Meet one of the main actors of the Renaissance, as well as, he is among the most influential and illustrious men in scientific history. Keep reading and discover with us, the great achievements, discoveries, inventions and Galileo Galilei contributions!
Biography of Galileo Galilei
On February 15, 1564, the city of Pisa saw the birth of this great scientist. At that time, this city corresponded to the area that at that time was called the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.
He was the first son of Glulia Amannati and Florentino Vincenzo Galilei, the latter, was a musician who also excelled in mathematics. He had 5 siblings and together with his parents, they formed a family that, although it was low-income, managed to survive thanks to what was achieved in trade.
In view of the economic situation that the family was going through, Florentino Vincenzo (Galileo's father) even having studied musical theory, being a composer and author of several works that were prestigious at the time, had to put aside his true passion ( music) to dedicate himself fully to commerce. When Galileo reaches the age of ten, Glulia and Florentino Vincenzo decide to move to Florence. Taking this decision into account, Jacobo Borhini, a religious neighbor, took charge of Galileo.
Your academic background
Galileo's training in the first instance was at home and was in charge of his parents until he was 10 years old. Later, Jacobo Borhini, becoming Galileo's tutor, gets in touch with the convent located in Florence called Santa María de Vallombrosa so that he can enter it. In this convent, he receives a noble and purely religious education, which is why Galileo begins to venture into religious life, even reaching the goal of becoming a priest.
Galileo's father (being an atheist man), learning of this, immediately opposes the idea. Some time later, his son contracts an eye infection and takes advantage of the illness to claim before the convent that they did not give Galileo enough care and that for this reason, he decides to remove him from there.
Already retired from the convent, Galileo's father enrolls him in a prestigious university located in Pisa two years later. There the young man decides to study philosophy, medicine and mathematics. This university still today remains one of the most prestigious in Italy.
Discovery of your profession
His father initially wanted Galileo to dedicate himself to the medical field, however, a friend of the Galilei family named Ostilio Ricci would have paved the way for the young Galileo to start in the world of mathematics. Ostilio, who was a student of the well-known mathematician Tartaglia, was known for relating practice to theory, a fact that would attract Galileo's attention and make his life take another direction.
Ricci's approach was unusual at the time, as almost no one used practical terms to share knowledge; instead, they were purely theoretical. The practices used in experiments were fun, dynamic, and anything but static. Galileo began taking classes completely separate from the university with his friend Ostilio Ricci. At the same time, he would put aside his medical studies to focus fully on mathematics.
One of the first contributions of Galileo Galilei related to mechanics was going to be made in his university stage. Said contribution of Galileo in this branch of science (where he would carry out multiple theories) would be a theory that would determine that the pendulums related to the oscillation lapses, are not dependent on the amplitude. It would be called the Isochrony Law.
Inspirational figures in Galileo's life during his training
Galileo Galilei even being a young student, begins to be sympathetic to the renowned Plato, Pythagoras and Archimedes, product of the readings of their works. At the same time, he is adamantly opposed to Aristotle's philosophy. All this, thanks to the fact that he feels trapped and passionate about the works and texts produced by the Greek mathematician Euclid.
The latter, it could be said, was one of the greatest influencers in Galileo's life, since thanks to his writings, he began to arouse interest in other authors or great characters. This generates that Galilei does not feel any kind of attraction or interest in the movements of the philosopher Aristotle. This, even being a university student, would refuse to generate comparisons with the professors of his time, he would also write a forceful statement against them. This fact would earn him a considerable amount of enemies.
Galileo Galilei decides to return to Florence in 1585 without having finished his university education. However, he would return with a lot of acquired knowledge and with enormous motivation and curiosity to continue doing mathematical studies. In that same year, Galileo feels inspired and begins to carry out what would be his first experimental activities. They would be directed towards the confirmation of theories that were closely linked to the gravitational centers of solid elements.
This inspiration also brings with it the emergence of numerous inventions, of which the following stand out: The hydrostatic balance that the scientist Archimedes had already proposed, the well-known fall of bodies, studies related to pendulums and a device that would help measure the heartbeat Within a given time scale, this device would be called a heart rate monitor.
Galileo and his contributions as an educator
After having carried out his first investigations and inventions in Florence, Galileo would receive an invitation from the Florentine Platonic Academy in the year 1588. This invitation would be for the purpose of Galilei teaching a few classes at this Academy. The classes he taught give him a motivation that leads him to want to get a position as a professor at a university.
For this reason, he manages to run into great academic figures, among whom the Italian mathematician, philosopher and astronomer Guidobaldo del Monte stands out. This character would take Galileo to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Fernando I de' Medici, who would give him the opportunity to work as a teacher in the area of mathematics at the University of Pisa, his debut being on November 12, 1589.
