Bede

We all know that Copernicus defied common sense to say the earth moved around the sun. What I am asking is why he came up with this idea. Here's some views from an essay of mine:

Now before the headbangers claim this is apologetic crap, the essay this is from did very well in my MA (getting a top grade) at my secular college. So, why did Copernicus move the sun to the centre? I submit it was a religious move that he sought to justify with mathematics (and, if you look at his maths, he didn't succeed very well).

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Peter Kirby

Take it as given that early scientists had theological inclinations and motivations. Where do we go from there?

best,
Peter Kirby

Bede

Peter,

Yes, early scientists had theological motivations. They expected to find laws of nature that reflected the glory of the creator. My question here is a narrower one: we know Copernicus wanted a cosmology that was worthy of God, but why did he think that putting the sun in the centre and moving the earth around it would give him that? After all, we all admit that the Bible, like the Greek astronomers, says the earth is stationary.

I have no idea, honest.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reaon

Hugo Holbling

John Henry is quite emphatic that Neoplatonic ideas were a significant (if not the most significant) influence on Copernicus and he insists on this in his paper Magic and Science:

However, Musgrave denies in a paper of his own that instrumentalist astronomical ideas held sway at all (attributing this theory at least in part to Duhem), claiming instead that the debate was a methodological one between dogmatic and critical realists. In that case, it would appear more likely that Copernicus was attempting to solve a real problem but may have arrived at his solution under the influence of heliocentric Neoplatonic ideas. Westfall, for his part, remarks that Copernicus was intending to construct a system that "satisfied the requirement of geometric simplicity", so we may wonder where he got that criterion (it may have again come from Neoplatonism, but what other options are there?).

More digging required, i guess.

Family Man

For the most part, I agree with your analysis. Where I might quibble is this thought: that a simpler model is better in and of itself. Absent Christianity, that is motive enough to develop a new theory. That a religious scientist would couch his research in terms that are compatible with his beliefs is no surprise.

In other words, if you're trying to claim that religion motivated Copernicus to develop his theory, you're stretching things a bit again. If you're saying that Copernicus was able to reconcile his scientific work with his religious beliefs without much difficulty, I fully concur.

Bede

Familyman,

But why is this true? Cop and all his contempories justify this idea using the religious argument given in the OP. How do you know Cop is reasoning in the opposite direction to that he says he is?

BTW, I'm looking forward to your thoughts on Lindberg and Numbers.

Also, Hugo - I am not sure who these heliocentric Platonists are supposed to be. Pythag and co. were not heliocentrists either - they had both the earth and sun moving around some mysterious central fire (which isn't the sun). Was it just a fruitful misreading?

Yours

Bede

Family Man

I don't know anything about Copernicus's mental state, and neither do you. As I'm sure you know, however, a historical subject's stated claims are not to be taken at face value, especially in the realm of an emotionally charged subject as religion. What is essential to motivate the new theory was the unwieldiness of the geocentric models. Without that, there would have been no motivation to change the model. To say that his religious beliefs caused him to create his new theory, however, requires us to get into Copernicus's head, which we can't do. Copernicus's comments could be taken as an after-the-fact rationalization rather than a before-the-fact motivation. And given human nature, the former strikes me as being more likely.

The fact is, the idea that the more we know about science the closer we get to knowing god was a common idea that many used to justify scientific research . Galileo, Kepler, Newton among many other lesser figures bought into that notion. But to say that their religion caused them to study science would require that you demonstrate that they wouldn't have studied science if Christianity hadn't existed. I don't see how such a claim could be verified.

Thus, the best that can be said here is that the early Christian scientists saw no conflicts between their beliefs and their scientific works. That is undeniably true. That Christianity caused the scientific revolution is going beyond what responsible historical analysis can claim.

BTW: I already posted my take on Lindberg and Numbers at Science, Religion, and Conflict Briefly, I fully agree that the conflict between science and religion is frequently overblown. But I also feel that the notion that there was no conflict between science and religion to be equally ill-founded. That Copernicus and the other scientists felt a need to justify their research in religious terms itself indicates the tenseness between the two institutions.

Hugo Holbling

Fair point, Bede, but I’m not licked yet. There’s a strong current of Neo-Platonism running through the time and the best overview of it I know of is Kuhn’s in his masterful The Copernican Revolution, particularly pp128 – 144. The placing of the sun at the centre was a symbolic device in much Neo-Platonic writing, wherein they equated it with God - Ficino’s On The Sun, for example, which Kuhn quotes. (I could give more references but – as you know – my library is split currently.) Even so, Kuhn himself admits that the point isn’t conclusively demonstrated by any means.

