Nicolaus Copernicus Accomplishments

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For approximately 14,000 years before Nicolaus Copernicus’s work was given credence to by the public, Ptolemaic system of astronomy had been the dominant teachings of the Catholic Church (that the earth was the center of gravity and other celestial bodies revolved around it, i.e. geocentric), even though, A. Mark Smith wrote in World Book, “[a] Greek astronomer Aristarchus had even suggested that the earth and all other planets moved around the sun” (Smith 1039). However, Copernicus was able to prove that Ptolemy was wrong, and he, determinedly, became the father of modern astronomy. Nicolaus Copernicus (born Mikołaj Kopernik) was born in Thorn (now Toruń, Poland) on February 19, 1473. Encyclopedia Americana apprises that, “[Copernicus] studied