Already carrying out his work as a professor at the University of Pisa, Galileo made a discovery between 1590-1591 that has to do with the task of drawing arches on bridges. This finding was named as the cycloid. This concept is developed by means of an arc-shaped curve moved from one point to another drawn above a straight line.
In search of new horizons: City of Padua
According to some historians, Galileo Galilei decided to leave Pisa due to alleged inconveniences and disagreements with one of the sons of Duke Fernando I, which is why he undertook a trip to the city of Padua in 1592. Upon arrival, Galileo began his work as a teacher in mechanics, geometry and astronomy at the main university of that city, until the year 1610. The University of Padua is currently considered one of the oldest houses of study on the planet.
In this institution, Galilei taught classes in mathematics, applied mechanics, astronomy and military architecture. At that time, the city of Padua was unaware of the problems on the European continent as a result of the inquisition, thanks to the fact that it was part of the so-called Republic of Venice and it was considered a very powerful and totally independent State.
Such independence helped Galileo Galilei to carry out his different investigations and studies that would be put into practice, without any interruption from the oppressors of the time. However, a year earlier in 1591, his father died while going through one of his worst economic situations. For this reason, Galileo finds himself obliged to help his family financially, manages to generate more income and begins to give lessons in his house to children and young people from high society families.
Galileo was not very good with the management of the money that came from his classes, for this reason, his help was not effective enough. However, he manages to stabilize his family's economy thanks to loans and collaborations from his friends.
In the year 1599 Galileo married Marina Gamba, she would share part of her life with him, consecutively she became the mother of his children, including two females and a male named Vincenzo. Being the firstborn Virginia. Said duo lasted in union until the date of 1610, date in which they make the decision to separate. After this separation, Galileo's daughters end up harmed, since they are not recognized as legitimate daughters, leaving only the youngest and only son as legitimate son.
Galileo Galilei's contributions as a result of his discoveries
By 1600 a new season begins that is quite profitable and successful for Galileo, in which he makes some really important scientific discoveries. Among these stand out:
The study of a new law called uniformly accelerated motion. In another context he discovers through expectations towards the firmament, a star that makes it present in the sky. Along with these investigations, he also invented a device called a thermoscope, an instrument that provides the temperature levels referring to the cold and heat present in the environment.
One year before the separation from his wife, that is to say, in the year 1610, Galileo created what is now considered one of his greatest initiatives thanks to the innovation that revolutionized the entire world: the creation of the telescope. However, he was not the only one working on the creation of a team of this caliber.
Hans Lippershey, for his part, also worked on the invention of a telescope, this character was usually dedicated to the production and elaboration of glasses and glasses for sight. To which Galileo activated and tried to make a telescope that surpassed the quality of the telescope made by Lipperhsey.
Indeed, this is how it happened, the telescope made by Galileo contains crystals that really have sharpness to observe at great distances. Both telescopes contain several differences, from their size, to the lenses they contained, Galileo's telescope had a great advantage, since through its lenses it is possible to see clearly, without distortion and any type of deviation.
Not satisfied with these results, Galileo continues to work on the telescope, trying to perfect other details that are a little more specific. Thanks to this, the telescope is presented in Venice to a certain public, who, faced with such an invention, were trapped by the level of quality it presents. Specifically, Galileo improves the quality of the lenses by about 8 times, with which it is possible to see and focus the image to be projected perfectly.
With a good monthly salary, thanks to the right to the telescope, which Galileo himself granted to Venice, the illustrious scientist remained calm for a period of time, since the salary offered for giving up his project helped him with his daily expenses. . His successes continue, the knowledge that he generates thanks to the use of the telescope, help him to discard several theories about the earth and space.
Return to Florence
In 1610 Galileo returned to Florence, a place that gave him the credit of being recognized as the first mathematician, apart from this, he was invited to numerous meetings, to which he was invited in order to carry out demonstrations about his inventions and scientific initiatives.
Without a doubt, Galileo was a figure who developed very well in the society that surrounded him. The recognitions that he obtained were truly deserved thanks to the constancy of his materialized works. However, he was a man of radical and firm thoughts, his position was based on the scientific studies that he had developed, it has to do with the theories that he carried out and interpreted under his precepts.
He had sympathizers in favor of his theories, but there were also opponents who did not agree with what Galileo proposed. Fact that later causes some discord, is then under constant investigation.
Invention of the refracting telescope
Jacques Badovere, a former student of Galileo, sends a letter from the capital of France to his former teacher, in order to confirm the existing rumors about a possible Telescope which helps to see the stars in the sky. This innovative tool was manufactured in the Netherlands by Hans Lippershey, who was known for making lenses.
