45.039 --> 00:26:49.640 had once been an orthodox Aristotelian. How then to explain their conversion. The 262 00:26:49.640 --> 00:26:53.920 only possible explanation, he claimed, was the strength of the arguments in favor 263 00:26:53.920 --> 00:27:02.359 of Copernicanism. Galleo thus sought not entirely successfully be said to turn being a 264 00:27:02.400 --> 00:27:07.920 minority from a disadvantage into an advantage. Where his opponents were happy to declare 265 00:27:07.119 --> 00:27:11.440 a bias in favor of tradition, he was prepared to argu in favor of 266 00:27:11.440 --> 00:27:17.000 a bias toward innovation. New arguments were more likely to be right than old 267 00:27:17.079 --> 00:27:23.720 arguments, because new arguments implied new thinking. And his third claim that because 268 00:27:23.839 --> 00:27:30.720 theology was the leading edge of science, it was perfectly proper for theologians to 269 00:27:30.720 --> 00:27:37.079 settle disputes between astronomers. Here, Galileo argued that one had to distinguish between 270 00:27:37.119 --> 00:27:41.039 the subject matter of a body of knowledge and the expertise of those who studied 271 00:27:41.079 --> 00:27:47.200 it. The subject matter of theology, which concerned itself with the salvation of 272 00:27:47.279 --> 00:27:52.480 souls, was certainly superior to the subject matter of astronomy, but this Galleo 273 00:27:52.599 --> 00:27:59.359 argued, did not make theologians expert in astronomy. In arguing in favor of 274 00:27:59.440 --> 00:28:04.519 technical expertise, Galileo was presenting a claim that seems absolutely obvious to us, 275 00:28:06.119 --> 00:28:11.160 but that would have seemed much less obvious to his contemporaries. In the first 276 00:28:11.160 --> 00:28:17.000 place, Renaissance culture was much more unified than ours is. Every theologian had 277 00:28:17.000 --> 00:28:22.519 studied philosophy, including astronomy, before studying theology. It was therefore plausible to 278 00:28:22.599 --> 00:28:27.599 insist that every theologian was capable of understanding and evaluating the arguments of astronomers. 279 00:28:29.759 --> 00:28:34.079 Second, in a society in which was sharply stratified between those who performed manual 280 00:28:34.119 --> 00:28:38.559 labor and those who did not, it was perfectly normal for gentlemen to give 281 00:28:38.680 --> 00:28:45.720 orders to builders, armorers, estate managers anyone, even though they lacked any 282 00:28:45.759 --> 00:28:51.759 specialist expertise. In arguing that there were some choices that were properly the preserve 283 00:28:51.839 --> 00:28:56.839 of experts, Galileo was defending a new type of authority. Galileo that had 284 00:28:56.839 --> 00:29:03.759 to overcome the most important of all arguments, the argument that the Bible could 285 00:29:03.759 --> 00:29:08.759 not be wrong when it's said that the sun moved here Galleo struck once more 286 00:29:08.920 --> 00:29:14.640 a unique argument. He argued that the Bible should be read in light of 287 00:29:14.799 --> 00:29:22.599 current scientific knowledge, rather than science be reconstructed to fit the Bible. In 288 00:29:22.680 --> 00:29:29.279 making this argument, Galleo cites Augustine eight times, Saint Jerome three times, 289 00:29:29.599 --> 00:29:34.240 and a myriad other Biblical authors. Now, it would be easy to form 290 00:29:34.279 --> 00:29:41.559 the impression from all of these different citations that Galileo was widely read in matters 291 00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:45.640 of theology. Indeed, this is certainly the impression he wants to give the 292 00:29:45.680 --> 00:29:51.440 person reading his arguments, but it would be a false impression. Sadly, 293 00:29:51.599 --> 00:29:56.920 it seems contradicting his claims of genuine piety. All of