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Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

cricetuscricetus.co.uk

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Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#21

Post by anonymouskimmer »

smsm42 wrote: post #18
ajross wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how that follows at all. Academic arguments about the structure of the heavens are irrelevancies except to the people in the argument (and those threatened by it). Sure, absolutely: you don't censor opinions about astronomy just because they seem "probably wrong" or demand blind adherence to the best available theory. You do the science, because sometimes scientists are wrong. But pandemic advice isn't ab…

> you bet on the consensus science because it's probably right. And it was. Was it though? As I am seeing now, some early policies were flat out murderous (such as hosting COVID patients together with healthy people in nursing homes), some were practically useless mortality wise (like lockdowns) and some are very minimally useful or not useful at all (like mask mandates and mass-firing unvaccinated people). Some were…

Many of those policies didn't follow any science. And a bunch of them not working well is likely due to conflicting talking points from various of the powers that be.

> some were practically useless mortality wise

If any of the advice decreased the rate of infection spread they were likely to decrease mortality through the simple effect of making work easier for health care workers.

Actual lockdowns worked for a long time in China, as well as travel lockdowns in countries such as Australia and New Zealand.

Masking works. Mandates don't work if huge chunks of the population don't follow them (i.e., if they aren't actually "mandates").

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8580811/

> Average COVID-19 mortality per million was 288.54 in countries without face mask policies and 48.40 in countries with face mask policies. In no mask countries, adjusted average daily increase was 0.1553 − 0.0017 X (days since the first case) log deaths per million, compared with 0.0900 − 0.0009 X (days since the first case) log deaths per million in the countries with a mandate. A total of 60 days into the pandemic, countries without face mask mandates had an average daily increase of 0.0533 deaths per million, compared with the average daily increase of 0.0360 deaths per million for countries with face mask mandates.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8287197/

> Twenty one articles were identified that analysed ecological data to assess the protective effect of policies mandating community mask wearing. All studies reported SARS-CoV-2 benefits in terms of reductions in either the incidence, hospitalization, or mortality, or a combination of these outcomes. Few studies assessed compliance to mask wearing policies or controlled for the possible influence of other preventive measures such as hand hygiene and physical distancing, and information about compliance to these policies was lacking.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#22

Post by ncallaway »

elpocko wrote: post #20
ncallaway wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> force people to behave in line with the best available evidence. I think this… really depends on the behavior. I think, pretty much universally we should never force someone to pretend their beliefs conform to such evidence. But, in certain circumstances, I think it’s absolutely appropriate to force people to conform to our understanding of the world. Consider exaggerating this principle to an extreme degree (to de…

> I think this… really depends on the behavior. > I think it’s absolutely appropriate to force people to conform to our understanding of the world. And I think... it's... appropriate to... use extreme violence to resist anyone who attempts to force me to conform to anything. Ellipsis.

Well, I hope you never get pulled over for speeding.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#23

Post by the-mitr »

Parallax by Alan Hirshfeld is a good book which tracks various efforts to find the evidence for the rotation of earth culminating in evidence of parallax of nearest stars.

Also of interest is Book that Nobody Read by Owen Gringerich in which he explores the diffusion of Copernican ideas of heliocentric system after its publication. The book is also a personal journey of the author finding/cataloging extant copies of De Revolutionibus.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#24

Post by elpocko »

ncallaway wrote: post #22
elpocko wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think this… really depends on the behavior. > I think it’s absolutely appropriate to force people to conform to our understanding of the world. And I think... it's... appropriate to... use extreme violence to resist anyone who attempts to force me to conform to anything. Ellipsis.

Well, I hope you never get pulled over for speeding.

[flagged]

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#25

Post by transportguy »

roenxi wrote: post #3

This article is interpreting events in a way that casts a revealing shadow. There is a subtle and difficult concept - it is a terrible idea to force people to behave in line with the best available evidence. In this era, it is hard to point that out without mentioning COVID so, y'know. COVID. But it has been true for long before that and it'll be true after the COVID response is forgotten. People should be allowed to…

The trial was more to do with precedence and academics though. Galileo was only punished in the 2nd trial because he had broken an order given to him in the first trial.

The corrections and withdrawals of work were the right of the Roman Inquisition which had oversight over the Vatican's academic publishing process. They were a publisher in their own right, and if they granted an Imprimatur for a book, it would be treated as if they had supported it as truth.

Hence, Copernicus had to be corrected to be "hypothetical" in 1615, so that it would accurately represent the truth known at the time.

Galileo had managed to get his Imprimatur on his Dialogue without the proper oversight it should have had. He arranged it so it was checked page by page by his Nuncio who didn't have the right competencies. When the Inquisition asked the Sacred Master of the Palace if they had indeed granted their Imprimatur, they hadn't, and it was an embarrassment for them.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#26

Post by GloucesterBoy »

throw0101b wrote: post #4

For a good timeline of the development, see the late [1] Michael F. Flynn's "The Great Ptolemaic Smackdown"; table of contents: * https://tofspot.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-great-ptolemaic-sma... First evidence for Earth's motion: > 1728. Building on efforts by Flamsteed, Hooke, and others attempting to detect that old bugaboo, parallax, James Bradley detects stellar aberration [2] in γ-Draconis (Phil. Trans. Royal Soc…

Galileo improved on Copernicus in the sense that he found evidence against the Ptolemaic model. But the Geocentric position had moved on by then.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#27

Post by GloucesterBoy »

GloucesterBoy wrote: post #26
throw0101b wrote: post #4

For a good timeline of the development, see the late [1] Michael F. Flynn's "The Great Ptolemaic Smackdown"; table of contents: * https://tofspot.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-great-ptolemaic-sma... First evidence for Earth's motion: > 1728. Building on efforts by Flamsteed, Hooke, and others attempting to detect that old bugaboo, parallax, James Bradley detects stellar aberration [2] in γ-Draconis (Phil. Trans. Royal Soc…

Galileo improved on Copernicus in the sense that he found evidence against the Ptolemaic model. But the Geocentric position had moved on by then.

Keep in mind that despite Tycho's model having the consensus, there were still Ptolemaic Astronomers.

Re: Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler all lacked proof

#30

Post by quixoticaxolotl »

roenxi wrote: post #3

This article is interpreting events in a way that casts a revealing shadow. There is a subtle and difficult concept - it is a terrible idea to force people to behave in line with the best available evidence. In this era, it is hard to point that out without mentioning COVID so, y'know. COVID. But it has been true for long before that and it'll be true after the COVID response is forgotten. People should be allowed to…

I don't think this is the right conclusion. It's more: people with no expertise and hidden agendas should be forced to behave in line with the best available evidence unless there are no other recourses for them. People with expertise, using the standards of high-quality data gathering and analysis, should be exploring alternative hypotheses. Galileo, Kepler, Newton et. al. all fell in the latter camp. COVID denial and flat earthism is an example of the former.

This really just boils down to saying: there is a rigorous evidence-based standard for updating our best available knowledge, and people who don't know how to adhere to that standard should be disqualified from recommending deviation (they are of course welcome to believe and do unto themselves as they wish, they just shouldn't be allowed from promoting it unless they have solid evidence for their claims).

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