The Renaissance Chapter 5

People in History

Write a short account of the life of a Renaissance scientist and two of his discoveries.

Sample answer

Galileo was born in Pisa in Italy in 1564. He had intended becoming a doctor but he found maths more interesting.
He believed that all the laws of nature could be proved by calculations and experiment. For example, he proved that two solid objects fall at the same speed whatever their weight. He called this the ‘law of falling bodies’. Up to then people had thought that heavier objects would fall faster than light ones.
 A Dutchman invented the telescope in 1608, but Galileo designed and built a much more powerful version of it. His telescope could magnify something thirty-two times and he was the first person to use the telescope to study the skies. He built over 100 telescopes.
Galileo could see things no human being had ever seen before. There were spots on the sun and mountains on the moon. He saw that Jupiter had four moons moving around it. He realised that Copernicus was right. The earth could not be the centre of the universe. The sun was the centre of the solar system and the earth did move around it.
When the Catholic Church heard Galileo’s theories they banned his books. The Church believed that the earth had to be the centre of the universe because the earth was created by God it is where Christ was born
Galileo published a book called The Dialogue which contained his findings. The pope summoned him to Rome where he was put on trial. Galileo was afraid that he was going to be burnt at the stake and he finally agreed to say he was wrong. He was not allowed to write about astrology after this but his ideas still lived on.

 

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