Chapter 3

The Science of Astronomy

• Astronomy is the first science

• It has ancient roots (the Chinese, Egyptians,
Greeks, Indians… all looked at the skies)

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 3.1 The Ancient Roots of Science
We will answer the following questions:
• In what ways do we use scientific thinking?
• How did astronomical observations benefit
ancient societies?
• What did ancient civilizations achieve in
astronomy?

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 In what ways do we use scientific
thinking?

• Scientific thinking is based on observations

and interpretation of everyday phenomena
and on trial-and-error experiments.

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 How did astronomical observations
benefit ancient societies?
• Keeping track of time and seasons
– for practical purposes, including agriculture
– for religious and ceremonial purposes

• Aid to navigation

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 Practical purposes for observations

Ancient people of central Africa (6500 BC)

noticed a correlation between the orientation of
the crescent Moon and the amount of rainfall.

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 Practical purposes for observations

The Egyptians depended on the flooding of the Nile

to grow their crops in their arid region.
They noticed that Sirius, the brightest star, became
visible in the eastern sky before sunrise in August,
just before the flooding. They learned that this was
the time to plant seeds.

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 Practical purposes for observations
For thousands of years the study of the skies was
restricted to the learned people.
For example, in Babylonia the priests were advising
the kings. They looked for propitious alignments of
stars to initiate projects…
Later on, Greek philosophers intervened to create
models of the cosmos…
Even if ancient civilizations kept detailed records of
astronomical observations, the modern Science of
Astronomy did not take birth until ~1600 AD.

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 What did ancient civilizations
achieve in astronomy?
• Daily timekeeping
• Tracking the seasons
• Calendar
• Monitoring lunar cycles
• Monitoring planets and stars
• Predicting eclipses
• And more…

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 • Egyptian obelisk:
shadows tell time
of day.

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 Archeoastronomy

England: Stonehenge (completed around 1550 B.C.)

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 England: Stonehenge (1550 B.C.)
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 Archeoastronomy
In Northwestern Europe we
find 100 or so similar sites
dating back to the Bronze Age
(3000 – 2000 BC.)
Most structures are oriented to
define the range of possible
rising or setting positions of the
Moon near mid-summer.
These are not ancient
observatories. These were
prehistoric people – we believe
that these alignments were just
symbolic.

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 Archeoastronomy

SW United States: the Anasazi’s “Sun Dagger” marks

summer solstice in the Chaco Canyon, New Mexico
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 Archeoastronomy

Macchu Pichu, Peru: Structures aligned with solstices.

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 3.2 Ancient Greek Science

Our goals for learning:

• Why does modern science trace its roots to
the Greeks?
• How did the Greeks explain planetary
motion?
• How was Greek knowledge preserved
through history?

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 Our mathematical and scientific heritage originated with the
civilizations of the Middle East and spread out from there.
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 Why does modern science trace its roots to
the Greeks?

• Greeks were the first

people known to make
models of nature.
• They tried to explain
patterns in nature without
resorting to myth or the
supernatural.

Greek geocentric model

(c. 400 BC)
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 The Shape of the Earth
Anaximander (570 BC) held
that the Earth is a cylinder
with depth 1/3 of its diameter

“Poised on emptiness,
supported by nothing,
it remains there because it is
equidistant from everything”

The sphericity of the Earth:

honor is given to Pythagoras.

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 Eratosthenes: Earth’s circumference (~240 BC)

Measurements:
Syene to Alexandria
distance ≈ 5000 stadia
angle = 7°

Calculate circumference of Earth:

7/360 = (5000 stadia)/(circum. Earth)

 circumf. ≈ 250,000 stadia ≈ 42,000 km
Modern value ≈ 40,100 km

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 How did the Greeks explain planetary motion?
Aristotle’s geocentric model ~ 350 BC:

• Earth is a sphere
• Earth lies at the center of the
universe because of the center-
seeking nature of the heavy
elements of which it is composed
• Heavens must be “perfect”:
objects moving on perfect
spheres or in perfect circles.

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 But this made it difficult to explain
the apparent retrograde motion of planets

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 The Ptolemaic model
The most sophisticated
geocentric model was that of
Ptolemy (A.D. 100-170):
• Sufficiently accurate to
remain in use for 1,500 years.
• Arabic translation of
Ptolemy’s work named
Almagest (“the greatest
compilation”)

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 The Ptolemaic model: epicycles

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 How do the epicycles explain retrograde motion?