Kuhn quotes Copernicus’ illuminating preface in which he dedicates the work to Pope Paul III and refers to the letter of Lysis to Hipparchus, discussing the well-known Pythagorean and Neo-Platonic injunctions that Copernicus remarks that he has finally chosen to ignore. Moreover, Copernicus himself explains that he was moved to consider and construct his system by the errors and inconsistencies (as he calls them) of the Mathematicians; he took this attitude, it seems, from the Neo-Platonic tradition of which he was a part and which influenced him. It was inconceivable that the God he and other Neo-Platonists worshipped would have created a world in which such a disorganised astronomical picture was the best that could be done.

Copernicus conclusion that a perfect mathematical picture should be sought was after all not based on any new observation or astronomical discovery but instead (apparently) on his conviction that such a divine order should exist. Another thinker not so influenced may, for instance, have concluded that the difficulties could not be solved in a simple and orderly fashion. Furthermore, Copernicus seems to conflate order and mathematically beautiful, a move not made by the Aristotelians.

In summary, I don’t think it is possible to divorce Copernicus from the Neo-Platonic tradition. Whether this explains completely how he came up with his idea is another thing.

Bede

Familyman,

I accept we can't read minds but that never stops historians trying!

Let's consider a statement that you, I and Nick all agree with: that simple models are better than complicated ones.

Why do I think that? Because during my long years of a physics degree I didn't like complicated theories and felt warm inside about beautiful elegant ones (don't get me started on the wonders of statistical mechanics). Maybe you have similar experience.

But why did Nick feel this? He lived in the early sixteenth century and the poor guy went to Padua University (among others) instead of Oxford. He tells us he believed this because he wants models that fit with his conception of the divine mind. Now, unless you have a better idea, we can't simply reject that explanation as it both makes perfect sense and is stated by Nick himself. And not just Nick but many other thinkers of the time and before.

Take William of Ockham who famously never cut himself shaving. The sharpness of his razor is a matter of conventional wisdom today but we must consider the context he honed it in. To Will, writing about 1320, the only things we could be sure about were empirical sense data and God. And given God was a perfectly good explanation for anything, we don't need snazzy theories about secondary causes. So parsimony actually means godidit is all we should need. Unsurprisingly the natural scientists of Paris U treated Ockhamism like a bad rash but the Italians rather liked it, I gather.

So, why are simple theories better that complicated ones? And what is wrong with Nicks own stated explanation?

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Family Man

The problem with it is that it fails to take the context of the times into consideration. That Copernicus believed what he said I do not doubt; but he had to believe that. It was a requirement of the time. Thus, the question is not why simpler theories are better but whether someone's Christian belief caused them to think that simpler theories are better. In other words, the social context of the times required these scientists justify their research to their religious beliefs; there is nothing outside their questionable statements that suggests their beliefs required them to do the research they did.

Two points ought to illustrate what I mean. The first is that scientific findings that contradicted church teachings did not exactly immediately sweep the field because it was a more elegant theory. Cardinal Bellarmine, when presented with Galileo's argument, didn't slap his head and say "Of course. My theology requires me to accept this obviously simpler model over the one the Church taught me." On the contrary, he said something like: "I could care less it's simpler. Until you can demonstrate beyond doubt that you're right I'll stick with my Church's beloved epicycles." (Yeah, I'm playing fast and loose, but you get the point, I'm sure.) For most Christians of the time, a simpler theory in and of itself was not sufficient to effect a change of belief. So the question remains, is this an after the fact rationalization or a the cause? Given the resistance displayed by the church, I'd opt for the former.

The second point is that as a method for discovering God, science was a abject failure. Kepler thought everything he discovered pointed toward the trinity. Newton, less than a century later, became convinced that trinitarianism was the work of the devil and wrote around a million words in defense of arianism. The real power of science has always been its ability to describe the natural world, and I doubt there are many physic majors that are aware of the theological predilictions of two of the major icons in their field. Which suggests to me that, even if your desired point is true, it is one of the great historical non-questions of all time. Even if you could demonstrate that Christianity encouraged science, it doesn't suggest that Christianity is true. All it really suggests is that it is human.