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Kindheit und Ausbildung : Isaac Newton wurde am 4. Januar 1643 als Sohn eines erfolgreichen und adeligen Schafzüchters in Woolsthorpe in der englischen Grafschaft Lincolnshire geboren. Sein Vater verstarb noch vor seiner Geburt, und da seine Mutter im Jahr 1642 ein zweites Mal heiratete, wuchs Isaac Newton bei seiner Großmutter auf. Die Tatsache, dass er als Kind von seiner Mutter verlassen wurde, soll der Grund für sein kompliziertes und labiles Wesen gewesen sein. Nach dem Tod ihres zweiten Ehemannes neun Jahre nach der Heirat kehrte seine Mutter in den Heimatort zurück. In Woolsthorpe besuchte Isaac Newton zunächst die Dorfschule, später wechselte er an die Lateinschule in Grantham. Wegen seines eigenbrötlerischen und verschlossenen Charakters war er ein Außenseiter, der von seinen Mitschülern gehänselt wurde. Dies führte dazu, dass er sich völlig zurückzog und sich nur auf die Lektüre von Büchern konzentrierte. Seine Mutter brachte ihn daraufhin bei einer Apothekerfamilie unter, wo Isaac Newton ein besseres Umfeld vorfand. In diesem Haushalt durfte er seinem Forscherdrang nachkommen und fand Literatur und Materialien, um mit seinen Ideen zu experimentieren. Obwohl der schweigsame Junge nicht durch besondere schulische Leistungen auffiel, erkannte ein Pfarrer sein mathematisches Talent und sorgte dafür, dass er ein Stipendium erhielt, um am Trinity College in Cambridge studieren zu können. Damit konnte es Isaac Newton umgehen, die Wirtschaft seines Vaters übernehmen zu müssen. Schon in seiner Kindheit zeigte er nämlich ein deutliches Interesse an experimentellen Forschungen und der Konstruktion von Geräten. Am Trinity College lernte er mit Isaac Barrow einen Mathematik- und Theologieprofessor kennen, der seine Talente gezielt zu fördern verstand und ihm in wenigen Jahren die Grundlagen der Naturwissenschaften vermitteln konnte. Während seines Studiums kam Isaac Newton auch mit den philosophischen und mathematischen Schriften von René Descartes und den Arbeiten Johannes Keplers in Kontakt, lernte verschiedene Sprachen und beschäftigte sich zeitweise mit Musiktheorie. Bereits im Jahr 1668 schloss er sein Studium mit dem Master of Arts ab, obwohl er aufgrund einer Pestepidemie zuvor zwei Jahre in Woolsthorpe verbracht hatte. Im Jahr nach seinem Abschluss wurde er Nachfolger seines Mentors Isaac Barrow und übernahm dessen Position am Trinity College. Damit wurde er nach Barrow zum zweiten Inhaber des Lucasischen Lehrstuhls, einer Position, die später auch große Wissenschaftler wie etwa Stephen Hawking innehatten. Akademische Laufbahn und wissenschaftliche Errungenschaften : Während der Zeit der Pestepidemie beschäftigte sich Isaac Newton, in seinen Heimatort zurückgekehrt, bereits mit der Gravitation und der Infinitesimalrechnung. In der einsamen Umgebung von Woolsthorpe entdeckte er außerdem im Zuge von kleinen Experimenten mit Prismen und Fensterscheiben, dass sich Licht in Spektralfarben zerlegen ließ. Auch wenn es sich dabei um kleine Spielereien handelte, lieferten sie wichtige Erkenntnisse im Bereich der Farbenlehre und der Optik. Bereits im Jahr 1669 konstruierte er ein Spiegelteleskop mit einer gewölbten Linse, mit der er das Licht bündeln konnte. Seine Erfindung stellte er später der Royal Society vor, die ihn daraufhin zum Mitglied ernannte. Nachdem er in Cambridge seinen Abschluss gemacht hatte, entwickelte er seine Arbeit an der Infinitesimalrechnung weiter und revolutionierte damit die Mathematik seiner Zeit. Bis dahin war es nur möglich gewesen, Zahlen zur Berechnung zu verwenden. Mit Newtons Errungenschaft konnten nun auch Geschwindigkeiten und andere veränderliche physikalische Einheiten durch Berechnung beschrieben werden. Etwa zur selben Zeit erarbeitete der deutsche Naturwissenschaftler Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz unabhängig von Newton die Integral- und Differentialrechnung. Letztlich setzte sich Newtons Infinitesimalrechnung gegen Leibniz' Differentialrechnung durch. Sie legte den Grundstein für eine exakte Berechnung physikalischer Vorgänge und machte Isaac Newton daher zu einem der wichtigsten Wegbereiter der modernen Naturwissenschaften. Nach seinem Studienabschluss und während seiner Tätigkeit als Professor in Cambridge beschäftigte sich Newton auch intensiv mit den Lehren von Johannes Kepler und Galileo Galilei . Dies inspirierte ihn zur Entwicklung der Newton’schen Mechanik, einer Theorie der Naturwissenschaft, die auf exakten Berechnungen und Experimenten beruhte. Ins Zentrum dieser Theorie der Mechanik stellte er das sogenannte Gravitationsgesetz. Auf dieses war er durch Zufall gekommen, als er im Garten des elterlichen Hauses im Gras lag und einen Apfel erblickte, der am Baum hing. Dabei stellte er sich plötzlich die Frage, warum dieser senkrecht nach unten hing. Seine Gedanken übertrug er auf die Sonne und den Mond und deren Position zur Erde . Das Gravitationsgesetz, dass er aufgrund seiner Beobachtungen formulierte und damit unsterblich werden sollte, besagt, dass zwei Massekörper voneinander angezogen werden. Mit dieser Regel fand er eine Erklärung der Schwerkraft und konnte beweisen, dass die Anziehungskraft umso stärker ist, je größer die Masse eines Körpers ist. Damit untermauerte Isaac Newton sowohl Galileis als auch Keplers Theorien über die Planetenbahnen und die Bewegung der Himmelskörper um die Sonne. Seine Erkenntnisse und Theorien fasste er in seinem Hauptwerk, der "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica" zusammen, die im Jahr 1687 erschien, von einigen Physikern später als das wichtigste Werk der Naturwissenschaften bezeichnet wurde und seinen Ruf als einer der bedeutendsten Universalgelehrten der Geschichte begründete. Diese Publikation führte zu seiner Beförderung zum Abgeordneten der Universität Cambridge, eine Position, die er bis zum Jahr 1690 innehatte. Ein schwerer Nervenzusammenbruch verhinderte einige Jahre später, dass er seine wissenschaftliche Forschungsarbeit fortsetzen konnte. Er wandte sich zunächst der Religion und der Alchemie zu und wurde im Jahr 1696 schließlich zum Aufsichtsbeamten im Münzwesen ernannt. Diese Tätigkeit führte dazu, dass er zum königlichen Münzmeister aufstieg und nach London übersiedelte. Dort wurde ihm im Jahr 1703 die Präsidentschaft der Royal Society übertragen. Bis zu seinem Tod am 31. März 1727 verkehrte Isaac Newton, der im Jahr 1715 als erster Wissenschaftler in Großbritannien zum Ritter geschlagen worden war, regelmäßig am königlichen Hof und genoss einen hervorragenden Ruf als Politiker. Seine sterblichen Überreste wurden in einem Ehrengrab in der Westminster Abbey beigesetzt. Privates : Isaac Newton wurde von Zeitgenossen stets als schwieriger und verschlossener Charakter beschrieben. Er soll von seinen unermüdlichen Forschungen so besessen gewesen sein, dass er sich bewusst nie auf Beziehungen zu Frauen einließ und auch nicht den Wunsch hegte, eine Familie zu gründen. Obwohl er mit vielen führenden Wissenschaftlern seiner Zeit in Konflikt stand, war er in der Fachwelt hoch anerkannt. Aufgrund seiner herausragenden Leistungen ging Isaac Newton als der bedeutendste Universalgelehrte des 16. und frühen 17. Jahrhunderts in die Geschichte ein. Er lieferte wichtige Erkenntnisse in vielen Bereichen der Naturwissenschaft, die die Physik ebenso revolutionierten wie die Mathematik oder die Astronomie. Das Weltbild, das er im Zuge seiner Studien schuf, behielt über zweihundert Jahre lang seine Gültigkeit.

