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The new ideas of Copernicus and Galileo began a revolution in our conception of the cosmos. It eventually became evident that the universe is a vast place and that Earth’s role in it is relatively unimportant. The idea that Earth moves around the Sun like the other planets raised the possibility that they might be worlds themselves, perhaps even supporting life. As Earth was demoted from its position at the center of the universe, so, too, was humanity. The universe, despite what we may wish, does not revolve around us.
Most of us take these things for granted today, but four centuries ago such concepts were frightening and heretical for some, immensely stimulating for others. The pioneers of the Renaissance started the European world along the path toward science and technology that we still tread today. For them, nature was rational and ultimately knowable, and experiments and observations provided the means to reveal its secrets.
At most any time of the night, and at any season, you can spot one or more bright planets in the sky. All five of the planets known to the ancients—Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn—are more prominent than any but the brightest stars, and they can be seen even from urban locations if you know where and when to look. One way to tell planets from bright stars is that planets twinkle less.
Venus, which stays close to the Sun from our perspective, appears either as an “evening star” in the west after sunset or as a “morning star” in the east before sunrise. It is the brightest object in the sky after the Sun and Moon. It far outshines any real star, and under the most favorable circumstances, it can even cast a visible shadow. Some young military recruits have tried to shoot Venus down as an approaching enemy craft or UFO.
Mars, with its distinctive red color, can be nearly as bright as Venus is when close to Earth, but normally it remains much less conspicuous. Jupiter is most often the second-brightest planet, approximately equaling in brilliance the brightest stars. Saturn is dimmer, and it varies considerably in brightness, depending on whether its large rings are seen nearly edge-on (faint) or more widely opened (bright).
Mercury is quite bright, but few people ever notice it because it never moves very far from the Sun (it’s never more than 28° away in the sky) and is always seen against bright twilight skies.
True to their name, the planets “wander” against the background of the “fixed” stars. Although their apparent motions are complex, they reflect an underlying order upon which the heliocentric model of the solar system, as described in this chapter, was based. The positions of the planets are often listed in newspapers (sometimes on the weather page), and clear maps and guides to their locations can be found each month in such magazines as Sky&Telescope and Astronomy (available at most libraries and online). There are also a number of computer programs and phone and tablet apps that allow you to display where the planets are on any night.
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