Galileo

Galileo spent most of his life teaching and studying physics. One of his most notable works was called "On Motion", this book disproved Aristotle's theory of gravity. This was monumental because Aristotle's theories had been accepted as true and Galileo was one of the first scientists of his generation to challenge Aristotle's work. Galileo also disproved the theory of geocentricism, which is the belief that Earth is the center of our solar system. This caused Galileo, a pious Roman Catholic, to be excommunicated from the Catholic Church because  the Catholic Church believed that our solar system was geocentric. Galileo's work, in both physics and meteorology, laid a foundation for the beginning of enlightened scientific thinking.