Starship Asterisk*

Just 400 years ago Galileo showed off his newly-designed telescope, forever changing not just his own life but all of science.
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On August 25, 1609, Galileo, still only a small-time math professor at the University of Padua, first demonstrated the telescope's powers to Venetian merchants. He hadn't invented the device and wasn't even trying to upend conventional wisdom about the Earth's place in the universe. Being a professor, he really just wanted to make some extra cash, and the telescope was marvelously useful to sailors, soldiers, and craftsmen alike.