Tycho Brahe, born in Denmark in 1546, was part of a noble family. What made his family noble? His uncle gave his life to try to save the life of King Fredrik II of Denmark. Brahe benefited a lot from the king due to his uncle's life-saving deed. For example, he was given an island which he turned into his own little country. He used the country to make astronomical observations.
After about 20 years of making astronomical observations from his small island, Brahe had many ideas of his own. But, he eventually lost the king's support. So, he moved to Germany and continued to study astronomy. After about 20 more years, he saw that his observations supported Copernicus's heliocentric theory. He used tools such as sextants and compasses to follow the stars and come to the conclusion that Copernicus was right. He hired Kepler, another important figure in the scientific revolution, to continue his work.
Thursday, 29 April 2010
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It is interesting that Tycho had come from a noble family, considering that usually the nobles had agreed and supported the church at that time. It is also interesting that Tycho, who was a well respected man himself had decided to study the known universe, considering that not many people who have power at this time really cared about science and improving knowledge about our world.
ReplyDeleteCool! He owned an island? i think that that is very neat. It is good he had the King on his side or he might not have been able to do his work. However, when he lost the king's support, he continued to study astronomy, which was good. He agreed with Copernicus's idea that the sun was in the center of the universe, which turned out to be right. I think that it was brave of him to go against what the church said, even if the church did not influence him (i'm not sure if it played a part in his life or not.)
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