Star Hopper.
Explaining the wonders of the night sky.
Johannes Kepler.
Johannes Kepler was born 27th December 1571 to a Protestant family in Wiel der Stadt, southwest Germany. Even at the age of 5 though he astonished travelers passing through the Tavern his Grandfather owned with his impressive mathematic skills.
Introduced to astronomy from an early age, observing the great comet of 1577, aged 6. Despite suffering from smallpox, hindering his vision and dexterity, Johannes also witnessed the lunar eclipse of 1780 stating that the moon "appeared quite red".
Passing through grammar and Latin school, as well as lower and higher seminary, Johannes studied Theology at the University of Tubigen under Vitus Muller. Once again proving himself a skilled mathematician, he regularly cast horoscopes for his fellow students. Under the tutelage of Michael Maestlin he learned the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems of planetary motion. It was at this point that he decided to subscribe entirely to the Copernican heliocentric system. Despite his desire to become a minister Johannes was reccomended for a teaching position in Graz at their Protestant School teaching Mathematics. He accepted the position in April 1594 aged 23.
A year later in July 1595, whilst lecturing to his students, he had an idea that would influence him for the next 35 years of his life. Johannes envisaged a universe based upon symmetry, and the 5 Pythagorean or Platonic solids. Each solid was inside a nested sphere, the Sun at the centre, and the five solids governing the position of the (then) known 5 planets. Sure that he had found a great truth he wrote the book "Mysterium Cosmographicum" (Mystery of the Universe) sending copies to many astronomers including Tycho Brahe.
Johannes had been trying to find a relation between the orbits of the planets by correlating them to different regular polygons (two dimensional shapes in which all internal and external angles are equal, and all edges are of equal length), but was faced by repeated faliures and incompatibilities with his model and observations, even after introducing other unknown planets.
After being unsuccessful in using these two dimensional shapes Johannes started experimenting with polyhedra. He found that by placing the platonic solids inside a sphere that circumscribed the corners he could arrange the platonic solids so that the spheres connect the inner shape at its corners, and the outer shape in the centre of each face. Arranged thus in six layers that correlated with the orbits of the six known planets (given the accuracy of measurement techniques at the time).
Using the Sun as the centre, the planets were arranged as follows with their platonic solid.
Introduced to astronomy from an early age, observing the great comet of 1577, aged 6. Despite suffering from smallpox, hindering his vision and dexterity, Johannes also witnessed the lunar eclipse of 1780 stating that the moon "appeared quite red".Passing through grammar and Latin school, as well as lower and higher seminary, Johannes studied Theology at the University of Tubigen under Vitus Muller. Once again proving himself a skilled mathematician, he regularly cast horoscopes for his fellow students. Under the tutelage of Michael Maestlin he learned the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems of planetary motion. It was at this point that he decided to subscribe entirely to the Copernican heliocentric system. Despite his desire to become a minister Johannes was reccomended for a teaching position in Graz at their Protestant School teaching Mathematics. He accepted the position in April 1594 aged 23.
A year later in July 1595, whilst lecturing to his students, he had an idea that would influence him for the next 35 years of his life. Johannes envisaged a universe based upon symmetry, and the 5 Pythagorean or Platonic solids. Each solid was inside a nested sphere, the Sun at the centre, and the five solids governing the position of the (then) known 5 planets. Sure that he had found a great truth he wrote the book "Mysterium Cosmographicum" (Mystery of the Universe) sending copies to many astronomers including Tycho Brahe.
Johannes had been trying to find a relation between the orbits of the planets by correlating them to different regular polygons (two dimensional shapes in which all internal and external angles are equal, and all edges are of equal length), but was faced by repeated faliures and incompatibilities with his model and observations, even after introducing other unknown planets.
After being unsuccessful in using these two dimensional shapes Johannes started experimenting with polyhedra. He found that by placing the platonic solids inside a sphere that circumscribed the corners he could arrange the platonic solids so that the spheres connect the inner shape at its corners, and the outer shape in the centre of each face. Arranged thus in six layers that correlated with the orbits of the six known planets (given the accuracy of measurement techniques at the time).
Using the Sun as the centre, the planets were arranged as follows with their platonic solid.
| Planet Name | Platonic Solid |
| Mercury | Inside the Octahedron |
| Venus | Octahedron |
| Earth | Icosahedron |
| Mars | Dodecahedron |
| Jupiter | Tetrahedron |
| Saturn | Cube |