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 How was Greek knowledge preserved through
history?

• The Muslim world preserved and enhanced the knowledge

they received from the Greeks.
• Al-Mamun’s House of Wisdom in Baghdad was a great
center of learning around A.D. 800.

• With the fall of Constantinople (Istanbul) in 1453, Eastern

scholars headed west to Europe, carrying knowledge that
helped ignite the European Renaissance.

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 Other astronomies: India
No observations – used models from others (Greeks,
Babylonians) and adapted these to their own needs
and traditions: time keeping, casting of horoscopes...
They employed sophisticated mathematical
algorithms for detailed predictions of eclipses, etc.
Their cosmology (from the Puranas, ~ 700 AD):
• Earth is a flat circle with a lofty mountain in the middle –
Mount Meru.
• Around it are 7 ring-continents, alternating with 7 ring-
oceans.
• The Sun, Moon and planets circle Mt. Meru above Earth.

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 Other astronomies: East Asia
The Chinese developed astronomy early: ~ 2000 BC.
Koreans and Japanese based theirs on this one.
The Chinese believed the country’s ruler to be the
‘emperor of all under heaven’:
– If just, the celestial bodies followed the appointed course
– If unjust, unpredicted events would appear (comets and
supernovae)

By ~ 1400 BC they had a simple Lunar Calendar

By ~ 600 BC they recognized the 19 year Metonic cycle
By ~100 BC they had a Solar Calendar…

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 Other astronomies: East Asia
Their star chart dates back
to ~ 2000 BC
They grouped stars into
Constellations. The first catalog of star
positions dates ~ 300 BC

Time keeping: they borrowed

the gnomon from the Arabs
Cosmology (~100 BC):
‘The heavens are like a hen’s egg and as round
as a crossbow bullet. The Earth is like the yolk
of the egg and lies in the center’
Water is inside the lower part of the egg – the Earth
floats on water. The heavens are supported by vapor.
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 Other astronomies: Islam
During 800 – 1300 AD the transition of astronomy from antiquity
to Renaissance occurred in Islam: Middle East, North Africa.
• Religious observances required solving the problem of time
keeping. They used and still use the Lunar calendar (that’s why
Ramadan shifts...)
• New sophisticated mathematical methods were envisioned
• New observations (many stars have Arabic names)
The Astrolabe:
a working model of the heavens.
Of Greek invention, the oldest
surviving come from Eastern Islam.
It’s a series of brass plates with
pointers nested on a solid plate with
celestial coordinates. It reproduces
the daily motion of stars around
the N.C. Pole (central pin)
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 Other astronomies: American Indians
In the North American Plains
we find many monuments,
like the Medicine Wheel,
dated ~ 1400 – 1700 AD.
The lines drawn between
significant markings point to
• Sunrise/Sunset locations
on Solstice day
• Rising points of the
brightest stars in summer
• etc.

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 3.3 The Copernican Revolution

Our goals for learning:

• How did Copernicus, Tycho, and Kepler
challenge the Earth-centered model?
• What are Kepler’s three laws of planetary
motion?
• How did Galileo solidify the Copernican
revolution?

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 How did Copernicus, Tycho, and Kepler
challenge the Earth-centered model?

By 1500 AD Europe came out of the Dark Ages and the

European Renaissance flourished.
This is the time of great artists, like Michelangelo and
Leonardo, and of explorers, like Columbus.
By now astronomers were aware that Ptolemy’s geocentric
model of the universe was not accurate.
Times were ripe for the Copernican Revolution to take place.
This time marks the beginning of Modern Astronomy.

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 Copernicus (1473-1543)

Proposed a heliocentric or
Sun-centered model.

Copernicus did not publish

his work - De Revolutionis
Orbium Caelestium –
Concerning the revolutions
of the heavenly planets -
until 1543 for fear of the
Inquisition.

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 Copernicus
This model could explain
• which planets are closer and
which are farther from the
Sun
• the retrograde motion of Mars

Still, the model was no more

accurate than the Ptolemaic
model in predicting planetary
positions, because it still used
circular orbits.

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 Tycho Brahe (1546 – 1601)

• Financed by the Danish king, he

built very large scale instruments
(to obtain better precision)
• Compiled the most accurate naked
eye measurements ever made of
planetary positions.

• Hired Kepler, who used Tycho’s

observations to discover the truth
about planetary motion.

