Discuss the below:
Q1: What are the most convincing observations Galileo reports in The Starry Messenger that support the Copernican theory that the Earth moves around the Sun? What did Galileo's later discoveries of the phases of Venus and sunspots contribute to discussions of the Copernican theory?
Q2: A major component of Galileo's new contributions to science in the 17th century was his appreciation that mathematics was the key to understanding Nature. Why was this view "revolutionary" in Galileo's day, and what evidence did he have to support the idea that mathematics is the "language" of Nature?
Q3: What does Galileo say in his Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina and The Assayer about the relationship between science and religion? Galileo's critics argued that the Copernican theory contradicted the Bible, and should therefore be rejected. Why did Galileo believe that science was not in conflict with religion, and indeed, could be taken as a positive rather than a negative factor in theology?
Q4: What would be the arguments of Galileo's Aristotelian opponents (not his theological critics) be against Galileo? What objections could they have made to his assertion that the Earth moved, and that the cosmos were heliocentric rather than geocentric? What philosophical or metaphysical arguments could me used as part of the scholastic opposition to the heliocentric theory?
Q5: Why did Galileo and the Copernicans eventually prevail in the course of the Scientific Revolution?
Refer to the following sources:
Bronowski, Jacob (1974). "The Starry Messenger." In The Ascent of Man. New York, NY: Little Brown & Co., Galilei, Galileo (1957). The Starry Messenger (1610), Letters on Sunspots (1613), Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina (1615), and The Assayer (1623). All translated in S. Drake (Ed.). Discovery and Opinions of Galileo. New York, NY: Anchor.