104
3 A Brief History of Space Flight
of innovative ideas. The dusty academic and scientific spirit of ancient Greece started
to revive in Europe, which is of epoch-making significance in the scientific and
technological history of human beings.
3.2.5 Rise of Space Science Fictions
Just under the epoch context of the Renaissance and the Exploration Age in Europe,
some basic sciences like astronomy, physics and mathematics have been developed
rapidly. In 1543, an astronomical book On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres
was written by Nicolaus Copernicus (1473−1543), a famous Polish astronomer,
was officially published. The heliocentric theory proposed in this book overturned
the status of the Ptolemy’s geocentric system which had fettered people’s thoughts
for more than 1000 years, which had a revolutionary change and profound impact
on modern astronomy. Thereafter, some famous astronomers and mathematicians,
including Danish Tycho Brahe, German Johannes Kepler, Italian Galileo Galilei
and British Isaac Newton, had made a lot of astronomical observation and studying
work, and further established and perfected the heliocentric theory, which completely
changed people’s outlook on the universe. After the sixteenth century, through some
new astronomical views and a series of major scientific discoveries, people generally
realize: the Earth is no longer the center of the universe, but an ordinary planet in
the solar system; both Mars and Venus are the planets similar to the Earth; both
living and non-living bodies contain the same elements; the fundamental elements
of matter are limited; both planets and stars have the same elements as the Earth;
all living things are evolving; and so on. People are used to feeling and imagining
the situation of planets, and thus some problems, for example, what other planets
are like, whether there are human beings living on the planets and what the existing
forms of extraterrestrial life are, always make people fascinate and fantasy. What
fascinates people most is the Moon, the nearest neighbor of the Earth, and thereby,
traveling to the Moon naturally became the first fantasy theme at that time.
In 1608, the German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571−1630) wrote a novel
Somnium (“The Dream”) in Latin, but the novel was not officially published until
1634 by his son, Ludwing Kepler. Johannese Kepler attempted to use the new astronomical views and scientific knowledge at that time to indirectly lead out the scientific
fantastic story. In Johannese Kepler’s narrative, an Icelandic boy and his witch mother
learn of an island named Levania (our Moon) from a daemon. Kepler presented the
detailed imaginative descriptions through the daemon, such as the Moon and its
phenomena, the phenomena between the Earth and the Moon, the planets’ periods
and the apparent motions of celestial bodies. In the meantime, he also believed that,
in addition to some special features, the celestial bodies such as the Sun, Mercury,
Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are as same as the Earth. Kepler’s novel The Dream is
considered the first serious scientific treatise on lunar astronomy. An English divine
and Church of England bishop Francis Godwin (1562−1633) wrote a book, The
Man in the Moone, which was first published posthumously under the pseudonym
3 A Brief History of Space Flight
of innovative ideas. The dusty academic and scientific spirit of ancient Greece started
to revive in Europe, which is of epoch-making significance in the scientific and
technological history of human beings.
3.2.5 Rise of Space Science Fictions
Just under the epoch context of the Renaissance and the Exploration Age in Europe,
some basic sciences like astronomy, physics and mathematics have been developed
rapidly. In 1543, an astronomical book On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres
was written by Nicolaus Copernicus (1473−1543), a famous Polish astronomer,
was officially published. The heliocentric theory proposed in this book overturned
the status of the Ptolemy’s geocentric system which had fettered people’s thoughts
for more than 1000 years, which had a revolutionary change and profound impact
on modern astronomy. Thereafter, some famous astronomers and mathematicians,
including Danish Tycho Brahe, German Johannes Kepler, Italian Galileo Galilei
and British Isaac Newton, had made a lot of astronomical observation and studying
work, and further established and perfected the heliocentric theory, which completely
changed people’s outlook on the universe. After the sixteenth century, through some
new astronomical views and a series of major scientific discoveries, people generally
realize: the Earth is no longer the center of the universe, but an ordinary planet in
the solar system; both Mars and Venus are the planets similar to the Earth; both
living and non-living bodies contain the same elements; the fundamental elements
of matter are limited; both planets and stars have the same elements as the Earth;
all living things are evolving; and so on. People are used to feeling and imagining
the situation of planets, and thus some problems, for example, what other planets
are like, whether there are human beings living on the planets and what the existing
forms of extraterrestrial life are, always make people fascinate and fantasy. What
fascinates people most is the Moon, the nearest neighbor of the Earth, and thereby,
traveling to the Moon naturally became the first fantasy theme at that time.
In 1608, the German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571−1630) wrote a novel
Somnium (“The Dream”) in Latin, but the novel was not officially published until
1634 by his son, Ludwing Kepler. Johannese Kepler attempted to use the new astronomical views and scientific knowledge at that time to indirectly lead out the scientific
fantastic story. In Johannese Kepler’s narrative, an Icelandic boy and his witch mother
learn of an island named Levania (our Moon) from a daemon. Kepler presented the
detailed imaginative descriptions through the daemon, such as the Moon and its
phenomena, the phenomena between the Earth and the Moon, the planets’ periods
and the apparent motions of celestial bodies. In the meantime, he also believed that,
in addition to some special features, the celestial bodies such as the Sun, Mercury,
Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are as same as the Earth. Kepler’s novel The Dream is
considered the first serious scientific treatise on lunar astronomy. An English divine
and Church of England bishop Francis Godwin (1562−1633) wrote a book, The
Man in the Moone, which was first published posthumously under the pseudonym