NICOLAUS COPERNICUS: With Google's head-turning Doodle animation, the ...

A Google Doodle today celebrates Nicolaus Copernicus, the Renaissance astronomer who pushed forward the (at the time) radical idea that Earth wasn't the center of the universe. Instead, he theorized Earth and other

An animated Google Doodle today celebrates Nicolaus Copernicus, the Renaissance astronomer who pushed forward the (at the time) radical idea that Earth wasn't the center of the universe. Instead, he theorized Earth and other planets revolve around the

(The astronomer called it his “Sketch of Hypothesis Made by Nicolaus Copernicus on the Heavenly Motions.”) The “Small Commentary” offered big-idea axioms, including — according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy — that “the earth is only the

Copernicus never solved one other glitch. In his view, orbits were round, and that caused problems because observations kept showing planets in places that didn't fit this theory. The realization that orbits are elliptical (sort of stretched-out

Early adopters of heliocentrism, today is for you. Today's Google Doodle celebrates the birthday of Nicolaus Copernicus, the Polish Renaissance man who first floated the theory that the sun, not the Earth, was the center of the