Acknowledgements 2
Science or insanity? 2
Nothing new under the Sun 6
Astronomy rules,OK? 13
2 Why Did Copernicus Say the Earth Moves? 16
Heavenly orbs 17
Science or art? 23
Ptolemy and the decline of cosmology 35
How to avoid a crisis : the medieval stand-off 44
How to create a crisis : Nicolaus Copernicus,cosmologist 58
3 Who Was Copernicus? 69
Why Copernicus? 70
Life and times 71
Renaissance man 82
Renaissance mathematician 96
4 What Was the Reaction? 103
Small beginnings 104
Copernicus and the astronomers 105
Copernicus and the Churches 115
Copernicus and the Aristotelians 136
5 What Difference Did it Make? 147
A world of difference 148
One physics or two? 151
How the Earth moves 155
Space : the final frontier 170
6 Last Words 176
Glossary 182
Further Reading 192