411 REFERENCE · Wiktionary
Ptolemaic system
Reference material by Wiktionary contributors. This retains its source identity and is not 411 news reporting.
English
Etymology
After Greek-Roman astronomer Claudius Ptolemy (c. 90 - c. 168 AD), who explained the theory in an influential work.
Proper noun
en astronomy A geocentric model of the solar system, described by the eponymous astronomer.
I VII 128 The theories in your books are almost as obsolete as the Ptolemaic System.
en 1902 w:Charles Kingsley Lecture I. The Ptolemaic Era. Alexandria and Her Schools [T]o Hipparchus we owe that theory of the heavens, commonly called the Ptolemaic system, which, starting from the assumption that the earth was the centre of the universe, attempted to explain the motions of the heavenly bodies by a complex system of supposed eccentrics and epicycles.
2005 February 20, Owen Gingerich, "‘Big Bang’: The Real Creation Science" (review of Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh), The New York Times (retrieved 7 Nov 2012):
Singh [...] criticizes the Ptolemaic system for its "inordinately complex" heaps of epicycles on epicycles, but declares that in some respects it was more accurate than the Copernican system.
Translations
geosentric model
Finnish: fi Ptolemaioksen malli
Polish: pl model Ptolemeuszowski m-in
See also
en Copernican system
References
en Obsolete scientific theories Copernican Revolution Flat earth