Greek Astronomy

Abstract

We make no apology for including Greek astronomy in our story of physics because astronomy today, more than ever in the past, is accepted as a branch of physics. We need only consider the interrelationships between high-energy physics and cosmology, stellar evolution, and nuclear physics or those between the structure of galaxies and hydrodynamics to see how closely these two branches of knowledge are related. In a sense, the story of physics properly begins with Greek astronomy, because the Greeks were the first to try to understand and explain the movements of the stars and planets in the evening sky. The idea that astronomical objects obey unseen forces (which we now associate with physical laws) probably originated, albeit in a murky form, with the Greek astronomers. Although their beliefs now appear to us as antiquated, the Greeks tried to use their mathematics to understand what they imagined to be the “geometrical” structure of the universe. Despite their preference for conceptual mathematics (as opposed to its practical applications), several Greek astronomers showed the usefulness of mathematical techniques by calculating such things as the diameter of the earth and the number of grains of sand in the known universe. These feats suggested that mathematics could be useful to astronomers by providing a means for quantifying disparate physical phenomena.

Except the blind forces of Nature, nothing moves in this world which is not Greek in its origin.

—Sir Henry James Sumner Maine