February 19 is the birth anniversary of one of the greatest minds that have lived in our planet: Nicolaus Copernicus, the man who began the scientific revolution in Europe and set the foundation for the birth of modern science as we know it today. Arguably, the greatest polish ever born.
In his last published book, “On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres“, Copernicus detailed a new theory of planetary motion for our Solar System, which up until that point was thought of the Earth as center of the universe, with all the planets and starts moving around it. Copernicus new vision called “heliocentric model” proposed that the Earth was not the center of the universe, but instead just like the other planets known at the time, it revolved around the Sun. It also proposed that the reason for sunsets and sunrises was the Earth’s rotation around its own axis. Years later, Kepler, Galileo and Newton would confirm and cement Copernicus’ place in the history of science.
What is not well known about Copernicus and is part of the reason why I decided to blog about him, is that he also contributed to other fields, such as law, strategy, engineering and economy. Copernicus came up with an early theory of the effect of “quantity of money“, an early predecessor of the Quantitative Easing (or money supply) theory. He also wrote about the “value of money”, and about how bad coinage drives good coinage out of circulation. Additionally, he also spoke five languages: Latin, German, Polish, Greek and Italian.
An all around genius, Copernicus’ contribution to our society is priceless and his legacy will live among us forever. If you ever get the chance to travel to Poland, see if you can pay a visit to Copernicus’ tomb and spend a few minutes at the place where the man who defined our Solar System now rests.
HR