Galleo's theological arguments were 294 00:29:57.200 --> 00:30:03.519 second hand. Sources of them were primary sources. All those eight citations from 295 00:30:03.559 --> 00:30:10.720 Saint Augustine actually came from other people's arguments. While the Inquisition in Rome was 296 00:30:10.799 --> 00:30:17.039 willing to admit that Copernicanism might be theoretically possible, they told Galileo that he 297 00:30:17.200 --> 00:30:23.519 needed proof, and specifically that he needed proof that the Earth moved. Galileo 298 00:30:23.599 --> 00:30:30.240 believed he did have such proof in the form of the Earth's tides. He 299 00:30:30.319 --> 00:30:36.480 confided this to the cardinal whom he felt most sympathetic to his cause, Cardinal 300 00:30:36.720 --> 00:30:41.839 Orsini. Galleo's theory of the tides was straightforward. The speed at which different 301 00:30:41.880 --> 00:30:47.240 parts of the surface of the Earth moved through space varies. Because the Earth 302 00:30:47.599 --> 00:30:52.759 is both orbiting the Sun and rotating on its axis, two constant movements produce 303 00:30:52.799 --> 00:31:00.279 a combined movement, which involves acceleration and deceleration. The result on long bodies 304 00:31:00.279 --> 00:31:04.279 of water that run from east to west is that water piles up at one 305 00:31:04.440 --> 00:31:10.839 end or the other, creating tides. Now, of course, many have 306 00:31:10.880 --> 00:31:15.920 claimed that there's a simple logical error in Galileo's argument. They maintain that while 307 00:31:15.960 --> 00:31:22.240 acceleration and deceleration may be apparent to someone looking at the Earth from an external 308 00:31:22.279 --> 00:31:26.640 fixed point, they would never be apparent to someone on the surface. This 309 00:31:26.759 --> 00:31:30.400 is just wrong, and the physical principle Galleos invoking does exist, but it 310 00:31:30.440 --> 00:31:33.720 does not play a noticeable role in the formation of the tides, which is 311 00:31:33.759 --> 00:31:40.759 of course caused by the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun. By 312 00:31:40.799 --> 00:31:45.720 the time Galileo was ready to publish, he knew that tides varied in power 313 00:31:45.759 --> 00:31:49.400 and condition. He also understood that there were two tides per day, not 314 00:31:49.559 --> 00:31:55.519 one. These were issues he would need to account for in any publication. 315 00:31:56.440 --> 00:32:00.920 Galleo's theory of tides was thus defective, it was odds with the fact, 316 00:32:00.920 --> 00:32:07.400 and it was internally inconsistent. But in sixteen sixteen he offered a second supplementary 317 00:32:07.519 --> 00:32:12.880 argument in support of the Earth's rotation, the fact that the trade winds blow 318 00:32:13.160 --> 00:32:16.079 from east to west. Now, of course, it so happens that the 319 00:32:16.200 --> 00:32:21.400 rotation of the Earth is the true cause of the directionality of the trade winds. 320 00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:25.920 Bacon, in a text surely unknown to Galleo, had tried to explain 321 00:32:25.960 --> 00:32:31.240 this phenomenon, sticking to Ptolemy as a result of the rotating heavens rubbing against 322 00:32:31.279 --> 00:32:37.680 the Earth, and the possibility of such an explanation may have prevented Galileo from 323 00:32:37.799 --> 00:32:40.240 laying nearly as much weight on the argument from the trade winds as on the 324 00:32:40.319 --> 00:32:45.960 argument from the tides. Moreover, nearly everyone has some experience of the tides, 325 00:32:46.480 --> 00:32:51.759 while Galleo, like most Italians, had no experience with the trade winds, 326 00:32:52.039 --> 00:32:58.119 making it a less plausible argument. But there's another reason why Galileo was 327 00:32:58.160 --> 00:33:01.599 reluctant to