Galileo! What can I say? He was magnifico. Jesting aside, Galileo was on of the enlightened ones - although he had faith in the church and his religion he didn't let that stop him wondering why, he wanted to know how the world worked and the Catholic church cast him down as a heretic because of it. Whilst he wasn't killed by them he was put under house arrest, and later died of heart problems.

I don't share his beliefs in the church, personally I think it's just a book with kind of a good story in places. What matters is that he made such a difference that his name will be remembered for centuries alongside the other greats of science.

Galileo Galilei has been so influential on the world of science in not just one field but many. His work the fields of technology, physics, and astronomy proved to be some of the most amazing work and have had a lasting legacy. His work has inspired generations of astronomers and will no doubt continue to for hundreds of years to come.

Invented the telescope. Probably the guy who discovered Jupiter. Contributions to astronomy are quite large. But I knock off a star because Astronomy is a real divide. . .some people find it stunningly fascinating whereas millions of eye-with-meat slaves work their whole lives and care not a whit about it.

Galileo also was a first-class wise-ass who spared little anger and frustration towards the church until they sunk their claws in him. The trial of Galileo is one of the most revealing discourses between science and religion. . .between wishful thinking and observation. . .and it's also the clever use of writing a 'dialogue' as an attempt to claim the work is fiction. He was a man who tried to merge his observations with his faith and (in his limited abilities and instruments of the day) came quite close. Quite tragic what the church did to one of its most glorious sons.

Very, very influential. . .four big ones, big guy. . .

  Brilliant Brilliant man who along with Nicholas Copernicus and Kepler gave birth to what is known as modern science today. Nicholas Copernicus hypothesized the heliocentric model of the universe whereas, with the invention of the telescope, Galileo confirmed it. Galileo also discovered the law of falling bodies as well. So, his influence is utterly undeniable.

As for the Galileo affair, this is much less understood as people think it is. This is a story that is told over and over and presents Galileo as a man who was the righteous defender of the modern truth of science versus the dogma of the Catholic church. However, this is not quite the truth. In fact, Galileo's real enemies were the university professor's who adhered adamantly to the Aristotle geocentric view of the universe. For many years, Galileo debated against the many professor's view of the Aristotle system and he won. He debated numerous professors and he never lost. This angered a lot of the professors with those vested aristotle academic interests at the time. It may surprise a lot of people that the same Pope , Pope Urban VIII, that persecuted Galileo was the same Pope who encouraged Galileo to write his book promoting his heliocentric views.  So, the church didn't condemn Galileo nor were they anti-science. However, due to the lack of proof for the heliocentric universe at the time the catholic church didn't believe in the heliocentric either and as a result adhered as well to the church doctrine that the sun revolves around the earth. Anyways,  Pope Urban VIII  gave Galileo the O.K to publish his book under 2 conditions.

1.) Galieo would give arguments for the heliocentric model and the geocentric model. The reason is because the heliocentric model was only at hypothesis status and there was no proof of heliocentricity due to the lack of technology at the time. So it was only fair to do argue for both systems.

2.) Galileo was to publish his book in Latin (the language the scientists used back then) and NOT Italian (the language read by the common man at the time).

Galilo, however broke both those rules. His book was biased in favor of heliocentrism. Galileo made up a character called Simplicio who argued weak arguments for geocentrism, and to add insult to injury he put the words of Simplicio into the words of the Pope. Moreover, Galilo wrote in Italian instead of Latin turning the Scientific community even more against him. The university professors hated him enough already before he published his works in Italian. This inevitably left the Pope furious and the scientific community as well. These chain of events is really led up to the arrest of Galileo.

So as one can tell, this isn't a matter of Church dogma vs. Science. It is more of a matter of Copernicanism vs. Aristotle's beleifs where the views were hotly disputed and of course copernicanism won which gave rise to modern science.

Here is a website thoroughly discussing the Galileo affair in detail from the unbiased website below.

http://www.ips-planetarium.org/planetarian/articles/mythofgalileo. html

A scientific genius whose struggle against the unbending Catholic hierarchy with its threatening Inquisition is expressed beautifully in Berthold Brecht's play.  The evil influence of the Church still persists in its unwillingness to admit the success of modern science.  The church is still lost in the fantasy world of spirits and refuses to see reality.  It still wields its power over humanity because of the uncertainty of the afterlife which the Church proclaims.  However, there is always the threat of Hell for the Sinner unless he obeys the Church's tenets.  Imagine, they still saw the Earth as the center of the Universe in Galileo's time and despite his proving the opposite with the discovery of the telescope, the Church dared not say that they had been wrong for over 1,000 years.  Who can wait for them to get with it.  The real question for the Church is:  Where did Cain's wife come from?  

one of the great minds of history. made sense the Catholic Church had him killed. they typically aren't much for intellectual thought and theory.

But it moves!

Up there with DaVinci as one of the greatest minds in history.

A triumph of reality over xtian superstition...a pity this great man died under house arrest though.