Moving Away from a Ptolemic View of the Human Economy

Abstract

Just before his death in 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus, the Polish mathematician and astronomer, published De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres), one of the most important books in the history of science. By showing that the sun—rather than the earth—was at the center of the universe (actually the solar system, but this understanding came later), Copernicus overturned a thousand years of thought based on the writings of Claudius Ptolemy. This revelation helped usher in the modern era by restructuring human understanding of the cosmos and humanity’s place in it. Ptolemy’s earth-centric viewpoint required the development of very complicated models of celestial movements that had to be continually modified to fit new knowledge. Until Copernicus showed that the earth-centered view of the universe was wrong, Ptolemy was given almost legendary status. Is there a parallel with modern economics?