Guest Posted June 4, 2009 Share Posted June 4, 2009 I've been renting the Cosmos DVD series from Netflix this week, and last night I watched a bit about Kepler and Brahe. I don't know much about Brahe, so I just looked him up on wiki and found this very interesting info! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tycho_Brahe#Death Recent investigations have suggested that Tycho did not die from urinary problems but instead from mercury poisoning: extremely toxic levels of it have been found in his hair and hair-roots. Tycho may have poisoned himself by imbibing some medicine containing unintentional mercuric chloride impurities, or may have been poisoned.[15]One theory proposed in a 2005 book by Joshua Gilder and Anne-Lee Gilder, suggests that there is circumstantial evidence that Kepler murdered Brahe; they argue that Kepler had the means, motive, and opportunity, and stole Tycho's data on his death.[16] According to the Gilders, they find it "unlikely"[16] Tycho could have poisoned himself since he was an alchemist known to be familiar with the toxicity of different mercury compounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 5, 2009 Share Posted June 5, 2009 So no one thinks that Kepler possibly murdering Brahe for his notes is an interesting twist in history? It definitely intrigued me! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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