Galileo Galilei was a great man of science. His discoveries and achievements are still widely use today in modern science. His belief, which is now a know fact, that the earth revolves around the sun, was, to say the least, a passion of his. His idea that the earth was in motion was a radical new idea at the time and was not popular by many. This account of his life shows us that the human race in its past was not as evolved as it is today, meaning that there was no open-mindedness to new ideas and discoveries. This shows us how our race once was, and how we grew from our stubborn ways.

             Galileo Galilei was born on February 15, 1564 in Pisa, which is now a part of Italy. By will of his father Galileo studied medicine at the University of Pisa, but his real interests were always in mathematics and natural philosophy. He is mostly remembered for his work on free falling objects, his use of the telescope, and his experimentation. He taught mathematics for a period, first privately in Florence when he wrote on hydrostatics and natural motions but did not publish, then at the University of Pisa, in 1592. This is where he showed students the error of Aristotle"s belief that the speed at which an object falls is proportional to its weight. He did so by dropping two objects with different weights simultaneously off the tower of Pisa, and showed that they landed at the same time. In that same year he was appointed chair of mathematics at the University of Padua (the University of the Republic of Venice). His duties were mainly to teach Euclid"s geometry in order to make use of astrology in their medical practice. However, Galileo apparently discussed more unconventional forms of astronomy and natural philosophy in a public lecture he gave in connection with the appearance of a New Star, now known as "Kepler's supernova", in 1604. In a personal letter written to Kepler in 1598, Galileo had stated that he was a Copernican, a believer in the Theories of Copernicus (which stated that the earth and all the other planets revolved around the sun).