Lebenslauf:

1643 : Isaac Newton wird am 4. Januar 1643 in Woolsthorpe in Lincolnshire geboren. 1655 - 1659 : Besuch der The King's School in Grantham. 1661 - 1668 : Besuch des Trinity College in Cambridge. 1669 - 1702 : Lucasischer Lehrstuhl für Mathematik an der Universität Cambridge. 1669 : Ernennung zum Mitglied der Royal Society. 1678 : Nervenzusammenbruch. 1687 : "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica" wird veröffentlicht. 1693 : Newton erleidet einen zweiten, schwerwiegenden Nervenzusammenbruch. 1699 - 1672 : Entwicklung eines Spiegelteleskops. 1703 - 1726 : Präsident der Royal Society. 1704 : "Opticks" wird veröffentlicht. 1705 : Newton wird zum Ritter geschlagen. 1726 : Isaac Newton stirbt am 20. März 1726 in Kensington (London).

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Isaac Newton

* 04.01.1643 Woolsthorpe † 31.03.1727 Kensington.

Er war ein englischer Physiker, Mathematiker und Astronom und einer der bedeutendsten Naturwissenschaftler der Geschichte. NEWTON entdeckte die Gravitation als universelle Kraft, die das Sonnensystem zusammenhält. Er fand die Grundgesetze der Mechanik und führte die Begriffe Kraft und Masse ein, entdeckte die Farbzerlegung des Lichtes und erklärte optische Erscheinungen mit seiner Korpuskeltheorie. In der Mathematik leistete NEWTON einen entscheidenden Beitrag zur Entwicklung der Differenzialrechnung.