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 Tycho Brahe
• Still thought the Earth
to be at center of solar
system,
• but recognized that
other planets must go
around Sun
• His was a hybrid
cosmology
• Few people took it
seriously

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 Kepler (1571 – 1630)
Kepler worked as Tycho’s assistant. Very well versed in math,
Kepler was able to interpret Tycho’s detailed observations.
Like Copernicus, he realized that Earth cannot be at the center of
the universe. Still, for the longest time he could not detach himself
from the idea of circular orbits.
On the left: diagram of the
celestial spheres.
He finally realized that he had to
give up the idea of circular orbits.
Once he tried an elliptical orbit,
this matched the observational
data perfectly.

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 What are Kepler’s three laws of
planetary motion?

• Kepler formulated three laws of planetary

motion.
• The first two were published in 1609, the
third one in 1619

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 Kepler’s First Law
The orbit of each planet around the Sun is an ellipse
with the Sun at one focus.

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 What is an ellipse?
An ellipse looks like an elongated circle.

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 Kepler’s Second Law
As a planet moves around its orbit, it sweeps out
equal areas in equal times.

That is a planet travels faster when it is nearer to the Sun and slower
when it is farther from the Sun.
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 Kepler’s Third Law
More distant planets orbit the Sun at slower average
speeds, obeying the relationship

p2 = a3
p = orbital period in years
a = average distance from Sun in AU

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 A difficult transition
Still, most scientists objected to this view.
Deeply rooted belief in Aristotle’s philosophy made
the heliocentric model unacceptable.
Aristotle’s view:
• Earth cannot be moving. If so, falling objects
would be left behind by Earth’s motion.
• The heavens must be perfect and unchanging.
Therefore the spherical realms of the Sun, Moon,
fixed stars, etc. surrounding the Earth
Telescopic observations gave the final blow to the
Aristotelian model of the universe.
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 Galileo (1564 – 1642)
As a professor of mathematics at Padua he heard of
the invention of the telescope.
He built his own and perfected it and decided to
apply it to observations of the skies.
By 1609 he began observations which were never
possible before. These confirmed Copernicus’
heliocentric model to be true.
By 1610 Galileo published an account of his
observations: the Sidereus Nuncius (the Starry
Messenger)

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 How did Galileo solidify the Copernican revolution?
• Using his telescope, Galileo saw:
• Sunspots on Sun (“imperfections”)
• Mountains and valleys on the Moon (not a perfect sphere)

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 How did Galileo solidify the Copernican revolution?

Galileo also saw four moons orbiting Jupiter

(not all objects orbit Earth).
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 How did Galileo solidify the Copernican revolution?

Galileo’s observations of the phases of Venus

(Venus orbits the Sun and not Earth)

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 As such the Sidereous Nuncius was challenging the 1500 years
old philosophy of Aristotle.
This got him in deep trouble with the Catholic Church, which
embraced Aristotle’s views. Indeed the scriptures state:
“O Lord my God… who laid the foundations of the Earth, that it
should not be removed forever…”

By 1616 the Catholic Church cautioned Galileo against speaking

out too forcefully on behalf of the Copernican system.
For seven years he complied. Although Galileo accepted the
Bible, he believed that it told ‘how to go to heaven, not how
heavens go’.

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 In 1623 he wrote a new book, ‘Dialogue concerning the two
chief world systems’
This got him in trouble, as his enemies convinced the Pope
that one of the three speakers in the book, Simplicio (simple
minded), was representing the Pope, making a fool of him.
In 1633 Galileo, by now 70 years old, was ordered in front of
a tribunal of cardinals and was ordered to take back his claim
that Earth orbits the Sun. He was ordered to house arrest until
his death in 1642.
In was not until 1824 that the ‘Dialogue’ was removed from
the list of banned books.
In 1992 Galileo was formally vindicated by the Church (Pope
John Paul II) and after 350 years his body now rests in the
Cathedral of Santa Croce, Florence, among the best.
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 3.4 The Nature of Science

• Science derives from the Latin scientia, meaning

“knowledge.”
The idealized scientific method
• Based on proposing and testing hypotheses
• hypothesis = educated guess

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 What is a scientific theory?
• A scientific theory is NOT the same as a
hypothesis, rather:
• A scientific theory must:
—Explain a wide variety of observations with a
few simple principles, AND
—Must be supported by a large, compelling body
of evidence.
—Must NOT have failed any crucial test of its
validity.

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