He knew about 6 planets. See the related link for further information.
Chat with our AI personalities
Copernicus believed that the Sun was at the center of the universe, not the earth. It's very conter-intuitive, but he realized that such a model would best fit the way that the planets behaved. Unfortunately, he also believed that the planets rotated around the Sun in perfect circles. Thus, his theory didn't work any better than the Earth-centric models. It was only when Kepler proposed that the planets moved in elipses around the Sun that we finally had a model that could accurately predict the motions of the planets. Copernicus laid the groundwork and Kepler (and many others) finished what he'd started.
4 children
Copernicus devised a new model of the planets' movements among the stars. To do this he made modifications to the ancient Ptolemaic system. Copernicus considered that the ancient model was geometrically complicated and that it could be simplified very much by placing the Sun at the centre, instead of the Earth. This was controversial because the Ptolemaic model had been around for well over 1000 years and had been incorporated into the scriptures, and it was believed the Earth is at the centre. Not only was it believed but it was also religious dogma. In the end Kepler came up with a new model of elliptical orbits that was shown to be right many years later after the law of gravity and the laws of motion had been discovered. Kepler's theory is the one that is still in use today. Kepler's theory retained Copernicus's idea of placing the Sun at the centre, so Copernicus was proved right in the end, although during Copernicus's lifetime he had no way of knowing it.
Nicolas Copernicus was influenced by his uncle, after his father died when Nicolas was only ten. His uncle educated him. Also, note people spell his name many different ways so pick which one i guess..
Nicholas Copernicus was afraid that no one would accept his theory so he did not release his book until the year of his death. Many say that he died with his book in his hands on his death bed.