Galileo Galilei

6 Pages 1425 Words

GALILEO’S LIFE AND
HIS CONTRIBUTION TO ASTRONOMY

Galileo was an Italian mathematician, astronomer, and physicist. Galileo Galilei was born near Pisa, Italy, on February 15, 1564. Galileo was the first child of Vincezio Galilei, a talented musician, and Giulia degli Ammannati. In 1574, Galileo’s family moved from Pisa to Florence, where Galileo started his formal education (Drake, 1978). Seven years latter, in 1581, Galileo entered the University of Pisa as a medical student. In 1584, home on vacation from medical school, Galileo began to study mathematics and physical sciences. A Family friend and professor at the Academy of Design, Ostilio Ricci, worked on translating some of Archimedes, which Galileo read and became interested in. This is where Galileo got his deep interest in Archimedes (Shea, 1972). When returning to medical school, medical school became less appealing to Galileo, and his deep interests in Archimedes and mathematics drew him in, Galileo left without a degree in the spring of 1585 (Drake, 1978). Starting his studies, in 1585, in Aristotelian physics and cosmology, Galileo had to leave the University of Pisa before he got his degree, because of financial problems.
Galileo became renowned in 1588, when he gave a lecture at the Florentine Academy on the topography of Dante’s Inferno, where he showed his extensive knowledge on mathematics and geometry. In 1589, Galileo’s rising reputation as a mathematician, earned him a teaching position at the University of Pisa (Sharratt, 1994). Galileo spent three years at the University of Pisa. His position required him to teach astronomy based on Ptolemy’s theory that all planets and the sun revolved around the earth. At Pisa, Galileo was in conflict with many other professors and various disputes seem to have made him despair of advancement in the University. In 1591, Galileo’s father died and this increased his financial responsibilities, when in 1952 he res...