During the year 1600 AD, an imprisoned man in Rome named Giordano Bruno was tried and found guilty of heresy by the Roman Inquisition. Pope Clement VIII considered Bruno an “unrepentant and pertinacious heretic” and condemned Bruno to be burned alive at the stake for his crimes. Bruno was a free thinker and spoke almost as freely about those thoughts. His crime was to support the theory of Copernican heliocentrism of the earth orbiting the sun (Copernicus' discoveries were not published until his death in 1543 while avoiding the inquisition). Bruno also expressed his belief that the sun was just another star moving among an infinite number of stars with planets that could be inhabited similarly to Earth. His thoughts were consistent with a pantheistic view, where God is everywhere and in everything in the universe, and he expressed those thoughts to those who wanted to hear him, as well as those who didn't approve. He was a free thinker and talkative about it. However, he was not burned alive for thinking freely. Giordano Bruno was punished for teaching, writing and freely sharing those thoughts with others. Bruno made an effort to recant, but his effort did not satisfy the pope, since Bruno could not give up the core of his philosophy. His final days included brutality, humiliation and disrespect with the intent to instill fear in the hearts of all possible heretics. Giordano Bruno was burned alive with a gag in his mouth and one of his books tied to his ankle. Thus began the 17th century. It was a dangerous time to express free thought, but free thought was growing out of control and the discoveries were exciting. Calls to support economic productivity, trade and growth... middle of document......n/14784a.htm>.http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14784a.htm"Strange Loops - History of the Barometer." Strange rings - History of the barometer. Np, nd Web. February 28, 2014. This website does not provide ownership information. http://www.strange-loops.com/scibarometer.html “This Month in the History of Physics.” This month in the history of physics. Np, nd Web. 01 March 2014. This website does not provide information about the property http://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201210/physicshistory.cfm"Giordano Bruno". Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online.Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2014. Web. 11 March 2014.TEXTBOOK Burke, James. The day the universe changed. Boston: Little, Brown and, 1985. Print.Hewitt, Paul G. Conceptual Physics. 11th ed. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2010. Print.