Download History of Astronomy- links and ties to Astrology

Project by Polly Adams
Maggie Aldworth
Avery Sheiner
Link to Astrology:
 In ancient times many peoples, such as the Greek saw
shapes in the stars and decided to tie meanings to
them. These meanings turned into the idea of
Astrology, and many peoples believed that they could
find ideas on their futures by looking to the heavens.
People Finding Meanings in the
Stars
 The beginnings of astronomy was not scientific
nor religious in nature, instead it was practical and
very down to Earth. Seafarers needed to navigate
their vessels and farmers had to know when to
plant their crops during the year. In a very real
sense, human survival depended on knowledge of
the heavens.
As a result,
 The ability to predict
the arrival of the
season as well as
other astronomical
events was
undoubtedly a highly
prized skill to
possess.
When one knows the stars…
 The humans ability to
perceive patterns in
the stars lead to the
“invention” of
constellations as a
convenient means of
labeling regions of
the celestial sphere.
And so, Astrology was born! Or gave
birth?
 Some argue that Astronomy was born
out of Astrology, or even the other way
around. Astrology is the study of stars
that was started thousands of years
ago, that is based off of the belief that
shapes made from stars as their
vertices mean something about a
person’s personality or even future.
Astronomy, on the other hand, is a
natural study of celestial objects
looking at them scientifically rather
than metaphorically, and finds
scientific results rather than finding
shapes in the sky and making
meaning of them.
Astronomy in Early Cultures
 Many separate cultures
all over the world built
large and elaborate
structures to serve as
primitive calendars. In
some cases these were
also used for religious
rites, like some place now
in the use of Astrology.
Such as…
 Stonehenge is located on
Salisbury Plain, England.
It is believed that this
structure was an early
kind of 3D calendar or
almanac, enabling it’s
builders and their
descendants to identify
important dates by
means of specific
celestial events.
Or Also…
 The big horn medicine wheel
in Wyoming is similar to
Stonehenge in design, and
presumably, intent. It’s
alignment with the rising and
setting of the sun and with
some other bright stars,
indicates that the Plains
Indians had much more than
a passing familiarity with the
changing of the night sky.
And One Final Example…
 Caracol Temple, built by the
Mayans around 1000 A.D. in
Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, is
much more sophisticated than
Stonehenge. It’s windows built
specially to allign with the
sunrise and sunsets at the
solstices and equinoxes, as
well as the rising and setting
of the planet Venus as to help
them understand the seasons
and how to plant crops year
round.
Links Between Time
 The Arab influence on
modern Astronomy is
subtle, but quite
pervasive. For instance,
many of the
mathematical techniques
involved in trigonometry
were developed by
Muslim Astronomers in
response to very practical
problems.
In Ancient Greece,
 To the Greeks, the universe
was basically the solar
system, namely the Sun,
Earth and planets known
at the time. They believe
that many stars beyond our
solar system were fixed in
one position.
Continued:
 Greeks also saw the
movements of the
Earth, Sun and Moon
as simple- apposed to
the movements of
other planets.
Skipping a Few Hundred Years…
 During the time span
between the Greeks and
the Renaissance, ideas
about the stars and night
sky didn’t seem to
develop as much as they
did during the beginning
years of the Renaissance.
The Renaissance and Astronomy
 Moving from Ancient
Astronomy to the Renaissance,
the idea of the sky changed
greatly in the sense that people’s
knowledge of the universe
expanded so that they saw it as
an expansion of the Earth rather
than a practical map used only
to determine the seasons.
 Western thought moved away
from the passive acceptance of
ancient dogma and static
believes towards critical
thinking and observational
testing.
Some of these thoughts were thought by
great thinkers…like these “founding fathers”
 Plato
 Aristotle
 Nicholas Copernicus
 Galileo Galilei
 All of these influential
historical figures not
only contributed to the
ideas of modern
astronomy, but also
popular theorems and
new ideas in their time
period.
Plato’s ideas turned into Play Dough… for
other astronomers.
 Under the mentorship of
Socrates, Plato was one of the
earliest to determine that the
other planets in the solar system
would have to always “orbit the
Earth” in a circle. This idea
would continue to be “molded”
and refined into the
understanding of planetary
motion that we have today.
Aristotle
 As the student of Plato,
Aristotle was highly
influential through his
models of the solar
system. Despite the fact
that he believed the
planets still orbited the
Earth, he was correct in
in his observations about
Copernicus’ work
 Copernicus rediscovered the
model of the solar system
making it so that the Earth
revolved around the sun instead
of the other way around. He
made the discovery that is
accepted in the world today as
complete fact that the only thing
orbiting the Earth is in fact the
moon.
 His major motivation was
simplicity towards the mapping
out of our solar system.
However, he still did not quite
grasp the fact that other planets
did not orbit in concentric
circles around the sun as he
knew that the Earth did.
Yo, Galileo!
 Copernicus’s work had little
affect on the general public of
the time because of his
contradictions to the popular
believes of religion. So, after
Copernicus’s death, that sly dog
Galileo popularized his ideas
and in turn got most of the
credit for discovering them.
 Galileo was a very famous Italian
mathematician and philosopher.
Because he was very willing to
perform his experiments to test
his ideas, the knew technology
of the telescope which he
recreated himself and used in
his investigations, he
revolutionized the way science
was conducted that he is now
commonly known as the
“Father” of experimental science
Speaking of using telescopes…
 The telescope was one of the
first instruments used to aid the
exploration of the stars. First
invented in Holland by Hans
Lippershay in 1608, this early
design consisted of a convex
objective lens and a concave
eyepiece. In the following year
Galileo Gelilei used the same
design idea to create a tool to
help him with his exploration of
the stars. This tool was one of
the windows leading to modern
day astronomy.
Combining Physics and Astronomy
 When the idea of
physics became more
popular and advanced
as time went on, it was
of course applied to
modern astronomy.
Using new technologies
and theorems scientists
were allowed to make
many big guesses about
the universe we live in.
Such as….
 Using physics and
scientific method people
moved onwards in the
pursuit of knowledge
linked to astronomy. This
lead to many facts that we
find very obvious and true
fact today, like that our
solar system has 8 planets
all revolving around the
same star, what we have
learned to call the sun.