In 499 CE, Aryabhata wrote down a 7-word analogy that explains why we don't feel the Earth move: As a man in a boat going forward sees a stationary object moving backward. He said the stars appear to circle westward not because they move but because the Earth rotates eastward — 1,582,237,500 rotations per yuga. Copernicus published the heliocentric idea in 1543. Aryabhata published the rotation hypothesis 1,044 years earlier.