Copernicus made the perceived revolution of the heavens into a function of the actual revolutions of the perceiver. In the Preface to the Critique of Pure Reason (2nd edn, B xvi), Kant uses this as an analogy to describe how progress in metaphysics requires attributing the apparent temporal, spatial, and causal order of the world to the structure of the perceiving mind.
Philosophy dictionary. Academic. 2011.