When Nicolaus Copernicus stated that Earth revolves around the sun, he initiated a centuries-long conflict between proponents of heliocentrism and those that maintained a geocentric view of the universe. The fight to establish the Copernican system, which began in 1543, would have very real consequences for astronomers like Galileo, Kepler, and Newton. This book provides an in-depth look at the development of Copernicus's theory, the effect it had on the lives of scientists willing to defend it at great personal cost, and heliocentrism's role in the latest astronomical research.