People used to believe that the stars are the bright points on the dome in the sky. They are the creators of stories and belief in myths, and they believe that earth is the center of everything. Today we observe the outskirts of habitable universe using billion-dollar mirror telescopes orbiting on our planet. It is not just that we will have better tools, but it is that we have a changed way of thinking, a changed curiosity, and our readiness to believe that we are no longer the center of the universe.
Ancient Cosmos: Harmony and Perfection
Centuries ago, the first great civilizations Babylonian, Egyptian, and Mayan were looking up at the sky in awe and intent. The heavens to them were a calendar and a clock and a sort of command of the gods.
The first people that tried to explain the universe in terms of attentive observation along with reasoning and philosophy were the Greeks. In his imagination, Plato had seen an ideal universe composed of geometry. nÃhoy false details of his student Aristotle who imagined crystalline, spherical heavenly bodies, the sun, moon and stars turning in perfect circles around the Earth. In this world-centered model, the universe was portrayed as an ideal stable world that was opposite of our imperfect world.
This is much more than a scientific opinion; it was strongly philosophical. The heavens represented perfectness, and it appeared that as a human creature, one took position of considerable importance to the creation process. This model was dominant over centuries since it was simply the right thing to do, even though it did not fit in all observations.
Copernicus and the Quiet Revolution
Nicolaus Copernicus was a peaceful mind, and he made a radical statement; what would happen if the earth was not the center of the universe? And what if were in motion went around the sun just as all the rest of the planets do?
Initially, the new heliocentric image could not be helpful in the calculation of orbits of the planets as compared to the ancient geocentric models which relied on a complex route known as a set of epicycles. Nevertheless, the new concept raised another question: perhaps the world does not constitute human beings.
The latter was emotional as well. To believe in Copernicus was to get off the stage of earth. Philosophers need to redefine what reality is when it comes to human purpose, destiny and significance in such a large universe.
Galileo, Kepler, and the Sky Cracks Open
Galileo Galilei constructed an amateur telescope and although a crude product now, it was a breakthrough during the 1600s. He was able to observe the craters on the Moon, moons orbiting Jupiter and Venus phases with it. The sky that had been painted as smooth and heavenly was rough, dynamic and never still.
Meanwhile, Johannes Kepler demonstrated that not only do the planets move along a perfect circle, but they move along an ellipse. This was against the ancient teachings that heavens had to be perfect. Abruptly mathematics revealed a clockwork world which did not require angels to heave planets.
Truth had come in through cracks even after the Church had shut Galileo. The universe was cognitive and almost unsimilar to how people had conceptualized.
Space Telescopes and Cosmic Humility
With such spacescope telescopes as Hubble and James Webb today, we have been able to detect looking further in time and space than the eye ever did. We have seen galaxies developing just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. We have discovered exoplanets and black holes and even the elusive dark matter nullifying all ideas of science being overly fantastic to ancient thinkers.
Every exploration gets us one step closer to figuring out the universe and one step closer to realizing that it does not necessarily center around us. It has become an exercise in humility in astronomy. As much as we gain knowledge, the less we are. And the less the more we value our position in the universe. We are not in the center, and we know it, and that knowing is a sort of cosmic miracle.
A Story Still Unfolding
Back to sky watchers and in front of space telescopes, our understanding of the universe has evolved over centuries out of boldness, inquisitively and, at times, violence. The tale combines science and philosophy, strict with amazement.
Neither is it yet over.
The discovery of any new thing makes us change the way we perceive the universe and ourselves. The richest thing which astronomy must teach us is not what it has told us about the planets but what it must teach us about our own humanity, to wonder and investigate and to keep on looking up.