Why are the skeptics here?

BTW, you are also clearly incorrect in asserting that this letter is what got Galileo in front of the Inquistion. According to the timeline of the Galileo Project http://galileo.rice.edu/chron/galileo.html the letter was not written until the summer of 1615. But Niccolo Lorini had already filed a written complaint with the Inquistion in February 1615 and Tommasco Cassini had given a deposition to the Inquistion accusing Galileo of heresy in March. Clearly, Galileo was responding to these developments, not waging a PR campaign to "coerce" the Church into anything.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
1. I know Johnston isn't an academic historian - why do you think I looked for other sources?

2a. So what if Marquette is an RC university? Are you claiming that teachers at Catholic institutions cannot be objective unless they take positions criticising the Church? That is putting the cart before the horse.

2b. Blackwell is a professor of the P view=usa
[3] ibid.
[4] http://www.asa3.org/asa/PSCF/2003/PSCF6-03Gingerich.pdf

Originally posted by no1marauder
Where exactly in that letter (conceding for the sake of argument your assertion that it was a pamphlet) does it say that Galileo wants the Church to adopt heliocentrism? In the excerpt I quoted above (might want to read it) he merely argues that since the opponents of heliocentrism cannot prove it is impossible, that it should not be declared heresy.

...[text shortened]... et the Church to officially endorse his theories as truth (and he couldn't even prove it).

Some years ago, as Your Serene Highness well knows, I discovered in the heavens many things that had not been seen before our own age. The novelty of these things, as well as some consequences which followed from them in contradiction to the physical notions commonly held among academic philosophers, stirred up against me no small number of professors-as if I had placed these things in the sky with my own hands in order to upset nature and overturn the sciences. They seemed to forget that the increase of known truths stimulates the investigation, establishment, and growth of the arts; not their diminution or destruction.

Showing a greater fondness for their own opinions than for truth they sought to deny and disprove the new things which, if they had cared to look for themselves, their own senses would have demonstrated to them.

Yet even in those propositions which are not matters of faith, [Scriptural] authority ought to be preferred over that of all human writings which are supported only by bare assertions or probable arguments, and not set forth in a demonstrative way. This I hold to be necessary and proper to the same extent that divine wisdom surpasses all human judgment and conjecture.

But I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason and intellect has intended us to forego their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them.

With regard to this opinion, and others which are not directly matters of faith, certainly no one doubts that the Supreme Pontiff has always an absolute power to approve or condemn; but it is not in the power of any created being to make things true or false, for this belongs to their own nature and to the fact. Therefore in my judgment one should first be assured of the necessary and immutable truth of the fact, over which no man has power... And in brief, if it is impossible for a conclusion to be declared heretical while we remain in doubt as to its truth, then these men are wasting their time clamoring for condemnation of the motion of the earth and stability of the sun, which they have not yet demonstrated to be impossible or false.

Originally posted by no1marauder
Maybe Kepler should have been threatened with torture too!! If he had been in Italy, he would have been. And he was an scientific idiot, while theologians like Bellermain were experts! You're completely ridiculous!

These people are no more "expert" than I am at weighing evidence in written documents. Probably less so. You've failed to present ...[text shortened]... ouldn't say it wasn't, he was accused of HERESY. That's OK with you, I guess. Incredible.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
As always, dear friend, read the whole letter:
http://www.galilean-library.org/christina.html
[quote]Some years ago, as Your Serene Highness well knows, I discovered in the heavens many things that had not been seen before our own age. The novelty of these things, as well as some consequences which followed from them in contradiction to the p ...[text shortened]... the implication is clear enough for anyone who wants to look at it dispassionately.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
You're continuously trying to muddle up the events leading to and causing the trial of Galileo (and you're constantly obfuscating the 1616 and 1633 trials) and the judgment of the trial. You're constantly trying to imply that I am "justifying" (morally) the heresy charge.

Is this how you win your cases in court? Shoot at random and hope something will stick?

Originally posted by no1marauder
BTW, you are also clearly incorrect in asserting that this letter is what got Galileo in front of the Inquistion. According to the timeline of the Galileo Project http://galileo.rice.edu/chron/galileo.html the letter was not written until the summer of 1615. But Niccolo Lorini had already filed a written complaint with the Inquistion in February 1615 and ...[text shortened]... sponding to these developments, not waging a PR campaign to "coerce" the Church into anything.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I could quote historians who have come to different conclusions as Moy clearly states. Your claim was ALL serious historians (save 1)agree with your assessment; that is another untruth as Moy's quoted statements concede. Moy's article shockingly ignores that the Church in 1616 declared heliocentrism a heresy; that's a rather important tidbit don't you th s much information as they do.

EDIT: BTW, 2 of 3 of those aren't "historians" either.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
You're right - it's his letter to Castelli (1613) that is used to raise the charges - but the letter to the Grand Duchess (1615) (an expansion of the letter to Castelli) is brought into evidence at the trial, the sentence of which is not given till December. So, I stand corrected.

Now, what evidence is there of a PR campaign by Galileo? The first o fic circles, but he hardly needs to be circulating letters and pamphlets for that, does he?

Originally posted by lucifershammer
1. No, my claim was that all serious historians (save one) disagree with your assessment. Learn to read.

2. You don't have access to as much information as they do - face it. You can only see what's on the Internet (often excerpts, not the whole thing - like the correspondence between Galileo and Kepler) and not even in the original l ...[text shortened]... cannot specialise in medieaval philosophy without also being an expert of mediaeval history.

Originally posted by no1marauder
No, you bloody fool, he doesn't NEED to write down ANY of his scientific theories in public documents; he can put them in a desk drawer. He is saying to the public that he believes his theory is correct. But you claimed his writings and publics were specifically directed at the RCC; that is unmitigated hogwash. Your claims get more and more spurious and outlandish with every post.

Originally posted by no1marauder
Since you don't have a clue what you are talking about, adding more people into the mix who don't know what they are talking about doesn't help much. Somebody with a doctorate in Philosophy isn't a historian. And you don't have the faintest clue about how much I know about Medieval History except that it is far more than you do.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
And your posts get increasingly muddled and abusive when you're backed into a corner.

The point is not that he put down his theories in "public documents" - the point is what kind of public documents and what audience. A public document directed at academics in universities is a very different animal from a pamphlet directed at aristocrats w not reading primary material - what about you? Are those letters about science or theology?

Originally posted by lucifershammer
You've seriously failed to attack the credentials of any of the authors I've cited except Johnston. Blackwell is the only other person you've individually attacked - but he is considered an expert by other historians! All you have are vague attacks for the other three - two of whom are professors of history themselves.

And you have the nerve to assert that they "don't know what they are talking about".

Originally posted by no1marauder
You continue to ignore the history, unsurprising in one so obviously ignorant of it. The Castelli letter was written one month after Father Lorini launched the first PUBLIC attack on Galileo accusing him of heresy. That's in the sites I've already given you. The Duchess letter is in response to evidence being presented to the Inquistion accusing him of b pting heliocentrism, but the sequence of events makes it utterly clear that that is not so.

A Dominican friar Niccolo Lorini, who had earlier criticized Galileo's view in private conversations, files a written complaint with the Inquisition against Galileo's Copernican views. He encloses a copy of Galileo's letter to Castelli.

[Niccolò Lorini] attacked Galileo in private in 1612 for his ideas that—according to Lorini—verged on the heretical but later wrote to him in apology.