What did Curtis and Shapley argue over?
In the debate, Shapley and Curtis truly argued over the “Scale of the Universe,” as the debate’s title suggests. Curtis argued that the Universe is composed of many galaxies like our own, which had been identified by astronomers of his time as “spiral nebulae”.
What did Harlow Shapley argue?
The participants were Heber D. Curtis, then of Lick Observatory, and Harlow Shapley of Mount Wilson Solar Observatory. In brief, the controversy concerned the scale and makeup of the universe. Shapley argued that the universe was comprised of a single galaxy, while Curtis held that it contained many galaxies.
What was the subject of the Curtis Shapley debate quizlet?
In 1924 the Shapley Curtis debate was settled by Edwin Hubble who had been studying the Andromeda Nebula and saw what he thought was a nova. Hubble showed that the andromeda spiral must be outside the Milky Way and is its own galaxy. What are the three broad categories of galaxies? Spiral, Elliptical and Irregular.
What did Harlow Shapley believe?
Harlow Shapley believed that everything in the universe was located within our own galaxy. He thought that the Galaxy was quite large – 300,000 light-years in diameter – and that the sun was not at the center.
Why was the Shapley Curtis debate important?
Shu, the Shapley-Curtis debate stands to this day as a fascinating “glimpse into the reasoning processes of eminent scientists engaged in a great controversy for which the evidence on both sides is fragmentary and partly faulty,” and as an historical illustration of the difficulty of navigating through “the treacherous …
Who proposed the Shapley Curtis debate?
Hale
Table 1 presents some aspects of the lives and works of the four people most closely associated with the 1920 debate: Hale who suggested it, Shapley and Curtis who carried it out, and Edwin Hubble who, a few years later, collected the data that settled the issue of island universes.
What was the Shapley Curtis debate all about was a winner declared at the end of the debate whose ideas turned out to be correct?
Was a winner declared at the end of the “debate”? Whose ideas turned out to be correct? The debate was over whether or not the spiral nebulae was within the Milky Way galaxy. Shapley believed the spiral nebulae was within our galaxy; Curtis argued that the spiral nebulae could be its own rotating star system.
Who was proved right in the Shapley Curtis debate?
After the debate Later in the 1920s, Edwin Hubble showed that Andromeda was far outside the Milky Way by measuring Cepheid variable stars, proving that Curtis was correct.
What did Shapley discover?
878 MildredHarlow Shapley / Discovered
Why did the great debate happen?
The First Great Debate was an argument between idealists, who dominated the paradigmatic thinking of post-war scholars after the end of the First World War, and realists, who challenged the assumptions of the former in viewing the nature and reality of international politics.
What discovery ended the great debate?
In view of his arguments against using Cepheids as distance scale indicators, it is ironic that this point was ultimately settled in his favor by Hubble’s discovery of Cepheids in the Andromeda Nebula several years after the debate. Shapley and Curtis were also wrong about some things.
What led to the great debate?
Two historic events triggered the great congressional debate that would lead to compromise: the Mexican War and the California Gold Rush.
How did Shapley find the size of the Milky Way?
Calculating Center Shapley correctly determined the galactic center of the Milky Way to be located in the constellation of Sagittarius. He did this by mapping out a three-dimensional distribution of the globular clusters.
What was William Herschel’s conclusion about the Sun?
In 1783 Herschel published an analysis of 19 proper motions and concluded that the Sun is traveling through space in the direction of the constellation Hercules (toward a point called the solar apex).
Who was right Shapley or Curtis?
But while Curtis correctly assumed that spiral nebulae were individual galaxies, Shapley was right about the extended three-dimensional distribution of globular clusters and the off-centre position of our Sun in the Milky Way.
How was the great debate ultimately settled?
In view of his arguments against using Cepheids as distance scale indicators, it is ironic that this point was ultimately settled in his favor by Hubble’s discovery of Cepheids in the Andromeda Nebula several years after the debate.
How did Shapley locate the center of our galaxy?
Shapley correctly determined the galactic center of the Milky Way to be located in the constellation of Sagittarius. He did this by mapping out a three-dimensional distribution of the globular clusters.
What was William Herschel’s experiment?
Herschel thought that the colors themselves might be of varying temperatures and so he devised a clever experiment to investigate his hypothesis. He directed sunlight through a glass prism to create a spectrum—the rainbow created when light is divided into its colors—and then measured the temperature of each color.
What is Herschel’s contribution to light and the Sun?
He found the first solid evidence that light and infrared are the same quantity that we know today to be electromagnetic radiation. Through a series of simple experiments, Herschel found the first piece in one of the great puzzles of physics that took another century to solve.
How was Shapley Curtis debate resolved?
The question was settled in 1923 when Edwin Hubble, using the 100 ” at Mount Wilson, discovered Cepheid Variable stars in the andromeda spiral nebula and used the perio-luminosity relation of Henrietta Leavitt to find the distance of these objects.
What did Curtis believe?
Curtis argued that the universe is composed of many galaxies similar to our own, identified by astronomers of that period as “spiral nebulae.” In contrast, Shapley believed that the spiral nebulae were merely nearby gas clouds, and that the universe was composed of a single large galaxy.
What main conclusion did Shapley draw from his measurements of the distances to the globular clusters?
Shapley concluded (and other astronomers have since verified) that the center of the distribution of globular clusters is the center of the Milky Way as well, so our galaxy looks like a flat disk of stars embedded in a spherical cloud, or ‘halo,’ of globular clusters.
Why is Charles Messier important?
Charles Messier, (born June 26, 1730, Badonviller, France—died April 12, 1817, Paris), French astronomer who was the first to compile a systematic catalog of nebulae and star clusters. In Messier’s time a nebula was a term used to denote any blurry celestial light source.
What is the Herschel’s relationship to comets?
Herschel’s focus, unlike most contemporaries studying comets, was on their physical structure, not their orbits. His observing procedures and analysis led him to forge a strong connection between comets and his investigations of nebulae.
What was the Shapley Curtis debate about how did Hubble settle this debate eventually?
1 Answer. Hubble measured the distance to the Andromeda Spiral Nebula and showed that it lies outside the Milkyway galaxy. This settled the debate about the nature of spiral nebulae.
What is the significance of the Shapley-Curtis debate?
The irony of the Shapley-Curtis debate is that it advanced our knowledge of the cosmos, while simultaneously revealing our insignificance on the grandest scales. “We believe we have a good, basic understanding of how the universe works,” says Mulchaey.
What was the relationship between Shapley and Curtis like?
The results did no great harm to either scientist’s career, though; Shapley won the directorship of Harvard College Observatory, while Curtis took the helm of Allegheny Observatory.
Was Shapley vs Curtis a fight of scientific Titans?
Neither the 30-something Shapley nor the balding, bespectacled Curtis came to fisticuffs on April 26, 1920. And their contest in the Guastavino-tiled opulence of the Smithsonian Institution’s Baird Auditorium was an unlikely fighting ring. But a clash of the scientific titans it most definitely was.
What is the Great Debate?
The format of the great debate has been used subsequently to argue the nature of fundamental questions in astronomy. In honor of the first “Great Debate”, the Smithsonian has hosted three more events. ^ a bWebb, Stephen (1999).