Galileo’s Glassworks

Galileo’s Glassworks
Author :
Publisher : Harvard University Press
Total Pages : 240
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780674042636
ISBN-13 : 0674042638
Rating : 4/5 (638 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Galileo’s Glassworks by : Eileen Reeves

Download or read book Galileo’s Glassworks written by Eileen Reeves and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Dutch telescope and the Italian scientist Galileo have long enjoyed a durable connection in the popular mind--so much so that it seems this simple glass instrument transformed a rather modest middle-aged scholar into the bold icon of the Copernican Revolution. And yet the extraordinary speed with which the telescope changed the course of Galileo's life and early modern astronomy obscures the astronomer's own curiously delayed encounter with the instrument. This book considers the lapse between the telescope's creation in The Hague in 1608 and Galileo's alleged acquaintance with such news ten months later. In an inquiry into scientific and cultural history, Eileen Reeves explores two fundamental questions of intellectual accountability: what did Galileo know of the invention of the telescope, and when did he know it? The record suggests that Galileo, like several of his peers, initially misunderstood the basic design of the telescope. In seeking to explain the gap between the telescope's emergence and the alleged date of the astronomer's acquaintance with it, Reeves explores how and why information about the telescope was transmitted, suppressed, or misconstrued in the process. Her revised version of events, rejecting the usual explanations of silence and idleness, is a revealing account of the role that misprision, error, and preconception play in the advancement of science. Along the way, Reeves offers a revised chronology of Galileo's life in a critical period and, more generally, shows how documents typically outside the scope of early modern natural philosophy--medieval romances, travel literature, and idle speculations--relate to two crucial events in the history of science.


Galileo’s Glassworks Related Books

Galileo’s Glassworks
Language: en
Pages: 240
Authors: Eileen Reeves
Categories: Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2009-07-01 - Publisher: Harvard University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Dutch telescope and the Italian scientist Galileo have long enjoyed a durable connection in the popular mind--so much so that it seems this simple glass ins
Galileo's Reading
Language: en
Pages: 257
Authors: Crystal Hall
Categories: Literary Criticism
Type: BOOK - Published: 2013-12-12 - Publisher: Cambridge University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Galileo (1564–1642) incorporated throughout his work the language of battle, the rhetoric of the epic, and the structure of romance as a means to elicit emoti
Galileo's Idol
Language: en
Pages: 211
Authors: Nick Wilding
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2014-11-27 - Publisher: University of Chicago Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Galileo’s Idol offers a vivid depiction of Galileo’s friend, student, and patron, Gianfrancesco Sagredo (1571–1620). Sagredo’s life, which has never bef
Galileo's Visions
Language: en
Pages: 337
Authors: Marco Piccolino
Categories: Medical
Type: BOOK - Published: 2014 - Publisher: Oxford University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

In a fascinating and accessible style, Marco Piccolino and Nick Wade analyse the scientific and philosophical work of Galileo Galilei from the particular viewpo
Galileo's Telescope
Language: en
Pages: 235
Authors: Massimo Bucciantini
Categories: Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2015-03-23 - Publisher: Harvard University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An innovative exploration of the development of a revolutionary optical device and how it changed the world. Between 1608 and 1610 the canopy of the night sky c