Nicholas Copernicus

People usually associate revolutions with politics rather than science.  Yet scientists often talk about the Copernican Revolution.

Nicholas Copernicus was a sixteenth century Polish astronomer who challenged the accepted idea that the sun and the planets revolved around the earth.  Ever since the second century when the great Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy had put forward his theory that the earth was the fixed centre of the universe, people had remained convinced, for philosophical and religious reasons, that this was the correct view of the universe.

Although a fan of Ptolemy, Copernicus couldn't ignore the failures in his so called geocentric model.  These flaws became obvious when he tried to explain the observed behaviour of the planets.  Copernicus worked to find a model of the universe that would allow for more accurate predictions.  But he still wanted to fit in his religious belief that the sun, as light giver, must be closer to perfection and to God than the earth.

The stakes were high, for if Copernicus was right in suggesting that the earth and planets all revolved around the sun, then people's beliefs about the heavens, held since the time of Aristotle, were wrong.  It truly was a revolution in science, when we recognized that our theories about the universe had to both explain and predict real observations.

So next time you get the feeling the world revolves around you, think Copernicus, and re-adjust your perspective.

MOVING BEYOND MATTER
by Debbie Hughes

People often think that science unfolds in a gradual and linear pattern.  In the last century, there have been some significant new theories which address this common assumption about science.  

The name most associated with theorizing about the nature and history of scientific developments is Thomas Kuhn.  He believed that science does not unfold in the way we've taken for granted.  He concluded that science progresses in a fashion not unlike political revolutions or even religious conversions.  He even coined the term "Scientific Revolution" to describe the utter upheaval in the way we look at the evidence and package it.

Kuhn wrote that the new way of understanding things comes to our mind all at once when we find ourselves in the middle of a deep crisis - sometimes maybe even in the middle of the night.  This gives us the taste of the beginning of change.  We have a new way of seeing which was hidden from view, since earlier there had been no need to search for a better way.  But now a new light has dawned.  A revolution in thought, in belief, in understanding has occurred.  A conversion experience is underway.

Religious conversion sometimes happens in a similar way.  Suddenly, we are thrown into a crisis in which our old ways of understanding and believing are no longer sufficient.  We try to solve the puzzle according to our old way of doing things.  And perhaps our religious system proves adequate to respond to the demands.  But perhaps it is found wanting.  We then become open to considering alternate systems of belief which more closely correspond to reality.  Perhaps we even experience a conversion.  We see things which we heretofore hidden from us.  We understand the world in a new way and fix our beliefs accordingly.

Today, consider your own system of religious beliefs.  Are you experiencing a period of stability or crisis?  If the latter, how do you go about your search for a more adequate paradigm?