The scientific theory that the earth revolves around the sun, was not always the norm when it came to scientific thought and beliefs. Much of the work that was done to demonstrate that the Earth revolved around the sun was because of a scientist named Kepler. This paper will examine the observations and mathematics that went into proving this theory.
¶ … Earth Revolves Around the Sun
Is this idea/theory/episode/question an example of scientific activity? Why or why not?
It's important to bear in mind that the philosophers of hundreds of years ago didn't always believe that the Earth revolved around the sun. Many of these thinkers believed that the sun revolved around the Earth and that the Earth was the center of the universe -- with the sun and all the stars and planets revolving around it. However, the complicated movement of the sun made this a very difficult theory to support. "The Sun, however, does not merely rise in the east and set in the west. You can see for yourself that the Sun only rises directly in the east on the equinoxes: at all other times of the year, it rises in the northeast (summer) or southeast (winter). Also, the Sun moves with respect to the stars: the Sun wanders through the 12 constellations of the zodiac, coming back to its starting point after 1 year" (ucsb.edu). Thus, because the sun was making such a complicated movement, these ancient people were forced to create a very confusing model of the earth revolving around the sun. Ultimately, they discovered, that the motions of the sun could be understood very simply by the Earth moving on a tilted axis once a day and the earth orbiting the sun once a year (ucsb.edu). This entire process is an example of scientific activity as it demonstrates the creation of a theory, intense observation and then the revision of a theory.
The theory that the Earth revolves around the sun is actually an episode of scientific activity. This belief is founded on evidence; even though for a long time, many notable astronomers only believed that the earth revolved around the sun, but had very little to go on (Cuk, 2002). For instance, the astronomer, Aristarchus believed that the Earth goes around the sun, once it was found that the sun is much bigger than the planets; similarly Copernicus, thought the idea of planets revolving around the sun was ideal, but didn't have any actual proof (Cuk, 2002). "Kepler discovered that laws governing of orbits become much more simple if the Sun is in their center. Newton has shown that this is caused by the universal law of gravity. If gravity works, Earth and other planets have to go around the Sun, because it is much heavier" (cornell.edu, 2002). These ideas and concepts demonstrate that there was enough scientific knowledge of the era for these great thinkers to understand that the Earth likely revolved around the sun, there just wasn't the capability or logistical or intellectual knowledge to prove otherwise.
2. How might the scientific validity or importance have been improved? In particular,
assess the quality of evidence and/or argument in some leading example. If it was not an example of science, how might it have been turned into a scientific activity?
However, 1725 demonstrated a clear instance of scientific activity regarding this theory: this was when James Bradley found a stellar aberration (Cuk, 2002). A stellar aberration refers to when there is a yearly change in the positions of all the stars in the sky as a result of the Earth's very own movement (Cuk, 2002). Aberration would arise because of the speed of light emitting from the sun and as a result of the Earth's own velocity, two truly complex dynamics (Cuk, 2002). This marked the first piece of evidence which indicated that sun revolved around the Earth.
On the other hand, a simpler means of explaining this consequence is in connection with the Earth's stellar parallax: if the Earth was adapting its place relative to the stars over time, then the stars would rightly appear to reflect this change as well. Stellar parallax is a major conglomeration of evidence as to why the Earth does revolve around the sun. Put more simply: "Parallax is the apparent difference in the position (line of sight to) an object, when the object is viewed from different locations. So, when we observe that a star has apparently moved (not to be confused with it actually having moved -- proper motion), when we look at it from two different locations on the Earth's orbit around the Sun (i.e. On different dates), that's stellar parallax! (And if the star does not seem to have moved? Well, its parallax is zero)" (Cain, 2009).
The Doppler effect offers further subsequent evidence that the Earth moves around the sun. A wavelength of light that comes to us via an object becomes shorter (or bluer) when the source is approached and also becomes longer (redder) when we move away from the source (Motz, 2002. Thus, when an Earth moves in forward momentum to a star, the star will only look somewhat bluer, when measured by high-tech instruments; also, it will seem redder when the Earth is on the reverse end of the orbit, moving in the other directions: thus, this dynamic demonstrates clearly that the Earth possesses a velocity in conjunction to the stars, comparable to aberration (Motz, 2002).
Fundamentally, we know that the universe is filled with billions of galaxies and that the sun is at the center of our galaxy. The moves around the center of our galaxy and the planets tag along. It's important to remember that the gravity of the sun is so large, that the planets revolve around it just like the way the moon revolves around the earth; however, all of these motions are simultaneous, so in actuality, the earth is going around the sun while the sun moves around the center of the galaxy, while the galaxy moves apart from other galaxies, as a result of the expansion originating from the big bang (ucsb.edu).
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