Man, The Church Can Be Pretty Harsh...

Because the geocentric idea was so praised by the church, my heliocentric theory is considered "heretic". If I release my masterpiece, my reputation could be shattered, and even worse, I could be sentenced to death. Now, how much would that stink?

I have a brilliant plan, though. I have decided to delay the release of my masterpiece until after my death. Clever, huh? That way I can completely avoid being persecuted by the Church, and still get my ideas out to the world. Sometimes, my intellectuality even surprises me. Anyway, I shall be placing the responsibility of "De Revolutionibus" in the hands of a dear fellow of mine, Andreas Osiander, in the hopes that he takes the utmost care of it.

This is Nicolaus Copernicus, signing off.

Because i've decided not to print my masterpiece just yet...

I'll give you an idea of what I talk about in De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium. Here is my theory:

The Universe consists of eight spheres. The outermost sphere contains many motionless, unmoving stars. At the center stands the motionless Sun. Each planet is in its own sphere in this order: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. However, the Moon revolves in its own sphere around the earth. The apparent daily revolution of the Sun and the stars around the Earth, was actually the motion and daily rotation of the Earth on its very own axis. It all makes sense now! Take that Ptolemy!

Unfortunately, I believe that all the orbits of celestial bodies must be perfect circles...which forces me to retain Ptolemy's idea of epicycles. Sigh, well, I'm still more right than he was.

This is Nicolaus Copernicus, signing off.

My Masterpiece is Complete

I've just completed a work that explains my theories in full depth. I have called it....
"De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium"

Or "On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres". And yes, I know, that is a quality title right there.

It is a collection of six books:

• First Book (Liber Primus) - This book is just a basic look at the Heliocentric Theory.
• Second Book (Liber Secundus) -  This book is, for the most part, theoretical. It explains the principles of spherical astronomy and provides a list of stars, to serve as basis for my arguments in the following books.
• Third Book (Liber Tertius) - In this book, I account for the apparent movements of the Sun and other unexplained phenomena.
• Fourth Book (Liber Quartus) - In this book, I account for the apparent orbital movements of the Moon.
• Fifth Book (Liber Quintus) 
• Sixth Book (Liber Sextus) - Both the fifth and sixth book serve as the concrete explanation of the Heliocentric Model, and they explain how to calculate the positions of the planets and such based on this model.

I'm feeling pretty good about this one! But I'm not quite sure if I should print it just yet...

Tell me what you think! This is Nicolaus Copernicus, signing off.

This guy is amazing.

This really happened...

"Little Commentary"

In my 40-page manuscript, Little Commentary, i've detailed seven basic axioms:

There is no one centre in the universe.

The Earth's centre is not the centre of the universe.

The centre of the universe is near the sun.

The distance from the Earth to the sun is imperceptible compared with the distance to the stars.

The rotation of the Earth accounts for the apparent daily rotation of the stars.

The apparent annual cycle of movements of the sun is caused by the Earth revolving round it.

The apparent retrograde motion of the planets is caused by the motion of the Earth from which one observes.

I shall base my conclusions and ideas on these seven axioms and nothing else! This is Nicolaus Copernicus, signing off.

Just wrote a manuscript!

Hello friends! I've just made available to some close friends my 40-page manuscript called "Commentariolus", (or "Little Commentary" for you English-speakers out there). Little Commentary details my ideas about the heliocentric theory, and details the basic points I want to get across. In my manuscript, I try to account for the movements of the planet that Ptolemy (who was totally wrong) and his geocentric theory (so, so wrong), could not account for.


I will give more details in my next post! This is Nicolaus Copernicus, signing off.

Why, Hello There!

Hello Physics students of the world, my name is Nicolaus Copernicus. Yeah, you know, they one they refer to as "the father of modern astronomy"...I'm kind of a big deal. While on this blog I will mainly be talking about the fascinating concept of Heliocentrism (and why it's so much better than Geocentrism), in this first post, I will be telling all you heliocentric-lovers about my life.

I was born on February 19th, 1473 in the city of Toruń in Royal Prussia, which is a part of Poland. I was named after my father, who was a merchant. My mother, Barbara, was the daughter of a wealthy merchant. I had 3 older siblings; my brother Andreas, my sister Barbara, who was named after mother dearest, and my sister Katharina. Katharina and her husband had 5 kids, who I was left to take care of for the rest of my life, but I, myself, never had kids nor got married. 


As you probably know, I'm famous for bringing back the heliocentric theory. I studied arithmetic, geometry, geometric optics, cosmography, theoretical and computational astronomy at  Kraków university. I also studied the writings of Aristotle and Averroes, which played a pretty important part in shaping my own theories. My years at Krakow gave me the knowledge that contributed to my theories about the universe. 


So there you have it, a small look into the life of I, Nicolaus Copernicus.