Innovation and extension of the active intrinsic value principle through the Galileo inertial discovery process for education

Aims of this study clarify the intrinsic value of Galileo’s law of inertia, which holds significance in the history of science, and the process through which such law of inertia was formed, for educational purposes, and explores a possible conversion of this intrinsic value into an environmental ethical value. The research methodology is to establish a value schema and, through its application, to explore the changes in the active intrinsic value principle of Galileo’s law of inertia based on the history of science. This study derived the following results: First, Galileo professed the value he assigned and discovered as a complete experience to support heliocentrism. Second, he realized his personal religious ideal, or in other words, the ideal of life as a whole. Third, the overall process is to feel a comprehensive and integral expansion of the self. Above all, it shows that the principle of active intrinsic value based on Galileo’s experimental activities has changed and expanded throughout the history of science. One internalizes one’s faith in accordance with the activity-centered value. Only when combined with aesthetic experience does education make one ethical. As general school education does not necessarily guarantee ethics, we must lead our values education toward ecocentric ethics education, which highlights beauty. It shows that these active intrinsic values also extend to ethical values.