WRONG!
Did you forget Medieval Times?
Did you forget what Church did to Galileo or Giordano Bruno?
Did you forget Medieval Times?
Did you forget what Church did to Galileo or Giordano Bruno?"
Interesting, if disconnected take on my comment. I did not forget anything the Church did and I didn't forget the slaughter attributed to the Israelites in the Old Testament nor the destruction of other people by the Roman Empire. I don't excuse those things. What I said was, that all of those influences built western civilization, warts and all. Islam has nothing but destruction in the last 800 years. The west has republican government, democracy, jury trials, constitutional law and most of the Nobel prizes, worthwhile art, music and literature and technology, modern medicine, space exploration and agricultural science that feeds the world. Islam has the Friday afternoon group hate.
I remember what the Church did, and what the revisionists did to the truth.
Galileo, educated by Catholic monks, and in science at Piza University by Catholic science professors, sought to prove that great authorities like Aristotle were wrong about the prevailing belief that the earth was still, and the universe rotated around it. In those days, Aristotle was deemed the final say on these matters, and the Bible seemed to prove this by saying the "earth was God's footstool".
But Galileo was not content to shatter prevailing beliefs with science, he often ridiculed and made sport of his opponents with pen and mouth, making many enemies for himself. He thrived on being controversial and confounding other scholars.
Galileo's theory on heliocentricity was originally put forth by Nicholas Copernicus. Copernicus' work, "De Revolutionibus orblure coelestium", was published at the solicitation of two distinguished churchmen, Cardinal Schömberg and Tiedemann Giese, Bishop of Culm. It was dedicated by permission of Pope Paul III in order that it would be protected from the attacks of the "mathematicians". Hence before Galileo's own work on heliocentricity, the Church had already endorsed the publishing of this proposition.
After Galileo's discovery, he went to Rome to be celebrated for it, and was accepted with warmth and admiration by Clergy and laymen. In fact, he set up his telescope to view sunspots in the Quirinal Garden belonging to Cardinal Bandim.
All along, however, though Galileo's science was right, he 'proof' was in error. Scientists to this day understand his proposition to be right, but his methods of 'proof' to be in error. Great minds of Galileo's time, like Bacon, strongly disagreed with heliocentricity, claiming (rightly) that Galileo's 'proofs' were lacking in good science. A great many other scientists of the times also thought the Copernicus/Galileo heliocentricity proposition was in error. Because the Lutheran revolt was taking place at nearly the same time, and Holy Scripture was being revised and understood differently by many, and because the prevailing belief by scientists of the times was against heliocentricity, Galileo's found himself embroiled in deep controversy, and was thought to be against the Bible's teachings.
More than four years after Galileo's triumph in Rome, the Inquisition asked him to recant his proposition, based on the fact it could not be proved, and that it lead to heretical beliefs about the Bible. Galileo quickly agreed to recant. The Church did allow Galileo to publish his heliocentricity, but only as theory, and not as scientific "fact". As I said earlier, even today's scientists agree that Galileo's supporting evidence was erroneous, though his theory was correct.
What was objected to mainly was Galileo's insistence that he was right, and that the traditional understanding of Scripture was wrong. The most influential Cardinal in the Church at the time, Cardinal Bellarmine, practically begged Galileo to write and publish his theories, but only to clearly state that no absolute proof yet exists. He even went so far as to write to Galileo:
Galileo, however, broke his promise and continued to write his heliocentricity as fact, and he continued to attack his learned adversaries with venom. He also continued to vascillate between recanting and then believing heliocentricity as fact. Eventually this did lead the Inquisition to "imprison" Galileo at the end of his life, and his "prison" was, as his Protestant biographer von Gebler wrote:
For the rest of his life, he was allowed to use as his 'places of confinement' the houses of friends, always comfortable and usually luxurious.
I hope this little reply clears up the ridiculous lies and distortions that are, unfortunately, still believed to this day.
Oh, please, Galileo lived peacefully in apartments at the Vatican itself. Some persecution.