Re: Galileo's _Dialog..._

["Bernard G. Cleyet & Nancy Ann Seese" <georgeann@REDSHIFT.COM>]

If my mem. serves me, this makes for some psychological problems.  The Pope was a boyhood
friend (of G. G.).  This is why he risked proposing his theories in the first place.
Someone (I think associated with the Pope) suggested the way to present the theory was
through a dialog, so that G. G. could plausibly deny that it was his belief.  Perhaps
making the "flat earther" the static earther was the mistake --  I've also heard that, if
push had come to shove, they would not have tortured him.  They only showed him the
instruments  -- B. Brecht claims he was a typical Physicist. I.e. no ideological strength,
and caved in too soon.  Of course the Italians suffered as a result (I know there was no
Italy then).  The center of engineering, science, etc. moved North.  So B. B. claims in
his play.

I may have conflated my sources, but I'm rather certain it doesn't all come from the Play.

bc


Nicholas Guilbert wrote:

> Charles, hello.
>
> In my 1967 edition (Stillman Drake's translation) of Dialogues Concerning
> Two Chief World Systems, a footnote appears at the very end of the text
> (Fourth Day) to the effect that Galileo put one of the favorite arguments
> of Pope Urban VIII (against the conclusiveness of the proof of the earth's
> motion) into the mouth of the character Simplicio.  Galileo thus indirectly
> called the Pope a simpleton, which was not the wisest of actions given the
> social and political order of the day.  In fact, this passage was later
> used in evidence against Galileo as one of the points in the text offensive
> to the Church.
>
> Whether or not Galileo meant this particular jab to be "underhanded" or not
> is a matter for debate, but his detractors evidently found it to be rather
> 'heavy-handed' and proceeded accordingly.
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas R. Guilbert
>
> The Peddie School
> Hightstown, NJ
>
> nguilber@peddie.org
>
>                     Charles
>                     Figura               To:     PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu
>                     <figura@WARTB        cc:
>                     URG.EDU>             Subject:     Galileo's _Dialog..._
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>                     04/24/00
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> Greetings -
>
> I'm teaching an intro to astronomy course and I'm going to be discussing
> Galileo for a day.  I recall hearing somewhere that Galileo used the names
> (Salviati, Sagredo, Simplicio) as underhanded jabs against the geocentric
> paradigm.  Obviously, Simplicio denotes an idiot/simpleton, but I don't
> remember
> the translation of the other names.
>
> > From the preface to The Dialog it seems that he has borrowed the names
> from real people.  I'm not sure that I understand who those people were,
> though.
> Can anyone help me out here?
>
> Thanks much -
>
> Charles Figura
> figura@wartburg.edu       http://www.wartburg.edu/mcsp/figura
> Department of Mathematics, Computer Science, and Physics
> (319) 352-8373           "The only capital crime in nature is stupidity.
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