Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The First Moon Map, and Not By Galileo

Posted by kdawson on from the dutch-trunke dept.

sergio80 writes in with a timely piece of history in this the International Year of Astronomy, celebrating the 400th anniversary of the invention of the telescope. "Galileo Galilei is often credited with being the first person to look through a telescope and make drawings of the celestial objects he observed. While the Italian indeed was a pioneer in this realm, he was not the first..." That honor belongs to Thomas Harriot, an Englishman, who bought his first "Dutch trunke" (i.e. telescope) shortly after its invention in the Netherlands and made a sketch of the moon as seen through it in July of 1609.

4 of 82 comments (clear)

  1. Unsung hero of science? by Compholio · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Despite his innovative work, Harriot remains relatively unknown. Unlike Galileo, he did not publish his drawings.

    "Thomas Harriot is an unsung hero of science," Chapman said.

    Not a chance, Harriot cannot be a hero of science since he did not publish his work. If you don't actually take the risk of publishing and try to contribute your knowledge to the world then you are not a hero of science.

    1. Re:Unsung hero of science? by Onymous+Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Dogma.

      If a person makes private discoveries that are later uncovered, it's still valuable.

      If heroism requires personal risk, there are plenty other ways an investigator could endanger themselves in the pursuit of knowledge.

      All that said, Harriot is still probably not a hero.

    2. Re:Unsung hero of science? by Compholio · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't think so, I didn't say anything about the quality or integrity of the work he did - I just said he's not a hero. If he had published his work and was persecuted for it (as Galileo was) then he could be considered a hero. This difference doesn't diminish the quality or importance of the work, but for him to be able to qualify as a hero of science (taking into account the time period) he would have to have published his work.

  2. Galileo's contribution was different by Kupfernigk · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The difference is that this was a well off amateur drawing the Moon, which was already known to have features. Galileo's main discoveries were sunspots (i.e. sun is not perfect) and 4 Jovian moons (i.e. not everything in the Universe could rotate around the Earth.) These were groundbreaking discoveries because they destroyed the Scholastic world-view as effectively as the Theory of Relativity replaced absolute space and time.

    Therefore this is all a bit of special pleading. This guy basically bought a telescope and drew a few pictures. Galileo made a telescope and changed the way we looked at the world.

    Disclaimer: I'm British, I revere Newton, but Galileo is the one I really look up to.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."