Copernicus’ Action Packed Life Revealed in Copernicus’ Secret by Jack Repcheck

Copernicus’ Secret is a biography of an astronomer and a cleric who established that the earth was never the center of the cosmos. The author, Jack Repcheck, explores the action-packed last 12 years of Copernicus’s life that altered the track of western history. The main aim of the author is to give a precise in-depth human explanation of the events that led to the scientific revolution. He also tries to bring this scientific genius to life in a manner, which has never been achieved in the past. In addition, the author also tries to reveal some of the little known weak character traits of Copernicus at the time of his major theories.

In his book, Repcheck recounts how a Catholic Church cleric invented a highly complicated theory of the heavens’ architecture. Copernicus made a breakthrough by solving a significant astronomical problem. Everybody except the astronomers had earlier accepted Aristotle’s concept that heavenly objects revolved around the earth in perfectly circular orbits. The astronomers were opposed to this notion since their calculations could not work according to it. Repcheck introduces Ptolemy who described a cosmos in which the earth positioned itself somewhat off-center and other heavenly bodies revolved in one circular orbit inside a second ideal circle at changeable speeds. Even though Ptolemy’s model was rather complicated, astronomers found it to be reasonable in their calculations. Astronomers were still using this new concept even 1500 years later. In this regard, the author starts to bring Copernicus into the picture.

Copernicus was born in Poland and was raised by a prosperous German family. As a result, he really enjoyed his youth, taking twelve years at four different universities. In 1503, he finall...

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... of Letters of Copernicus. On the other hand, examples of secondary sources include Adamczewski’s The Towns of Copernicus’ and Zinner’s Regiomontanus.

In conclusion, Jack Repcheck has really succeeded in his major purposes of writing this book. He has given a precise and in-depth human explanation of the events that led to the scientific revolution. He has explained thoroughly the political, human, and cultural factors that eventually paved the way for the revolution. The author has brought this scientific genius to life in a manner that has never been achieved in the past. He has revealed some of the little known weak character traits of Copernicus at the time of his major theories. Copernicus’s secret mistress and other scandals, together with his earlier intention to hide his work, are some of the little known facts about him that the author reveals in the book.