Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Two videos on how we figured out our solar system just based on obversations alone, long before we left the surly bonds of Earth
The video “Terence Tao on how we measure the cosmos” was very interesting to watch, as Terence goes into depth on how people in the past, and by past, I mean the distant past, figured out the earth was a sphere, how big that sphere was, and even reasoned that the earth went around the sun, long before the Christian Church even existed! And the method that Kepler used to figure out the orbits of Earth and the planets, when at the time we didn't quite know the distance to them, and all we had were positions in the sky to go by.
Incredible.
Also, a second video on how the moons of Jupiter (yes, it's not at all about Pluto despite the title) revealed much about how our solar system works. It even revealed that light had a finite speed.
I think if these methods were more widely known, how we figured out the shape of the Earth, the size of the moon and sun, and how orbits worked, then people wouldn't have the mistaken belief of a flat earth holding up the firmaments.