This telescope would have given him the opportunity to see very distant stars whose visualization was limited by the human eye. Galileo Galilei would make important contributions when reading the letter sent by his former French student, he immediately builds his own telescope, the same one, easily surpasses its Dutch counterpart thanks to the fact that it does not blur the image nor does it give bad formations to the celestial bodies, it would also be able to magnify the image about six times, while the Dutch telescope would magnify it three times.
This great advance would mean one of his important contributions and a before and after in the life of Galileo Galilei. Despite having made a great improvement in this artifact, Galileo is not satisfied and continues trying to perfect his invention, therefore, he would manufacture what would be his number two telescope, the same one, it would have the capacity to magnify the objects seen 9 times. Having finished this project in August (specifically on the 21st) he would exhibit it in the Plaza de San Marco located in Venice (Italy).
The Republic of Venice receives the legal rights of the telescope from Galileo, these seeing the multiple uses that this artifact could have (especially in the military area) decide to reward him and allow him to keep his position at the University of Padua and release him from all the financial anguish due to your improved income. However, Galilei was not master of optics and therefore the telescopes he built varied greatly in quality, some even becoming unusable.
In the year 1610, he had numerous achievements and several of those considered as most important contributions of Galileo Galilei, thanks to his dedication to astronomy and the progress he made in the construction of telescopes. These dedications and studies resulted in the confirmation that all the planets did not rotate around the Sun and that the so-called celestial bodies do not rotate around planet Earth.
Attacks and the appearance of new enemies
Due to the discoveries made through telescopes (such as the confirmation of the heliocentric model presented by Nicolaus Copernicus) they brought numerous confrontations as a consequence, which mainly came from a group of people who strongly supported the geocentric theory in the universe. This also produced multiple and varied attacks that were becoming much more violent against Galileo Galilei.
It could be said that the confrontation that started it all occurred through agreements and brochures that were published by Galileo and the people who followed him, however, the opposite sector carried out the same tasks with the intention of refuting Galileo Galilei's contributions. .
Some time later, the attacks orchestrated by Galilei's enemies would change direction, now they would focus on his way of thinking. This sector would allege that Galileo (supposedly) uses the scriptures of the Bible at his convenience to support his theories. These allegations would be taken into account in 1611 by Cardinal Roberto Bellarmine, who would order the Inquisition to carry out investigations and follow-ups around Galileo.
religious hypothesis
From the year 1604 (the year in which Galileo manufactured the telescope) he would carry out studies that would have to do with the collection of data that would support the theory exposed by Copernicus, which states that the planets revolve around a star (the Sun). ). This theory questioned the ideology of Aristotle and the guidelines established by the Catholic Church. Therefore, in the year 1612 a priest named Niccolo Lorini would give a talk where he would roundly criticize (from a religious perspective) Galileo Galilei. This meant the beginning of attacks of a religious nature.
A year later Galileo wrote a letter stating that the theory of Nicolaus Copernicus did not refute the passages in the Bible. This letter was addressed to one of his students, himself, he was going to make it public and for this reason the Inquisition was going to declare Copernicus' approach heretical.
Discussions would take place in later years and in them, Galilei in his defense would present truths that would be related to his discoveries. Galileo went to Rome in the year 1615, where he was going to continue defending what was presented by Nicolaus Copernicus. A year later, in the month of February, he would receive a call from the Holy Office, the same was for the purpose of studying censorship in Copernicus' theory.
The same would consequently be censored, and Galileo Galilei was instructed not to engage in any activity related to the teaching and/or defense of Nicolaus Copernicus's theory under any circumstances. This was a severe blow to Galileo, who, despite being seriously ill, continued his studies and defenses from various venues, while also exhibiting numerous works that would become prestigious and significant in history.
A good friend of Galileo (Maffeo Barberini) would be named Pope Urban VIII in 1623, who granted him permission to continue his astronomical works and to publish them under the following conditions: Be impartial and not cause any kind of fuss related to the theory. However, nine years later he would publish the work called Dialogues on the two greatest exponents of the world, in which he would once again support Copernicus, ignoring the censorship issued in 1616, which forced him to refer to Nicholas's theory as an assumption. and not as something confirmed.
In Rome they were going to react quickly and they were going to summon Galileo for an investigation, which lasted almost a year (between September 1632 and July 1633). However, Galilei was treated respectfully and was not denigrated. In the month of April 1633, they would begin the procedures for Galileo to confess his crimes by ignoring what was issued in 1616, they would also threaten him with torture. Taking into account the threats, Galilei was going to accept the terms and be taken to court.
