A major technical issue

The original geocentric framework and the background into which the perspective of Copernicus emerged included two incompatible facets of astronomy. The ability to predict astronomical events relied on using the calendar system as a reckoning device while the astronomy of planetary dynamics could not be proved using this timekeeping system.

"Maffeo Barberini, while he was a Cardinal, had counselled Galileo to treat Copernicanism as a hypothesis, not as a confirmed truth. But 'hypothesis' meant two very different things. On the one hand, astronomers were assumed to deal only with hypotheses, i.e. accounts of the observed motions of the stars and planets that were not claimed to be true. Astronomical theories were mere instruments for calculation and prediction, a view that is often called 'instrumentalism'. On the other hand, a hypothesis could also be understood as a theory that was not yet proved but was open to eventual confirmation. This was a 'realist' position. Galileo thought that Copernicanism was true, and presented it as a hypothesis, i.e. as a provisional idea that was potentially physically true, and he discussed the pros and cons, leaving the issue undecided. This did not correspond to the instrumentalist view of Copernicanism that was held by Maffeo Barberini and others. They thought that Copernicus' system was a purely instrumental device, and Maffeo Barberini was convinced that it could never be proved. This ambiguity pervaded the whole Galileo Affair."

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This is not a matter of using history to suit a purpose, the technical arguments for heliocentricity used the motions of all observed objects through the field of stars, including the Sun, whereas it is not possible to account for the observed motions of the inner planets using this system which also predicts events like eclipses and transits.

The empiricists later used and still use a 'hypothesis' drawn from an experimental level or the even more fatuous 'thought experiment' in order to apply their imaginings to an astronomical scale. This is not strictly a complaint against the theorists but rather the impediment for promoting astronomy as a careful,consistent and understandable discipline for those who care enough about their surroundings,the education of their youngster and the vale they place on their own lives.

It is about standards.