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could be ascribed to the earth-centered model as well. And wherever
there were snags with the earth-centered model, there were similar prob–
lems with the sun-centered model. In addition, the predictions yielded by
Copernicus's heliocentric theory were
not
as accurate as those of
Ptolemy's earth-centered theory. Nowhere in the process that led
Copernicus to his theory is there much evidence for the "further experi–
ence
->
greater understanding" epistemological model. To be sure, if
one applies celestial mechanics to the problem, then the heliocentric
model emerges as vastly superior to the earth-centered model. Yet celes–
tial mechanics was developed only in the hundred years after Copernicus's
death, and it played no role in the formulation of his theory. What did
compel Copernicus to envision a heliocentric system was, quite simply, its
beauty. What was most attractive about Copernicus's new model, and
what made it superior to the earth-centered model, was its simplicity, its
consistency, and its harmony. Within the earth-centered theory of
Ptolemy, the movements of the celestial bodies could be explained only
with recourse to a complicated system of cycles and epicycles. In helio–
centric theory, the notion of epicycles was completely discarded, and the
orbit of each of the moons and planets was seen as a perfect circle. In
De
revolutionibus
~rbium
coelestium
Copernicus states that what drove him to
formulate his theory was not so much a need to achieve greater accuracy
in his calculations but rather a desire to develop a model of the universe
that would be "perfect in form" and possess a "marvelous symmetry."
Johannes Kepler, the German astronomer who considered himself a
Pythagorean, observed in his work
Harmonices Mundi:
The movement of the heavenly bodies is like a great song, a continu–
ous, many-voiced song. It is a song that must be appreciated through
intellect and reason, rather than experienced directly through the sense
of hearing. This music, through its modulation and cadence, and ac–
cording to the working-out of a fixed, preordained six-voice coun–
terpoint, seems to measure and delineate the passage of time.
It must be stressed that Kepler's description of the motion of the
planets as a kind of song is not merely a fanciful literary metaphor but an
intrinsic part of his research methodology. In many of his works on
as–
tronomy Kepler actually employs musical staff notation, using the
language of music rather than words to explain his ideas. He often
described the velocities and orbital movements of the individual planets
in
terms of musical intervals and meters, and many of the names given to his
various laws of motion come from the musical diagrams he used. In the
context of Kepler's research, beauty is not merely a thread running
