
They knew it was round, damn it - supermatou
https://thonyc.wordpress.com/2016/05/25/repeat-after-me-they-knew-it-was-round-damn-it/
======
danielam
This isn't the only childish myth that refuses to die. The so-called Galileo
affair and Copernicus' alleged fear and trembling over publishing "his"
heliocentric theory are two notorious and by now classical examples. In both
cases, the supposedly grand Manichean battle between Religion and Science was
nothing but the fallout of the provincial squabbling of petty men. Copernicus
-- who was a classically educated cleric -- was reluctant to publish De
Revolutionibus on account of hostility from rival astronomers (and though the
Church had no doctrinal interest in something as theologically irrelevant as
which rock orbits which other rock, Paul III and Cardinal von Schoenberg did
take interest in his work). Furthermore, Copernicus' original contribution was
not the idea of a heliocentric "universe", but the mathematization he produced
that "saved the appearances" accounted for in the geocentric model. The
Galileo "affair", which stretched for some 30 years IIRC, culminated in house
arrest in the papal apartments overlooking the papal gardens, a fate far
better than that of many in the 15th century or the 21st century for that
matter. Ultimately, his house arrest was largely the result of Galileo's habit
of harassing people and making enemies, some of whom were clerics, and nothing
to do with doctrine (the story goes that Galileo was arrested and forced to
abjure the very same heliocentrism Paul III and others encouraged and found so
fascinating under pain of death, but anyone free of prejudice and acquainted
with the history knows this account to be comically stupid as it is
presented). There are many more such fabrications and misconceptions.

At least some of these myths are known to have their origins in the 19th
century and in the slanderous writings of fanatical Enlightenment and
Protestant writers whose rabid hatred for Rome seems to have, in their minds,
given them license to resort to libel or corrupted their thinking. The author
credits two men in the article who certainly had an axe to grind.

~~~
transfire
Uh, no. You are the one reading too much revisionist history.

On the morning of June 22, 1633, Galileo, dressed in the white shirt of
penitence, entered the large hall of the Inquisition building. He knelt and
listened to his sentence: "Whereas you, Galileo, the son of the late Vincenzo
Galilei, Florentine, aged seventy years, were in the year 1615 denounced to
this Holy Office for holding as true the false doctrine....." The reading
continued for seventeen paragraphs...

"And, so that you will be more cautious in future, and an example for others
to abstain from delinquencies of this sort, we order that the book Dialogue of
Galileo Galilei be prohibited by public edict. We condemn you to formal
imprisonment in this Holy Office at our pleasure."

"As a salutary penance we impose on you to recite the seven penitential psalms
once a week for the next three years. And we reserve to ourselves the power of
moderating, commuting, or taking off, the whole or part of the said penalties
and penances."

"This we say, pronounce, sentence, declare, order and reserve by this or any
other better manner or form that we reasonably can or shall think of. So we
the undersigned Cardinals pronounce."

Seven of the ten cardinals signed the sentence.

Following the reading of the sentence, Galileo knelt to recite his abjuration:

"Desiring to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and of all faithful
Christians, this strong suspicion, reasonably conceived against me, with
sincere heart and unfeigned faith I abjure, curse, and detest the aforesaid
errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect whatsoever
contrary to the said Holy Church; and I swear that in the future I will never
again say or assert, verbally or in writing, anything that might furnish
occasion for a similar suspicion regarding me...."

"I, the said Galileo Galilei, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound myself
as above; and in witness of the truth thereof I have with my own hand
subscribed the present document of my abjuration, and recited it word for word
at Rome, in the Convent of Minerva, this twenty-second day of June, 1633."

"I, Galileo Galilei, have abjured as above with my own hand."

