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Comment by Spellman | Hacker News Reader

Galileo v Church was about whether the Earth moved, not about the Earth being a sphere.

Hmm, looks like we're both wrong although you're less wrong than I am. Copernicus supported a heliocentric view and the Church didn't consider it a problem. Galileo was accused of biblical interpretation, positing that the bible isn't intended to be an authority on science, which then explodes into an anti-heliocentricism position by the Church at that time. Cute.

I'm gonna guess this confusion happens for the same reason as then: politics vs facts. This same thing happens where school boards what simplistic explanations for certain things they want deemphasized and politically biased yet detailed explanations for ones they want emphasized. Its annoying.

I have also read that Galileo was a rather aggressive fellow who made a hobby of antagonizing authority figures, and his persecution was less a matter of rigorous doctrine than of finding an excuse to make him shut up.

I don't have a source handy for that, so take it with a grain of salt, but it's an interesting take on the story.

He published essentially a comic book with a character that looked just like the pope named Ignoramus.

A rule of thumb when studying history: if a side appears really stupid, or really evil, then you probably don't have all the facts.

like the Nazi's?

Godwin's law proved again!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

Well yes. Just like the USA isn't all people always doing evil things despite Abu Graib (sp?), special rendition, Guantanamo, ... Oscar Schindler was a Nazi too and some Allies committed atrocities just as some Nazis did.

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