acknowledge the supure periority of the argument from trade winds over the argument 328 00:33:01.599 --> 00:33:07.119 from tides. He had invented the latter himself, while he had borrowed the 329 00:33:07.119 --> 00:33:14.920 former from someone else. So Galileo marshaled all his arguments in favor of a 330 00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:20.920 moving earth, in other words, in favor of Copernicanism. He knew very 331 00:33:21.000 --> 00:33:24.480 little, however, about what was really going on. It took him quite 332 00:33:24.480 --> 00:33:29.240 some time to establish that there was no prospect of his being found guilty of 333 00:33:29.279 --> 00:33:32.680 heresy, and when he did, he promptly attributed to its own presence in 334 00:33:32.799 --> 00:33:37.200 Rome and the skill with which he had presented his case, when in fact 335 00:33:37.599 --> 00:33:42.279 there had been no danger from the day of his arrival. And this is 336 00:33:42.319 --> 00:33:47.079 because of his greatest success with Cardinal Orsini, who, armed with galles argument 337 00:33:47.079 --> 00:33:51.839 about the tides, approached the Pope on his behalf on the twenty fourth of 338 00:33:51.880 --> 00:33:57.119 February, the very day actually, when the Panel of Theologians ruled once and 339 00:33:57.160 --> 00:34:01.880 for all that Copernicanism was heretical. It was already too late. In fact, 340 00:34:01.920 --> 00:34:06.480 it had been too late when Galileo first talked of coming to Rome. 341 00:34:07.280 --> 00:34:12.199 But the decision of these theologians had now to be turned into a program of 342 00:34:12.280 --> 00:34:16.239 action. On March the fifth, the Congregation of Index, part of the 343 00:34:16.280 --> 00:34:23.199 Inquisition, issued a decree banning a book about the revolutions of the Earth and 344 00:34:23.280 --> 00:34:30.199 banning all books that taught the Copernicanism was true. Now, to be clear, 345 00:34:30.800 --> 00:34:37.719 there was no direct mention of Galileo's letter on sunspots, presumably indeference to 346 00:34:37.760 --> 00:34:40.440 the Grand Duke of Florence, who had made it clear that he was going 347 00:34:40.519 --> 00:34:47.440 to support his court mathematician. Even more surprising is that the word heresy, 348 00:34:47.719 --> 00:34:52.000 which had been central to the judgment of the Panel in the Theologians, appears 349 00:34:52.320 --> 00:34:59.880 nowhere in the Congregation's decree. Be that as it may. On the twenty 350 00:35:00.079 --> 00:35:06.679 fifth of February sixteen sixteen, the Pope told the Inquisition to have a talk 351 00:35:06.719 --> 00:35:15.920 with Galileo. They were to warn him that he must abandon Copernicanism. Specifically, 352 00:35:15.800 --> 00:35:21.559 he was to be read out loud a warning directly from the Pope, 353 00:35:21.559 --> 00:35:30.119 a sort of medieval cease and desist letter. Galileo was never to publicly support 354 00:35:30.159 --> 00:35:39.000 Copernicanism again. Now this letter is of dramatic consequence to our story, because 355 00:35:39.679 --> 00:35:45.480 years later Galileo is going to assert that he never heard the contents of the 356 00:35:45.559 --> 00:35:52.840 letter. He will swear that if there ever was such a letter, the 357 00:35:52.880 --> 00:36:00.480 Cardinals never read it to him as instructed. The question then becomes was Galileo 358 00:36:00.639 --> 00:36:09.960 given a friendly warning or was he formally prohibited from supporting Copernicanism. To all 359 00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:15.840 the lawyers who are listening, you will know that such a difference counts for 360 00:36:15.880 --> 00:36:23.440 a lot, especially in this case. Now there is a text, and 361 00:36:24.159 --> 00:36:30.239 this text, and we have it, does prohibit Galileo from