"To Copernicus' mind the question was not one of truth or falsity, not, does the earth move? He simply included the earth in the question which Ptolemy had asked with reference to the celestial bodies alone; what motions should we attribute to the earth in order to obtain the simplest and most harmonious geometry of the heavens that will accord with the facts? ...ample proof of the continuity of his thought with the mathematical developments just recounted, and this is why he constantly appealed to mathematicians as those alone able to judge the new theory fairly."