What I Learned About Galileo, Newton, and the Steam Engine

Galileo Galilei, usually referred to as Galileo, is a well respected scientist for many reasons. He did detailed experiments about motion. Galileo started gathering evidence for the heliocentric system when he supposedly invented the telescope in 1609. The data he collected was invaluable to the advancement of the heliocentric system. He was able to show that planets do not create their own light. He showed that the planets appear as lights in the night sky because they reflect the light of the sun. He stopped officially promoting the heliocentric system because of the Roman Catholic church.

Sir Isaac Newton made the three laws of motion, which is still used in physics today. He also designed the reflecting telescope. He also invented calculus, and developed the law of universal gravitation. He wrote a couple of books, including Quaestiones Quaedam Philosophicae and The Principia. He retired from research after two nervous breakdowns.

The earliest known steam engines were the novelties created by the Greek engineer and mathematician named Hero. His most famous invention was called the aeliopile. This was a small, hollow sphere to which which two bent tubes were attached. This sphere was attached to a boiler that produced steam. As the steam escaped from the sphere's hollow tubes, the sphere itself would begin to whirl and rotate. By the mid-sixteenth century, work on air pumps had established the notion of a piston working in a cylinder, and around 1680, the French physicist Denis Papin put some water at the bottom of the tube, heated it, converted it to steam, and saw that the expanded steam pushed forcibly and moved a piston just ahead of it. Following Papin, an English military engineer, Thomas Savery built what most regard as the first practical steam engine. But this engine had no piston since Savery wanted only to draw water from the coal mines deep below the earth. The most important improvement in steam engine design was brought about by the Scottish engineer James Watt. In 1769 he introduced a steam engine with a separate condenser. Watt's steam engine was not perfect however, and did have one major limitation; it used steam at low pressure.