HISTORY OF ASTRONOMY
EARLY CIVILISATIONS
• Had a practical approach to
astronomy
• Used the stars and planets to
predict seasons and for
navigation
TATAI ARORANGI
• Maori ancestors had a wealth of astronomical
knowledge that they referred to as Tatai Arorangi
• Maori used the stars to calculate seasons
• Astronomy was used when planting and harvesting
crops
• Stars were used to navigate vast distances across
land and sea
ARISTOTLE AND THE
GEOCENTRIC MODEL
o Aristotle (an ancient Greek
philosopher) believed that the
earth was the centre of the
universe and that all the sun,
moon and stars all revolved
around the earth
o The right image shows aristotles geocentric model
GALILEO GALILEI
• Used the telescope to view
objects in the sky (1609)
• Observations of stars, planets
proved that the planets
actually revolve around the
sun.
• So this means the earth is not
the centre of the universe and
the stars do not orbit the earth
BRAHE AND KEPLER
• Mathematicians who
made observations on the
shape of the planet’s
orbits over a 20 year
period
Circle orbit
• Brahe’s observations and
Kepler’s analysis revealed
that the orbits of the
planets were not perfect
circles, but ellipses (oval
shaped).
Elliptical orbit (oval shaped)
EDWIN HUBBLE
• Born November 20 1889
• While working at the mount Wilson observatory discovered other galaxies outside of the milky way
• Using red shifting was able to estimate the distance to the andromeda galaxy
• As a tribute to his contribution to astronomy NASA named the Hubble space telescope after him
OUR PLACE IN THE GALAXY
SCIENTISTS NOW KNOW THAT WE ARE IN ONE OF
OVER 100 BILLION GALAXIES
using a variety of
techniques of radio,
optical, infrared
and even x-ray