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For centuries, mankind has stared up at the stars at night, wondering what’s out there. That curiosity has launched our pursuit of knowledge of planets and galaxies, including our own.

Not only has 2009 been designated as the Year of Astronomy, it also marks the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei’s first use of a primitive telescope as well as the evolution of technology and the interest he inspired in the astronomers who followed him to continue researching the planets.

Speaking at Thursday’s Southern Alberta Council on Public Affairs luncheon, Barry Olson discussed the advances the human race has made since the days of Galileo, and the big picture of what we have learned.

“It’s a global celebration of astronomy and its contributions to society, stimulating worldwide interest,” said Olson, president of the Lethbridge Astronomy Society as well as a research scientist at Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development.

While many organizations attempt to capture the interest of the public in astronomy, he said this year locally they’re bringing it to a more “aggressive level.”

They would like everyone to experience a “Galileo moment” this year, whether it might be learning about the phases of the moon or the true meaning of falling stars.

“We want to bring the science to the public and have them engage in some level of understanding,” he said.

Olson admits it was not Galileo alone who sparked interest in what exists beyond our own planet. We have been using the stars for navigation for hundreds of centuries, but it was Galileo’s desire and passion for astrology that revolutionized modern views of what our galaxy looks like.

“It was in 1609 when Galileo’s observations revolutionized astronomy and changed world views profoundly in terms of how we saw the universe,” he said.

In 300 BC, Aristotle suggested the Earth was the centre of the universe. Many years later, Aristarchus claimed it was the sun that was the centre of the universe.

That model hung around for several hundred centuries, until the early 1500s. Copernicus, a gentleman from Poland, reinvented the sun-centred concept.

“In those days, because of the way society was governed, when people started talking about those sorts of concepts, they got into a lot of trouble,” said Olson.

As the years passed, many astronomers began to suspect every star in the sky was a different galaxy, which led them to believe our own star, or sun, was the centre of the universe. They also discovered the objects surrounding those planets were orbiting those stars.

“(Galileo) looked at Jupiter, and discovered it has four bright satellites around it,” he said. “Over a period of time, he noticed that they moved, so he concluded that they were gravitationally attracted to Jupiter, and they were actually orbiting the planet.”

Galileo then noticed Venus moved as well, and was also orbiting the sun, due to the changes in phase of shadows on each planet. He decided if Jupiter and Venus orbit the sun, the Earth must, as well.

Eventually, the church at the time condemned his theories and sentenced him not to death, but to house arrest, where he spent the rest of his life.

People such as Albert Einstein championed him as the father of modern science, and Galileo has received similar praise from many well-known philosophers and astronomers.

“We now, of course, know that the sun is just a regular star, and it’s a member of a collection of stars and dust and gas that we call a galaxy. We name our home galaxy ‘The Milky Way’ galaxy, and it’s actually located out in one of the suburbs of one of the spiral arms (of our universe),” said Olson.

Our star is one of what is estimated to be 200 billion stars in our galaxy alone, which is why Olson insists we can’t be the only life out there, and that there must be something else, though we have yet to discover it.

Originally posted 2009-04-11 21:14:32. Republished by Blog Post Promoter