Tiberius(?

) Claudius Ptolemaeus of Alexandria (ca 90-168) Egypt (in Greco-Roman domain) Ptolemy was one of the most famous of ancient Greek scientists. Among his mathematical results, most famous may be Ptolemy's Theorem (ACBD =ABCD + BCAD if and only if ABCD is a cyclic quadrilateral). This theorem has many useful corollaries; it was frequently applied in Copernicus' work. Ptolemy also wrote on trigonometry, optics, geography, and astrology; but is most famous for his astronomy, where he perfected the geocentric model of planetary motions. The mystery of celestial motions directed scientific enquiry for thousands of years. The problem had been considered by Eudoxus, Apollonius, and Hipparchus, who developed a very complicated geocentric model involving concentric spheres and epicyles. Ptolemy perfected (or, rather, complicated) this model even further; his model was the standard for 14 centuries. While some Greeks, notably Aristarchus, proposed heliocentric models, these were rejected because there was no parallax among stars. (Only Aristarchus guessed that the stars were at an almost unimaginable distance, explaining the lack of parallax.) Of course the geocentric models suffered from a bigger problem: they couldn't explain the observed changes in the brightness of Mars or Venus. The great skill demonstrated by Ptolemy and his predecessors in developing their complex geocentric cosmology may have set back science since, as we now know, the Earth rotates around the Sun. (Since the planets move without friction, their motions offer a pure view of the Laws of Motion; thus the heliocentric breakthroughs of Copernicus, Kepler and Newton triggered the advances in mathematical physics which led to Scientific Revolution.)