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Bruno is put on permanent "Moderation"


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#1 Rogerdodger

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Posted 17 February 2007 - 11:52 AM

This day in history:

Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake as a heretic on February 17, 1600.
Bruno is seen by some as a martyr to the cause of free thought.

He taught briefly in Padua, and applied unsuccessfully for the chair of mathematics, that was assigned instead to Galileo Galilei one year later.


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The monument to Bruno in the place he was executed, Campo de' Fiori in Rome.

"I fought, and that's a lot. I thought I could win ... but nature and luck curbed my endeavour."
"Perhaps you, my judges, pronounce this sentence against me with greater fear than I receive it."


Legacy: The 20-km diameter crater Giordano Bruno, named in Bruno's honor, is located on the moon at 103°east lunar longitude, 36° north lunar latitude. It is believed to have been created by a meteorite impact in 1178, witnessed by five English monks as related in Carl Sagan's Cosmos.
Notice the "white" spot on the moon:

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Eyewitness account of the impact which formed this crater:
From the translation, "The upper horn (of a new Moon) split in two." A portion of the sunlit crescent visible at the earth was either obscured by the ejecta cone or cloud produced by the impact or darkened by the shadow of the ejecta.

"A flaming torch sprang up, spewing out fire, hot coals, and sparks." Incandescent gases and solids or liquids were ejected. "The moon ... writhed ... and ... throbbed like a wounded snake." Gases produced or released by the impact formed a temporary atmosphere which was in turbulent or had non-uniform motion, thus causing the light from the moon to pass through variable amounts of material with variable indices of refraction.

"Afterwards it (the crescent moon) resumed its proper state. This phenomenon was repeated a dozen times or more, the flame assuming various twisting shapes at random and then returning to normal." Evidently, "the flame" continued throughout the writhing process, which can be attributed to the large-scale motion of gas clouds. Because the duration of a "flame" consisting of incandescent gases or other material among the ejecta should be short compared to the time scale for the motion of large gas clouds, some uncertainty exists regarding the interpretation of "the flame." Instead of consisting of incandescent material, the appearance of a "flame" could be produced by sunlight reflected from dust particles moving as ejecta from the crater, just after the impact.

"Then ... the moon from horn to horn, that is along its whole length, took on a blackish appearance." This observation is consistent with the presence around the entire moon of a temporary atmosphere in which a sufficient amount of dust was suspended to block a significant amount of light reflected from the moon's surface.

The most decisive test of the validity of the report and the impact hypothesis explaining it would be the identification of a surface feature on the Moon which corresponds to the event reported. The occurrence of the event at the "midpoint" of the "upper horn" of a "new Moon" establishes its location at a latitude near 45° north and longitude near 90° east.


NOTE: One theory suggests the event described above was a meteoritic trick of the eye.
I think the guy who came up with this "theory" should be burned at the stake. ;)

Edited by Rogerdodger, 17 February 2007 - 12:58 PM.