Matt+King+-+Entry+2+(Due+Sept.+14)

 History tells us that Galileo is the man who improved the telescope into the useful and practical tool we see today, with uses for the military, astronomers, and physicists. However, most people do not know much about his life or personality. In my opinion, this information is, at the least, just as interesting as the telescope itself.

Many people do not know that Galileo was an extremely charismatic person. Galileo was very good at taking the situation at hand and making it beneficial to himself. He used this to make connections with anyone in power, so that he could express his theories and philosophies freely. For example, when he discovered the moons of Jupiter, he named them after members of the Medici family, who held power in Tuscany, and, in doing so, was given the position of Mathematician and Philosopher to the Grand Duke of Tuscany (Life of Galileo, Fowler 1). He also publically insulted people who he disagreed with philosophically, but only when he knew they did not have the power to punish him. In this way, Galileo was much different than Bruno. For example,"He had written of an infinite universe which had left no room for that greater infinite conception which is called God... He preached a philosophy which made the mysteries of the virginity of Mary, of the crucifixion and the mass, meaningless" (Giordano Bruno, Kessler 1). This of course angered the Church, and led to his imprisonment for eight years, and eventually his execution by the Inquisition.

Galileo, unlike other philosophers such as Aristotle or Plato, theorized based on what he could physically see or prove. For example, he used his telescope to show skeptics, such as Father Clavius, the leader of Jesuit astronomy, that there were mountains on the surface of the moon, instead of merely arguing his theory. In fact, Galileo was actually able to calculate the heights of these peaks using his telescope and a little bit of geometry. (Galileo and the Telescope, Fowler 1)