The History of Astronomy

If you have a love for star gazing, telescopes, the Hubble, the universe and this thing and  we call "astronomy", you are not alone. Naturally, we understand that astronomy is an extremely appreciated science that has actually produced a few of the most incredible achievements of the twentieth century. It is a growing area of fascination and one of the most interesting pastimes with thousands of astronomy clubs and tens of thousands amateur astronomers viewing the stars every night simply like we do.

Did you understand that astronomy is one of the earliest and most reputable sciences of them all? For the sake of having some truly great trivia to toss around at astronomy club next week, let's highlight some of the huge minutes in the history of astronomy.

For numerous centuries the science of astronomy was not unique from the practice of astrology. For clearness, astronomy is the research study of the stars, worlds, and the universe with a plainly clinical method.

There is historic proof that astronomy was an acknowledged science as far back as the Babylonian civilization hundreds of years prior to Christ. The combination of astronomy and faith is so widespread that we see it in the Christmas story in which the Magi, Zoroastrian priesthood most likely from the equivalent of ancient Syria, followed a star to the Christ child.

The very first book on astronomy was composed by Ptolemy throughout the Greek empire. Because that historical publication, the who's who list of terrific astronomers charts a course right through the center of contemporary science consisting of Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Sir Issac Newton, Jung, Michelangelo, Benjamin Franklin and more just recently even Einstein and Stephen Hawkings would sign up with that worthy list. It appeared that from the renaissance on to this day, practically any man or woman of intelligence meddled in astronomy to some degree and it has actually constantly been thought about as an indication of the learned to understand about deep space and things astronomical.

Astronomy has had an effect on many facets of our lives that we actually do not recognize. Numerous words in our language had their roots in astronomy such as ...

* Influenza which originates from the Latin root word for influence. This shows an early belief that the position of the moon and stars might affect health and cause or remedy illness.

* Disaster which originates from the Latin for "bad star".

* Lunatic which has the root word "Luna" in it which is the Latin word for moon. This highlights the long held belief that is even common today that illogical habits and unsafe and even wild things occur during a full moon.

Astronomy and its correlation with astrology has actually likewise affected education, religious beliefs and culture to a large degree over the centuries. In the English language, the very first 2 days or our week, Sunday and Monday are a referral to astronomy as their actual meaning would be "The Day of the Sun" and "The Day of the Moon."

If you have actually discovered astronomy ending up being a consuming enthusiasm in your ideas and what captivates you about the world we live in, you are in great company as this area of research study has actually been a significant part of culture and thought virtually since the dawn of civilization. And it will continue to captivate humanity for as long as those lovely stars shine over our heads.