Galileo and the emergence of telescopes

Skipping through the channels once more I came across a NOVA documentary on telescopes but also found the same doc on YouTube -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMyZiPSALDo

This is the second documentary in as many days where Copernicus is bypassed in favor of Galileo in the discovery of the Earth's motion and the structure of the solar system. There is no surprise why that is the case but it is criminal on the parts of those involved.


The proof of the Earth's orbital motion for the faster moving Venus and Mercury their actual loops around the Sun is every bit as enjoyable as the illusory loops of the slower outer planets caused by the Earth overtaking them..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdFrE7hWj0A

Galileo recognized what the phases of Venus meant but because of the geocentric framework could not deal with the direct/retrogrades of the innermost planets -

" Now what is said here of Jupiter is to be understood of Saturn and Mars also. In Saturn these retrogressions are somewhat more frequent than in Jupiter, because its motion is slower than Jupiter's, so that the Earth overtakes it in a shorter time. In Mars they are rarer, its motion being faster than that of Jupiter, so that the Earth spends more time in catching up with it. Next, as to Venus and Mercury, whose circles are included within that of the Earth, stoppings and retrograde motions appear in them also, due not to any motion that really exists in them, but to the annual motion of the Earth. This is acutely demonstrated by Copernicus . . ." Galileo

The answer was hidden in plain sight as the stars close to the orbital plane transition from left (evening appearance) to right (morning appearance) due to the orbital motion of the Earth. The celestial sphere enthusiasts and their giddy rotating celestial sphere can't appreciate the grace of the stellar transition and consequently the Earth's orbital motion and would deny the wider population this method and insight.