~~~
benbreen
You're both right. No one who studies Galileo disputes that he ran afoul of
the Inquisition. The question is whether the specifics of his case justify
framing it as part of an epic battle between science and religion (or reason
and ignorance, or any other binary opposition really), and I think the parent
comment is correct in suggesting that most historians today would answer "no"
to that. Mario Biagioli's book _Galileo Courtier_ is a really excellent work
of history that I recommend to anyone interested in the details - it's more
about the role of patronage in supporting Galileo's work, but gives a lot of
insight into the systems of authority at the time, and Galileo's unique
personality.

~~~
carlob
There was also a third camp at the time: Jesuits.

Apparently Galileo met with Jesuit astronomers at the Vatican Observatory, and
they suggested he might save both scientific evidence and theological
correctness by adopting the Tychonic system, where the center of the universe
is still the earth, but all the planets revolve around the sun, which revolves
around the earth.

As it turns out, we now know that both the Copernican and the Tychonic are
exactly equally wrong.

~~~
qb45
I don't think they were exactly equally wrong. The Tychonic system doesn't
quite predict stellar parallax, for example. I'd say it's the worse model of
those two.

And it looks less pretty on pictures, too.

EDIT: Ironically, the lack of observable (at the time) parallax was reportedly
used by Tycho Brahe to argue against heliocentrism, because "stars obviously
can't be far enough to make prallax unobservable". Now, that's clearly wrong.

~~~
huxley
Tycho Brahe was wrong but on stronger scientific ground given the observations
available, stellar parallax wasn't observed until around 1806 by Giuseppe
Calandrelli and not definitively measured until 1838 by Friedrich Bessel.

~~~
cygx
_Tycho Brahe was wrong but on stronger scientific ground given the
observations available_

Depends on how much weight you place on different lines of reasoning.

One of Galileo's key insights was that there's no fundamental difference
between the terrestrial and the celestial. In contrast, the Aristotelian
heavens are made of aether, in part to be able to account for the diurnal
motion of far-distant planets and stars.

------
Maultasche
It turned out Columbus was wrong and everyone else was right. The Earth was
simply too large to sail around the other way.

The only thing that kept Columbus' expedition from certain doom was bumping
into a continent that was unknown to most of Europe, despite some Norse having
settled there in earlier centuries.

Imagine if the Americas hadn't existed. He would likely have died in the
middle of a huge ocean.

~~~
tosseraccount
_Earth was simply too large to sail around the other way._

Yet ... 27 years after Columbus' first voyage, the Magellan expedition started
it's circumnavigation sailing west proving it was possible.

There are plenty of islands in the Ocean to load up on food and water.
Magellen, in fact, stopped at several islands.

~~~
ubernostrum
It was too large for the ships Columbus took, provisioned as Columbus
provisioned them. And everyone who ridiculed him knew that.

Magellan went out with a larger fleet and two years' provisions laid in.

~~~
tosseraccount
_2 years ' provisions_

Magellan Voyage took 3 years.

~~~
xlm1717
Hey may have left with 2 years' provisions, but as you said, he stopped at
many islands along the way to restock his provisions.

------
pluma
Wait. There are people who believe Columbus was the first person to establish
as common knowledge that the world was round? Is this an American thing again?

~~~
PeCaN
I kid you not, it's taught in American elementary schools (at least it was to
me, in the early-mid 2000s).

...Yeah. Thankfully my middle school general science textbook mentioned this
shit's been known forever and the Greeks even estimated the circumference of
the thing.

~~~
Spellman
Compounding the error is the claim he discovered the Americas. He actually
found the Caribbean islands. Which is kinda close, but not really the same.

But yay simplification that Columbus found America! At least that's what most
teach the kids. My kid will know better.

~~~
euyyn
How are the Caribbean islands not American?

~~~
xyzzy4
They are not connected to continents.

~~~
function_seven
True, but they're definitely in the same realm if you will. Just like Great
Britain is part of Europe, and New Zealand is part of Australia.
(Continentally-speaking!! Don't flame me, Kiwis).

Madagascar is Africa, Japan is Asia. I don't know what to categorize Iceland
as, though.

