Our Knowledge of the Solar System
Our Knowledge of the Solar System knowledge-of-solar-system
Tycho Brahe ( 1546 – 1601) lived after Copernicus. He was the first person to witness and document a supernova in 1572. He did not believe in the Copernican system , but proposed a system in which the Sun orbited the Earth while the other planets orbited the Sun. He took many measurements throughout his lifetime. He was aware of parallax and could predict eclipses, planet positions and other astronomical events in his time.
In 1610 Galileo discovered the phases of Venus, Jupiter and the four moons and Saturn and its rings using his telescope. This led Galileo to believe in the Copernican system.
In 1616 Rome ( basically the Christian Pope) decided that the heliocentric model was contrary to both philosophy and Scripture. This caused major problems for Galileo who was shunned for speakin about his beliefs.
Johannes Kepler (1571 – 1630) knew Tycho Brahe in fact they worked together. After Tycho Brahe’s death Kepler analysed Brahe’s data and was able to prove planetary motion through three famous laws of planetary motion. It was the work of Kepler that finally convinced the world that the Copernican system as in fact the model of our Solar System.
