Title: Works of Galileo Galilei, Part 2, Volume 13, Floats: Fragments and First Drafts Related to the Treatise "Of Things that Float on Water"

Description

This fragmentary work elaborates on earlier studies undertaken by the Italian scientist, philosopher, and mathematician Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) on the Greek mathematician and physicist Archimedes of Syracuse (circa 287 BCE–circa 212 BCE). This study contains notes about the theories of buoyancy and floatation, which Galileo later gathered in a more coherent form in his treatise Discorso… intorno alle cose che stanno in sù l’acqua (Discourse on floating bodies), published in Florence in 1612. As with his more prominent work of astronomy, Sidereus Nuncius (Starry messenger), Galileo’s work aroused controversy for its views on scientific causality and its relationship to the Aristotelian method. Two scholars from Pisa, Arturo Pannocchieschi d'Elci and Giorgio Coresio, published treatises later in 1612 criticizing Galileo’s work.