Objective: telescope 600 years and enter imaginatively into a past age, experience what it felt like to believe in a Ptolemaic (Earth-centered) universe.
Hierarchical (ladder-like) cosmos: God at the top, man at the bottom, the planets and fixed stars in between. This conception of a linear, hierarchical universe, is mirrored in architecture, literature, and social organization.
Artist's vision of the universe:
The Psalter Map , Thirteenth Century
Ptolemy's Map, Second Century
Compare this to our twentieth century solar system and universe.
See Hubble Space Telescope's home page for images of the universe.
Galileo challenged the validity of the Ptolomeic universe but was silenced by the Inquisition.
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