 If this theory were correct , there would be only one high tide per day . Galileo and his contemporaries were aware of this inadequacy because there are two daily high tides at Venice instead of one , about twelve hours apart . Galileo dismissed this anomaly as the result of several secondary causes including the shape of the sea , its depth , and other factors . Against the assertion that Galileo was deceptive in making these arguments , Albert Einstein expressed the opinion that Galileo developed his " fascinating arguments " and accepted them uncritically out of a desire for physical proof of the motion of the Earth . Galileo dismissed the idea , held by his contemporary Johannes Kepler , that the moon caused the tides . ( Galileo also took no interest in Kepler 's elliptical orbits of the planets . ) 
