Mathematics, Motion, and Truth: The Earth goes round the Sun
Speaker(s):
Jeremy Gray
Date/Time: 02/11/2009, 5:30pm
Venue: Barnard's Inn Hall
The reality of the Earth's motion, as proclaimed by Copernicus, quickly proved contentious. Accepted by Kepler, disputed by theologians (Lutheran and Catholic alike), veiled in suggestions of mere convenience, adopted and explained by Newton as a consequence of universal gravitation, parent of the notion of force - What is involved in accepting as true that the Earth goes round the Sun? This lecture traces these debates from the early 1600s to the time of Poincaré.
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