In June of that same year he was going to be sentenced to life imprisonment since he renounced his ideals. By accepting the terms, the sentence was altered and he was sentenced to house arrest, where he was to serve a sentence of 5 years until 1638. During that time he was allowed to receive visitors who were companions and some colleagues, thanks to this he was able to make public some works and works that would mean relevant contributions of Galileo Galilei.
At the beginning of 1638 in the month of January, Galileo Galilei would go blind and for this reason they agreed to move him to his house located in San Giorgio near the beach where he was able to work with several apprentices, among whom Vincenzo Viviani and Torricelli stand out.
Death
At the age of 77, Galileo Galilei died at the beginning of the year 1642, specifically on January 8. His burial would take place a day later in Florence. Almost 91 years later, a tomb was to be built in the church of Santa Cruz in Florence, said tomb was part of a dedication to Galileo.
The main contributions
Galileo Galilei made numerous and multiple contributions in different branches of science, in which astronomy, physics and mathematics stand out, these contributions would lead him to be called the father of modern science. Among them, the most notable are:
first law of motion
He was a pioneer of the law introduced by Isaac Newton. With it, he concluded that bodies in general accelerate at the same rate and rate regardless of their volume. This idea was carried out with terms related to speed, such as acceleration and speed through inclined planes. He also developed the concept of force as a motor of movement and concluded that the natural or normal state is at rest or in homogeneous movement.
A clear example of this is that every object has a speed, the same, has a magnitude that is equivalent to zero, this state is called rest. Galileo also showed that objects can withstand different changes in motion and direction. The latter is called inertia.
Advances in the telescope
Galilei was also a great inventor, an example of this is the great improvements and progress he made in the Dutch telescope, which had a 3-fold image magnification. Galileo took that magnification ten times further, managing to magnify the image 30 times thanks to the focuses he made on the lenses. As a result of advances, he was able to be the first to see 4 natural satellites of Jupiter, the Sunspots, the surface of the Moon and its craters and the phases of Venus.
Thanks to his constant study of sunspots, he deduced that the planet Earth could rotate on itself. Also the discovery of the phases of the planet Venus was a fundamental pillar to support and confirm the theory of Nicolaus Copernicus. It claimed that the planets revolve around the Sun.
Defense to the heliocentric concept of Copernicus
The study at Natural satellites of Jupiter was one of the main confirmations of the Copernican theory, especially because these satellites make an orbit around Jupiter, which showed that the planet Earth was not the center of the universe as proposed by Aristotle. He also presented his work on the rotation around the Sun and this would be one of the largest contributions of Galileo Galilei.
Scientific method
This great scientist also inserted what would be a totally new way of investigating for the time, this through the famous scientific method. This method would also be used in the different experiments and findings of it. At present it is essential in any experiment carried out scientifically. In science it would be one of the most important contributions made by Galileo Galilei.
law of falling bodies
Aristotle presented the idea that force was the cause of speed and Galileo refuted it with the concept that force generates acceleration and concluded that bodies fall to the earth's surface at a continuous acceleration. This was also considered one of the great Galileo Galilei's contributions to physics.
Mathematical contributions of Galileo Galilei
One of his major works in this branch of science was the many lectures and exhibitions about 2 new sciences that are closely related to mechanics. Galileo also presents the acceleration of bodies when they are in free fall, the movement carried out by pendulums and his work on objects on an inclined plane or surface.
Thermoscope
A remarkable invention was undoubtedly the thermoscope, the same, was built by Galileo in the year 1593 and was dependent on pressure and temperature to give a result. This artifact was made using a long pipe that was attached to a small glass with water inside, a glass or crystal ball was placed on the tip. Today this very useful device is called a thermometer. This artifact would be recognized as one of the great contributions of Galileo Galilei.
military compass
Galileo Galilei also made contributions in the military field between 1595 and 1598. The most relevant had to do with a compass that performed multiple tasks, such as the calibration and elevation of the barrel bar, it was also used by merchants to perform calculations in what which refers to currency exchange.
Works of Galileo Galilei
Throughout his life he was the author of numerous works that would be of great prestige and would transcend history as the great contributions of Galileo Galilei, among which the following stand out:
- In 1604 he published the operations of the military compass
- The Sidereal Messenger published in 1610
- Discourse on things that float on water in 1612
- Letter addressed to Mrs. Cristina de Lorena, who was Duchess of Tuscany in 1615
- In 1623 he published the work El essayador
- The controversial work of 1632 called Dialogues on the two greatest systems in the world
- Two new sciences in 1638
