assignment 8 Flashcards
Order these thinkers: galileo, ptolemy, copernicus, apollonius of perga, kepler
apollonius of perga, ptolemy, copernicus, galileo + kepler (kepler lived longer)
True or false: Scientists in Copernicus’s time, though they had some evidence in favor of Copernicus’s theory, were unable to prove that the Earth goes around the Sun (rather than the Sun going around the Earth). Today, with our improved technology, we are able to prove that this is the case
FALSE: science does not prove things
Ptolemy’s model: Mars undergoes retrogade motion when___
- at closest point to earth (at perigee)
- at its brightest as seen in Earth’s sky
- is rising in Earth’s sky when Sun was setting, Mars setting when Sun is rising
Small circle whose center orbits earth on large circle
epicycle
On Ptolemy’s model of the heavens, Mercy and Venus are always_____
near to the sun in the earth’s sky
what arguments did copernicus give in favor of his model
- fewer circles in explaining retrogressions
- model avoids equants
- allows observations to determine planetary distances in units of earth’s orbital radius (planetary order)
- no suspicious role of sun
How does Ptolemy’s model say Sun plays a “suspicious role”?
- Centers of epicycles for Mercury and Venus line up with the Sun as seen from the Earth
- Epicycles for Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn each go around in the same time it takes the Sun to orbit the Earth
define perigee and opposition
perigee: planet is brightest
opposition: planet at closest point to earth in its orbit
true/false: copernicus and ptolemaic model both predicted mars, saturn, jupiter at perigee when it is at opposition
true
What danger is Bellarmine talkinga bout?
contradicting the Bible
Bellarmine praise foscarini and galileo for “proceeding prudently by limiting to speaking supositionally and not absolutely”. Bllearmine was saying….
Foscarini and Galileo right in regarding Copernican model as merely “saving the phenomena”
T/F: During time between ptolemy and copernicus, did astronmers add more little circles to ptolemy’s model to improve the accuracy ,making the model more complicated.
False. They did not add more circles
Bellarmine and Osiander disagreed/agreed about the aim of science
agreed. both were anti-realist, saved the phenomena
anti-realism vs realism
realists: aim of science is to provide true description of the world
anti-realists: aim of science is to provide true description of the ‘observable’ part of the world
was galileo a scientific realist or anti-realist?
galileo was a realist. why?
were copernicus and kepler realists or anti-realists
copernicus was a realist: equant argument available only under scientific realism.
kepler: sun placed at physically significant location with sun as explanatory presupposes realism
what is the pessimistic historical meta-induction?
anti-realist position that mature theories are possibly to turn out to be false as regards empirical evidence in the history of science-likewise, they are also not even approximately true
name an objection to the scientific anti-realism arguemnt from empirically equivalent rival theories
the 2 theories that are empirically equivalent by themselves may not be empirically equivalent when combined with auxilary hypothesis
Stellar paralax was widely recognized to be predicted by copernicus’s theory. But, not actually detected until 1830s. scientists were not justified in accepting copernicus’s theory before it was detected
false.
Kepler was in ____ with Copernicus’s theory
agreement. bro got people to believe it
What is an example of something that Copernicus’s theory expalined but which Ptolemy’s theory “could give no reason”
mars is brightest when it is visible all night
what did Kuhn think about Coeprnicus’s argument of greator harmony and “aesthetic” superiority?
he thought it was WEAK
the particular location for the sun suggesting that the sun helps cause the planets to follow their orbital paths did NOT count in favor of Kepler’s version according to scientific anti-realism
true.
when are two theories empirically equivalent
if and only if one of them “saves” the phenomena”, then the other does also.
(nothing about both being true)
what are unobservable facts in astronomy? who only cares about observable facts?
unobservable facts: earth at motion/rest, sun in motion/rest, arrangement of celestial spheres
anti-realists only care about observable facts, not unobservables
why was kepler’s theory considered to be realist?
he insisted that astronomy was capapble of providing true description of planetary motion. bro thought sun helps cause planets to follow orbital paths. this was not observable.
why did copernicus’s theory not fit the then-accepted physical theories concerning motions of bodies?
because accroding to physical theories then:
1. center of universe was natural place for Erathy things so there was no force pushing earth away from natural place
2. if earth was revolving around sun, it would always be changing direction and if you dropped a rock it should head toward center of universe which might not be cetner of earth
osiander said “merely the basis of calculations; even if they should be false, that hardly matters, as long as they reproduce the phenomena of the movements exactly… irregular movement of the Sun occurs rather in virtue of the epicycle or in virtue of the eccentric?”
argument for scientific anti-realism from empirically equivalent theories
what is the no miracles argument?
it would be an extraordinary conincidence if a theory that talks about electrons and atoms made accurate predictions about the observable world-unless electrons and atoms actually exist.
the likelihood that the theory makes accurate predictions just by chance is highly unlikely so anti-realists would be believing a miracle.