defending Copernicanism quote 362 00:36:30.360 --> 00:36:38.840 in any way whatever, either orally or in writing end quote. But of 363 00:36:38.840 --> 00:36:46.280 course the question is is it real. When in the eighteen sixties the record 364 00:36:46.320 --> 00:36:52.920 of the Inquisition's dealings with Galileo was made public, this document became the object 365 00:36:52.920 --> 00:36:57.960 of heated debate. Some said that it was a forgery, introduced only into 366 00:36:57.960 --> 00:37:04.199 the file in sixteen thirty three, about seventeen years later, in order to 367 00:37:04.239 --> 00:37:09.559 make it easy to convict Galileo. Modern scholars, however, are nearly all 368 00:37:09.599 --> 00:37:15.760 agreed that the document is genuine, and consequently that its warning was read to 369 00:37:15.800 --> 00:37:24.840 Galleo. Thus, there would be three possibilities. One Galileo heard the letter 370 00:37:25.559 --> 00:37:32.000 and didn't say anything. Two Galileo did hear the letter and verbally assented, 371 00:37:34.280 --> 00:37:40.360 and three Galileo never got the letter at all. I want to be clear 372 00:37:42.039 --> 00:37:45.920 in any case, the evidence is unequivocal, and that is that Galileo was 373 00:37:46.079 --> 00:37:53.440 never handed the letter. He was never given the formal text, so unfortunately, 374 00:37:54.039 --> 00:38:00.519 will always be stuck wondering was it truly read to him. Ten years 375 00:38:00.599 --> 00:38:07.559 later, Galleo would prove unable to recall precisely what happened had he been formally 376 00:38:07.599 --> 00:38:13.960 warned. He didn't think so, but he couldn't recall for certain We will 377 00:38:14.039 --> 00:38:19.039 probably never know what happened that day. In the offices of the Inquisition, 378 00:38:19.960 --> 00:38:25.760 certainly no one wrote down a transcript that being said. Yalleo was careful not 379 00:38:25.920 --> 00:38:31.880 to mention Copernicanism in print for the next decade, So I think the proper 380 00:38:32.000 --> 00:38:38.400 inference here is that he must have at least understood he was not to broach 381 00:38:38.760 --> 00:38:46.039 the topic in public. On March the eleventh, sixteen sixteen, Galileo had 382 00:38:46.079 --> 00:38:52.480 a private audience with the Pope. Again, we do not have a transcript 383 00:38:52.559 --> 00:38:57.559 of what was said, but Galileo left feeling reassured. We know that from 384 00:38:57.599 --> 00:39:05.719 his writings. The biggest takeaway for Galileo from the events of sixteen fifteen sixteen 385 00:39:05.840 --> 00:39:12.159 sixteen was probably an intense mistrust of the courts. He did not like the 386 00:39:12.199 --> 00:39:15.239 experience, and I can see why. I mean, he seemed to get 387 00:39:15.280 --> 00:39:22.880 assurances that everything was fine from multiple people throughout the process, including evidently the 388 00:39:22.920 --> 00:39:31.760 Pope himself, and yet he was to some extent censured. But as we 389 00:39:31.840 --> 00:39:37.280 will see next week in our final Galileo episode before we turn to the Inquisition 390 00:39:37.360 --> 00:39:47.320 and his trial, any belief that he was safe was profoundly misguided. Now, 391 00:39:47.400 --> 00:39:52.320 as always, if you're looking for more content before next week, you 392 00:39:52.320 --> 00:39:58.480 can get a free trial of Western Sieve two point zero were past the wars 393 00:39:58.480 --> 00:40:02.599 of the successors at at this point and starting to contemplate the rise of Rome 394 00:40:02.679 --> 00:40:09.840 in dramatic detail. Can check that out either using the Patreon link or theglow 395 00:40:09.880 --> 00:40:13.840 dot com link. They're both in the show notes, and they both offer 396 00:40:13.960 --> 00:40:17.119 seven day free trials if that's something you're interested in.