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For astronomy buffs, the arrival of 2009 brings more than just resolutions to eat better or live more frugally. The fledgling year has been designated the International Year of Astronomy (IYA) by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the International Astronomical Union.

The IYA, intended to raise the public profile of astronomy, recognizes the 400th anniversary of the year Galileo, the Italian astronomer, began studying the heavens with telescopes of his own making. His observations of 1609 and 1610 showed the moon to be pockmarked rather than smoothly surfaced and unveiled four of Jupiter's moons, among other discoveries.

Now, as reported in the current issue of Physics World, Italian scientists have re-created one of Galileo's scopes in the hope of seeing the universe just as he saw it. (A macabre note to that end: the researchers are apparently seeking to disinter the legendary astronomer to study "the physiology of Galileo's eye.")

Staffers at Florence's Institute and Museum of the History of Science built the replica with assistance from the Arcetri Astrophysics Observatory and the National Institute of Applied Optics in Florence. The telescope is based on a 20-power model gifted by Galileo to Cosimo II, the grand duke of Tuscany. (Although Galileo further refined his instrument to reach a magnifying strength of 32, that high-power version does not survive in reproducible form today.)

One difference between the 400-year-old scope and today's facsimile: the latter is outfitted for digital photography, and the Institute's Web site hosts a few shots of the moon and Saturn taken with the new telescope.

1 Comments

1. 1. YOUSUF GABRIEL 05:25 AM 8/11/09

   GALILEO'S ASTRONOMY
   By Allama Muhammad Yousuf Gabriel
   Our unscientific philosopher has rightly remarked that Galileo's astronomy has affected a great revolution of thought. Indeed a revolution. A revolution not of thought only, but the revolution of mind also along with the revolution of earth. That is, the mind of man was at comparative rest when the earth was considered as stationary. But later, when it was believed that the earth was in rotation, mind of man also assumed rotation along with the earth. Since that day peace has left the mind, and the mind is in constant revolution. The discovery, of Galileo might mean much to the astronomers, but to the humanity in general he did no more than a topsyturvification of the former Ptolemic system. That is whereas ptolemy held the earth at rest by his right hand and moved the firmament with his left around the earth, Galileo after his life-long watching, held the sun stationary by his left hand and moved the earth around the sun by his right. This fact so trivial in itself, has indeed topsyturveyed the whole world. It caused a science-religion conflict as fierce as rent the heavens of humanity's mind. It has reversed the entire outlook of man. It has snatched away all the peace and rest from human mind. It is like a man walking on his hands, head down, and legs up like an acrobat. The denizens of this earth who before the discovery of earth's motion had gone about their business with a confidence that the earth beneath their feet, was at rest and reliable; are now seen in their hard endeavour to catch up with furiously racing earth, they being mercilessly tossed about; their bellies convulsed by the jerks and jumps , their hats flying backwards in the fierce back-rush of wind and they with their mouths wide open struggling to keep their balance, rising and falling alternately. And when we see this our condition, we are reminded of a verse of the Quran which reads:-
   "Is he, therefore, who goeth groveling upon his face, better directed than he who walketh upright in a straightway?".
   (Quran 67 ?22)
   It is amusing to observe Milton, in the midst of raging controversy about the rotation of earth, chanting his worthy verse and wonderful thought in so detached a manner:-
   What if the sun,
   Be center to the world, and other stars
   By his attractive venture and their own
   Incited, dance about him various rounds?
   Their wandering course, now high, now low, now hid,
   Progressive, retrogressive or standing still,
   In six thou seest and what if seventh to these,
   The Planet earth, so steadfast though she seem,
   Insensibly three different motions move.
   (Paradise Lost Book VIII)
   The Quran says also and astonishingly so:-
   "Say: Unto whom (belongeth) the earth and whosoever is therein, if ye have knowledge? They will say: Unto Allah. Say: Will ye not then remember? Say: Who is Lord of the Seven heavens, and Lord of the Tremendous Throne? They will say: Unto Allah (all that belongeth). Say: Will ye not then keep duty (unto him) ? Say: In Whose hand is the dominion over all things and He protecteth, while against Him there is no protection, if ye have knowledge? They will say: Unto Allah (all that belongeth). Say: How then are ye bewitched?".
   (Quran 23 ? 84 to 89)
   Now whether the earth moved around the sun or the sun moved around the earth, or both moved around each other in a dance, or whether earth moved from West to East or East to West, what should all this mean to us mortals who have but to sojourn for a while in the earth and then leave it as strangers. The significance has to be attached to Him who owns all this. The real Master. And our ability, entity, genius and power be directed towards finding out the reality of Him who created all this that we see, touch, taste, hear and smell but fail to understand further the ultimate reality. And let the Creator be the object of our search, whether through his material works, the objects of our sense, or through the inner world of mind, for, that also is a world in itself, complete. Or else we die, all of us, and our boat sinks in atomic hell.
   Allama Muhammad Yousuf Gabriel
   Adara Afqar e Gabriel QA Street Nawababad Wah Cantt Distt Rawalpindi Pakistan
   www.oqasa.org
   yousuf_gabriel@yahoo.com
   
   

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