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Leaning Tower of Pisa - it has ne-
ver been established if this is true or
whether he was just joking. He also
investigated the motion of objects
travelling on an inclined plane and
found the parabolic law of fired pro-
jectiles which was useful for artillery-
men. His research also led him to
discover the conditions for the flo-
tation of solid bodies in a liquid.
In 1607 he constructed an elemen-
tary form of air thermometer.
Galileo before the Holy Office
JnsephNico1as ROb(Vt-11( Ill". - 1847
Another of Galileo's ideas was that
the orbit of the Earth around the
off with a reprimand. However, the invented the pendulum clock using
verdict on 21 June 1633 was that he this principle. Sun could be used as a base to mea-
must recant. For Galileo the choice sure the distance of the nearest stars
was simple: renounce Copernicus What marks Galileo's science is, in by parallax. He suggested that other
planets in the Solar System would
and live or support Copernicus and contrast to the usual practice of the
have moons and predicted that light
die -- either in prison or at the time, a mixture of the theoretical
travels with an extremely great but
stake, as others had done. and the experimental. He is often
measurable velocity.
referred to as the father of modern
As a devout Catholic, he felt obli- experimental physics. He perceived
ged to respect the Pope's authority. that mathematics and physics would Galileo added to his income by ma-
He recited a humiliating formula join forces, and in this way paved king calculators for the military and
in which he renounced his error in the way for Newton's laws some six optical lenses, and it was in this way
spreading the ideas of Copernicus. decades later. that he had first been asked to make
He was sentenced to prison, which telescopes, which became the best in
the Pope commuted to house arrest. At the age of 22 he invented the hydro- all Europe. Although the Venetian
This ruling remained in effect for static balance which was used by authorities had granted him lifetime
tenure at Padua University, in 1610
the last eight years of Galileo's life. jewellers to assess precious metals.
He was so famous, however, that he Aged 25, he was awarded the post he left to become philosopher and
mathematician to the Duke of Tus-
continued to receive distinguished of mathematics lecturer at Pisa Uni-
foreign visitors at his house. It took versity. Three years later, he became cany, an appointment that left him
free to conduct research.
the Catholic Church 203 years to professor of mathematics at Padua
admit that it was wrong! University, where he remained for
the next eighteen years and per- Throughout much of his life Galileo
Galileo had been born into the minor formed the bulk of his outstanding had suffered from long periods of ill
health. It is believed that the major
aristocracy, which meant that he had experimental work.
problem was gout brought about by
to work for a living. As a teenager his
drinking too much wine, but he also
father, a musician, had enrolled him The most substantial contribution
in Pisa University. One day during of Galileo is the establishment of suffered from an irregular pulse,
his first year at university, Galileo mechanics as a science based on a hernia and eventually blindness.
remarked a lamp swinging in Pisa mathematics. His practical experi- With the help of his young assis-
Cathedral. He noted that it took the ments discovered the laws of uni- tant Viviani, he continued his scien-
tific correspondence with unbroken
same time to complete an oscilla- form acceleration, in that bodies of
vigour until his death on 8 January
tion, independent of the distance different weights fall at the same
covered. Later in life, he suggested speed -- disproving another of 1642. I
that the principle of the pendulum Aristotle's proposals. In old age,
could be used to make clocks. It was he liked to say that he discovered HAYWARD BEYWOOD
in 1656 that Christiaan Huygens this by dropping weights from the
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