ADASI: BOOKS OF THE MONTH

66-0358704
Galileo: His Science and His Significance
for the Future of Man by Albert Di Canzio, 415 pages including illustrations, photographs, bibliography and extensive indices.

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Here at last is a readable and thorough account of the significance of a supremely pivotal and intriguing scientist of the early 17th century - whose contributions to the content, the method and the instruments of science were so many and so critical that the title "Father of Modern Science" is usually reserved for him. That brilliant intellectual revolution brought him into a tragic conflict with the Inquisition. Here the author, an independent observer who studied the science of Galileo at institutions run by Jesuits (the same religious order from whose ranks powerful clerics emerged to play key roles in the trial and condemnation of Galileo in 1633) lashes out at the academic establishment, members of which, he says, have bungled the interpretation of that conflict and buried its significance for the future of man in petty criticism. With unprecedented clarity, he extracts the meaning of this crucial episode in the history of man, framing it in a fresh and crisp perspective. Within his vision of the future looms a newly productive focus on scientific reasoning (with indoctrination as its antithetical foe), on the relationship between science and theology, and on prospects for post-Galilean industries.

Albert Di Canzio's GALILEO: HIS SCIENCE AND HIS SIGNIFICANCE FOR THE FUTURE OF MAN connects Galileo's work to that of his major precursors and successors and to contemporary challenges facing humans on planet Earth. Sharply distinct from past accounts of the massive collision between his philosophy and that of the philosophers and churchmen of his day, this work exposes a host of myths, such as the notion of modern anti-Copernican academics that relativity theory invalidates Galileo's astronomy. It reveals little known original contributions by Galileo to pure mathematics, to computer science, to physics, and to astronomy (including Galileo's role in the discovery of the giant planets Uranus and Neptune and his widely misunderstood role in the invention of the telescope and of astrometrics.) Written from the perspective of one who studied the science of Galileo in Jesuit institutions, this work contains a full discussion of Galileo's interaction with the Roman Catholic Church from his 1633 trial up to and including the 1992 pronouncement of church leaders on the Galileo case. It also includes the first English translation of an essay by Antonio Favaro, editor of Galileo's complete works, as well as authorized excerpts, previously unpublished in their native English, from a manuscript of leading Galileo scholar Stillman Drake. Except for certain passages that can be safely skipped by readers with a non-mathematical background, this book can be read by any curious, intelligent reader willing to exchange a bit of concentration for the opportunity to accompany the author on the trail of one of the grandest adventures that the history of science has to offer.

Reviewed and acclaimed by experts:

"Fascinating reading. Meticulously researched. Brilliant, scholarly study and exposition of the contributions of Galileo to science and life, both ancient and right up to the present day, with implications for the future of humanity."

... Dr. Robert E. Houston, Jr., Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of New Hampshire

"GREAT fun to read."

... Dr. Sallie Baliunas, Astronomer, Deputy Director of Mount Wilson Institute and Director of the HK Project (which monitors stellar chromospheric activity, extending to other stars Galileo's pioneering study of sunspots and solar rotation).