...He ended up with a quantitative description he could test against reality...
Which was based on the ad-hoced assumption (the planets are moving along ellipses around Sun). Just Galileo was, who confirmed this abstract model by real non-formal connections and observations (the Venus craters, Lunar shadows, etc..) I'm not in role of Kepler in understanding of Aether concept, but the Galileo - by the same way, like the string theorists didn't finished their model, because they didn't explained the existence of strings by logical model. From string theorists perspective, the string model is ad-hoced by the same way, like the Kepler model.
Can you understand this analogy? Every - even the prettiest - formal model is requiring the logical proof at its very end. This is why most of theorems in math were proved less or more lately by rigorous proof based on logic. If the physics wants to become a truly rigorous science by the same way, like the math, it would require the logical proof of all their conjectures as well. Without it the causal process of human understanding can be never considered finished.
...you cannot get your work published in a reputable journal...
By the same way, like the Galileo wasn't allowed to publish his conclusions in mainstream press of his time by Holy Church..:shrug: With compare to Galileo, I've no problem with this in the era of Internet. The reputable journals are heavily censored by peer-review approach, they're expensive and as such they're not publicly available. I'm not required to use them at all, if I want to spread my ideas freely.
Of course, some mainstream science proponents are unhappy from such development, because they want to retain the Universe understandable just by mainstream science approach, i.e. by using of complex math to support the importance of their existence by the same way, like the Holy Church proponents at theirs times. It's all about freedom of information spreading and money support by rest of society. The mainstream science just replaced the role of Holy Church, so the history with proponents of new ideas just repeats: the prohibiting of ideas spreading and ignorance.
But who cares about them? You cannot stop the evolution of human understanding.
...you're the one who said he needed to know Newton's work...
Nope, on the contrary, you liar..
. It was you, who introduced the ISL into discussion to support your claim, the
picture isn't enough in derivation of Kepler's law. It was you, who asked me to derive it by using of ISL. It was you, who didn't realize, the ISL isn't possible to use for derivation of Kepler's laws at all, because we cannot weight the mass of planets directly.
As we can see, by strictly rigorous approach of modern science, neither Galileo, neither Kepler wouldn't be allowed to publish their ideas in contemporary mainstream press, simply because of lack of formal derivation of their finding. And the mainstream science would never accept the introduction of heliocentric concept into physics by such "picture based" way by the same way, like the Holy Church did in Galieo times (..yes, fifty years after Kepler!).
Isn't it silly and funny? But it's quite real with the approach of yours.