Galactocentrism in the context of "Great Debate (astronomy)"

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⭐ Core Definition: Galactocentrism

In astronomy, galactocentrism is the theory that the Milky Way Galaxy, home of Earth's Solar System, is at or near the center of the Universe. The galactocentric model was the standard model of cosmology from the decline of heliocentrism onward, but was reliant on the assumption that the Milky Way is the only such galactic structure in the universe, surrounded by a starless void only occasionally populated by extragalactic nebulae.

Thomas Wright and Immanuel Kant first speculated that fuzzy patches of light called nebulae were actually distant "island universes" consisting of many stellar systems. The shape of the solar system's own parent galaxy was expected to resemble such "island universes," but "scientific arguments were marshalled against such a possibility," and this view was rejected by almost all scientists until Edwin Hubble's measurements in 1924.

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👉 Galactocentrism in the context of Great Debate (astronomy)

The Great Debate, also called the Shapley–Curtis Debate, was held on 26 April 1920 at the U.S. National Museum in Washington, D.C. between the astronomers Harlow Shapley and Heber Curtis. It concerned the nature of so-called spiral nebulae and the size of the universe. Shapley believed that these nebulae were relatively small and lay within the outskirts of the Milky Way Galaxy (then thought to be the center or entirety of the universe), while Curtis held that they were in fact independent galaxies, implying that they were exceedingly large and distant. A year later the two sides of the debate were presented and expanded on in independent technical papers under the title "The Scale of the Universe".

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LINKED FROM (PARENTS)
← Great Debate (astronomy)
LINKS TO (CHILDREN)
Astronomy → Milky Way Galaxy → Earth → Solar System → Universe → Heliocentrism → Void (astronomy) → Nebula → Thomas Wright (astronomer) → Immanuel Kant → Star system → Edwin Hubble →