Galileo Galilei was born on February 15, 1564 in Pisa, Italy. His parents were Vincenzo and Guilia Galilei. His father was a musician who carried out many experiments on strings to support his musical theories.
When Galileo was old enough to be educated, his parents sent him to the Camaldolese Monastery. The Camaldolese order was of great interest to Galileo. He planned on joining the order, but this was very displeasing to his father. Vincenzo wanted Galileo to become a medical doctor. Galileo gave up on the idea of joining the Camaldolese order and continued his schooling in a Florence school run by Camaldolese monks.
In 1581, he was sent back to Pisa to attend medical school at the University of Pisa. Galileo never seemed to take his medical courses seriously, his true passion being mathematics. After talking to many of Galileo's teachers, his father, still reluctant, gave in and let Galileo focus on mathematics.
Galileo began teaching mathematics, fist privately, in Florence in 1585. In 1586, he wrote his first book, The Little Balance. In the following year, he traveled to Rome to visit the mathematicians at the Jesuit Collegio Romano. A topic which was very popular with the Jesuit mathematicians at this time was centers of gravity. Galileo brought with him many results he discovered on this topic. He made a favorable impression on Clavis, but failed to gain an appointment to teach mathematics at the University of Bologna. But in 1588 Galileo received a prestigious invitation to lecture on the dimensions and location of Hell in Dante's inferno at the Academy of Florence.
In 1589, Galileo was appointed to fill the position of chief of mathematics at the University of Pisa. He gained a very good reputation and wrote his second book, De Montu, which was a series of essays on the theory of motion, which he never published because of flaws in the theories. In this work, he did discover that one could test theories about falling bodies using an inclined plane to slow down the rate of descent.
By 1604, Galileo was very well known and had been a professor at many universities. At this time, the belief of most people was that everything orbited around the earth. Galileo was a strong believer in Copernisism, which contradicts this belief. He went on to invent the first complex telescope and started making discoveries in the night sky. He wrote the Starry Messenger, which caused a great sensation. He claimed to see mountains on the moon and proved that the Milky Way was comprised of tiny stars. He also saw four small bodies orbiting Jupiter. He later moved on to Saturn and discovered three bodies orbiting.
As Galileo was making these discoveries, the governments and church were slamming Copernicus. In 1616, Galileo wrote a letter to the Grand duchess of Tuscany, which vigorously attacked the followers of Aristotle. The same year, the church condemned the teachings of Copernicus. Galileo was forbidden to hold Copernican views, but wrote The Assayer anyway. This book was not banned, probably because it was dedicated to the Pope. However, Dialogue concerning the Two chief systems of the World- Ptolemaic and Copernican did him in. It was banned and Galileo was condemned to lifelong imprisonment. It was carried out sympathetically and he was put under house arrest.
In his time in house arrest, he wrote another book and drew plans for a pendulum clock, which he never carried out. He died in early 1642. The pendulum plan was attempted by his son, but ended up failing.
