ABSTRACT
Ptolemy and Copernicus skin a cat The next step in resolving intractable problems involves opening our minds to alternative ways of thinking in light of our revised assumptions, which is the focus of this chapter. The value of opening our minds to new ways of thinking is conveyed by the story of Ptolemy and Copernicus. From ancient Greek times until Copernicus laid out his heliocentric theory, we in the West assumed ourselves to be the centre of the universe, as laid out in Ptolemy’s geocentric solar system. The persistence of the geocentric paradigm can be attributed to a single core belief underpinning the religious, cultural and moral fabric of the time: that man is the centre of God’s divine creation. However, the paradigm was also buttressed by 1600 years of empirical observations that proved the predictive power of Ptolemy’s geocentric theory. This was courtesy of the theory’s complex system of epicycles, which mathematically resolved the paradox of retrograde planetary motion created by placing earth in the centre of the solar system (Debus 1978).
