Copernicus
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Born on Feb. 19, 1473, in Thorn (Torun), Poland, Nicolaus
Copernicus was destined to become, through the publication
of his heliocentric theory 70 years later, one of the
seminal figures in the history of scientific thought. The
son of a prosperous merchant, Copernicus was raised after
his father's death by a maternal uncle. The uncle enabled
him to enter the University of Krakow, then famous for its
mathematics, philosophy, and astronomy curriculum. This
experience stimulated the young Copernicus to study further
liberal arts at Bologna (1496-1501), medicine at Padua, and
law at the University of Ferrara. He emerged from Ferrara in
1503 with the doctorate in canon law.
Shortly afterward, Copernicus returned to Poland and
eventually settled at the cathedral in Frauenberg, less than
160 km (100 mi) from his birthplace. Elected a canon of the
church, he not only faithfully performed his ecclesiastical
duties, but also practiced medicine, wrote a treatise on
monetary reform, and turned his attention to a subject in
which he had long been interested--astronomy.
By May 1514, Copernicus had written and discreetly
circulated in manuscript his Commentariolus, the first
outline of those arguments which he eventually substantiated
in De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions
of the Heavenly Spheres, 1543). This classic work challenged
the geocentric cosmology that had been accepted dogmatically
since the time of Aristotle. It was in fact in direct
opposition to Aristotle and to the 2d-century astronomer
Ptolemy, who had enunciated the details of the geocentric
system.
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Nicolaus Copernicus
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Ptolemy based his work on the observed celestial phenomena of
the daily rotation of the heavens, the annual movement of the Sun
through the ecliptic, and the periodic retrograde motion of the
planets. His geocentric system, however, required a complex
combination of cycles upon cycles, akin to an arbitrary meshing of
larger and smaller gears, to account for these motions. Copernicus
proposed in De revolutionibus that a rotating Earth revolving with
the other planets about a stationary central Sun could account for
these same observed phenomena in a simpler way.
Anticipated in various aspects by the Pythagoreans and Aristarchus
of Samos (with whom Copernicus was familiar), and by the Muslim
astronomer Ibn al-Shatir and certain Christian writers (whose ideas
there is no conclusive evidence he was aware of), the new theory that
he espoused in De revolutionibus exhibits a peculiar mixture of
radical and conservative elements. In the midst of his radical
reordering of the structure of the universe, Copernicus still adhered
to ancient Aristotelian doctrines of solid celestial spheres and the
perfect circular motion of heavenly bodies, and he held essentially
intact the entire Aristotelian physics of motion. He also clung to
the Ptolemaic representation of planetary motion by means of complex
combinations of cycles, although with significant innovations. In
addition, Copernicus realized that his theory implied an enormous
increase in the size of the universe but declined to pronounce it
infinite.
These aspects of the Copernican treatise do not mitigate the
novelty or the impact of the final theory, or the author's firm
conviction that his system was an accurate representation of physical
reality. Rather, they indicate the scope of the work that lay ahead.
This work was effectively addressed in the next century when Kepler
determined the ellipticity of planetary orbits, Galileo formulated
his new concept of motion, and Newton espoused his theory of
universal gravitation.
The enunciation of the heliocentric theory by Copernicus marked
the beginning of the scientific revolution and of a new view of a
greatly enlarged universe. It was a shift away from the comfortable
anthropocentrism of the ancient and medieval world. A scientific
theory that reflected so profoundly on the place of humanity in the
universe was not welcomed by the church, and it was only after the
publication (1540) of Narratio prima (A First Account), by an
enthusiastic supporter named Rheticus, that the aged Copernicus
agreed to commit to print the theory already outlined in 1514. An
undocumented, but often repeated, story holds that Copernicus
received a printed copy of his treatise on his deathbed. He died on
May 24, 1543.
Steven J. Dick
Bibliography: Banville, John, Doctor Copernicus (1977); Burtt, E.
A., A Critical and Comparative Analysis of Copernicus, Kepler,
Galileo, and Descartes (1924; repr. 1987); Koyre, A., The
Astronomical Revolution (1969); Kuhn, T., The Copernican Revolution
(1957); Moss, Jean, Novelties in the Heavens (1993); Rosen, E.,
Copernicus and the Scientific Revolution (1984); Westman, R. S., ed.,
The Copernican Achievement (1976).
Last modified on: Thursday, October 30, 1997.