~~~
falsedan

      > New Zealand is part of Australia. (Continentally-
      > speaking!! Don't flame me, Kiwis)
    

I'm not a kiwi, but NZ is on a subduction zone so can't be part of an existing
continent. PNG is probably more what you were thinking of re: AU.

~~~
function_seven
You're right. I was thinking of Papua New Guinea. I seem to always imagine NZ
as being much closer to AU than it really is. Thanks.

------
bambax
What's really amazing is how calumny works: the bigger the better.

It's very likely _nobody_ , since men walked the earth, who gave it a moment's
thought ever believed the earth to be flat; it's absolutely certain nobody in
Europe or the Middle East post Aristotle ever believed it either (as many
comments already point out).

And yet, a myth invented in the 19th century to make fun of "medieval times"
and the Catholic Church is still around today, and needs to be constantly
refuted.

I think it works because it flatters us, making us feel sooo superior to those
ancient characters that must have been sooo stupid and smug. Well, in this
case at least, we're the smugs and the stupids.

~~~
qb45
> It's very likely nobody, since men walked the earth, who gave it a moment's
> thought ever believed the earth to be flat

Ahem,
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_earth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_earth)

------
ianferrel
I blame Stan Freberg.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Freberg_Presents_the_Unit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Freberg_Presents_the_United_States_of_America_Volume_One:_The_Early_Years)

------
mcguire
Ah, Washington Irving. One of the greatest minds of his time; what he didn't
know, he made up on the spot.

------
kesara
Now try convincing
[http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/](http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/) :)

~~~
dreamsofdragons
Arguing with genuinely stupid people just makes me frustrated and depressed.
It's far far easier to just ignore them.

~~~
userbinator
It is extremely difficult to tell apart genuine stupidity from advanced
trolling.

~~~
eric_h
Indeed. I'm as certain as one can be that the flat earth movement is half
stupid and half troll (at least on Internet message boards). I sincerely hope
that my unscientific estimate is not erring in favor of the right hand side
there.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
I've always just assumed that it was just "trolling", like being a follower of
the FSM - noodles all round.

------
kazinator
Of course they knew it was round. Under the belief that the Earth isn't round,
land discovered by sailing west would have been taken for granted to be a new
discovery, and not India, which lies to the east. Its inhabitants wouldn't
have been dubbed Indians.

~~~
Buge
Whether they are called Indians or not has nothing to do with the myth that
Europeans thought the Earth was flat.

The myth says "Columbus thought the Earth was round, while everyone else
thought it was flat". Even if that myth was true, they would still be called
Indians, because Columbus named them that.

------
transfire
I'm pretty sure there were many Europeans who thought the Earth was flat. And
given the quality of the Columbus' crew, some among them as well. The idea
that it must be all or none is ridiculous. How many people today still reject
Evolution?

~~~
egjerlow
The point is that we're still being taught that the reason Columbus sailed
westward was to prove that the earth was round, which was certainly not the
case. I have lost count of the times the 'we used to think the world was flat'
argument has been used in discussions I have partaken in. Though it does have
a valid point (we know more now than we used to) it is also misused,
especially when it comes to discussions on science and religion. It is quite
ironic when the defenders of science in that perceived battle perpetuate this
myth.

~~~
transfire
Well, "the reason" is certainly wrong. But I think it is easy to understand
the error. When Columbus thought he reached the Indies, it was the final
difinitive proof that the world was indeed circumnavigable and thus round.

------
lolc
A thorough rant if I ever read one.

------
known
God != Religion;

Religions are ~2000 years old;

Humans are ~200,000 years old;

Earth is ~4,000,000,000 years old;

Religion was born when first con-man met the first fool;

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_earth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_earth)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_ancient_history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_ancient_history)

~~~
golergka
> Religions are ~2000 years old

Ehm.