ISAAC NEWTON ist einer der zentralen Personen der wissenschaftlichen Revolution, die im beginnenden 17. Jahrhundert von Italien (GALILEO GALILEI, 1564–1642) ausging und mit der Herausbildung der klassischen Mechanik ihren Abschluss fand. Die Mechanik NEWTONs wurde durch ihren klaren Aufbau und ihre mathematische Strenge bis weit in das 19. Jahrhundert hinein zum Vorbild für andere Teildisziplinen der Physik und übte auch wesentlichen Einfluss auf das Weltbild aus.

Kindheit, Jugend und Studium

ISAAC NEWTON wurde am 4.1.1643 (nach dem damals in England noch gültigen Julianischen Kalender am 25. 12. 1642, man findet deshalb als Geburtsjahr manchmal 1642 und manchmal 1643) in dem mittelenglischen Woolsthorpe nahe dem Städtchen Grantham als Kind einer Bauernfamilie geboren. Sein Vater starb noch vor seiner Geburt. Seine Mutter heiratete bald nach seiner Geburt wieder und überließ die Erziehung ISAACs ihrer Mutter und ihrem Bruder. Der Rektor seiner Schule in Grantham setzte durch, dass der begabte Junge sich auf die Universität vorbereiten konnte. Seine Mutter hätte ihn freilich lieber als Landwirt auf dem Hofe in Woolsthorpe gesehen. Nach den Erinnerung seiner Schulgefährten war ISAACc ein zurückgezogener, vielseitig interessierter Junge, der gern bastelte und experimentierte, aber auch Streichen nicht abgeneigt war. Ein Beispiel: Bei einem nächtlichen Drachenaufstieg erschreckte er die Gutsbewohner mit an der Drachenschnur befestigten Kerzen, versuchte aber auch, die Zugkraft des Drachens zu bestimmen. In Grantham lebte NEWTON bei einem Apotheker, was ihn zu chemischen Versuchen veranlasste. Hier begegnete er auch seiner Jugendliebe, mit der er bis ins hohe Alter freundschaftlich verbunden war. Außer dieser harmlosen Beziehung hat er nie ein engeres Verhältnis zu Frauen, verheiratet war er nie. 1661 begann NEWTON sein Studium an dem berühmten Trinity College zu Cambridge, wo insbesondere sein Lehrer I. BARROW (1630–1677) auf ihn aufmerksam wurde und ihn stark beeinflusste.

Forscher und königlicher Münzmeister

Als wegen einer Pestepidemie 1665 auch die Universität in Cambridge den Lehrbetrieb unterbrechen musste, zog sich NEWTON nach Woolsthorpe zurück und entwickelte dort in den folgenden zwei Jahren die Grundlagen seiner Naturauffassung, die er später in mühevoller Kleinarbeit, durch scharfsinnige Überlegungen und geschicktes Experimentieren weiterentwickelt hat. Seine wichtigsten mathematischen Entdeckungen hat er in dieser Zeit gemacht. 1669 verzichtete BARROW zugunsten seines Schülers auf seine Lehrstuhl und ermöglichte diesem damit eine einigermaßen sichere Existenz. Seine wichtigsten beruflichen Positionen waren 1669 bis 1701 Mathematikprofessor in Cambridge, 1671 Mitglied und ab 1703 Präsident der Royal Society sowie ab 1698 königlicher Münzmeister, eine Stellung, die ihm ein sorgloses Leben sicherte. NEWTON starb im Alter von 84 Jahren am 31.3.1727 in Kensington als ein anerkannter Mathematiker, Physiker und Astronom. Als erster englischen Naturwissenschaftler erhielt er ein Staatsbegräbnis. Sein Leichnam ruht in der Westminster Abbey in London an der Seite berühmter Persönlichkeiten der englischen Geschichte. NEWTON war einer der berühmtesten Wissenschaftler seiner Zeit, dessen Autorität noch lange nachwirkte.

Wissenschaftliche Leistungen

Die Liste der wissenschaftlichen Leistungen von ISAAC NEWTON ist lang und eindrucksvoll. In der Optik beschäftigte sich NEWTON mit der Dispersion (Farbzerlegung) des Lichtes und der Entstehung der Farben . So ließ er Sonnenlicht durch einen etwa 8 mm breiten Spalt im Fensterladen durch ein Glasprisma auf eine weiße Wand fallen und erhielt ein farbiges Lichtband. Aus diesem Ergebnis schließt er vorsichtig:

„Es sieht so aus, als ob das Licht verschieden stark gebrochen wird“ . Und er schreibt weiter: „Um hierdrin Klarheit zu bekommen, untersuchte ich, was denn die Folge einer zweiten Brechung dieser Art sein würde“ .

Er stellte ein zweites Prisma hinter das erste so, dass das erste Prisma das Licht nach oben und das zweite Prisma es zur Seite brach. Das Ergebnis bestätigte seine Vermutung: Auch durch das zweite Prisma wurde das blaue Licht stärker gebrochen als das rote. Weitere Untersuchungen ergaben, dass weißes Licht aus farbigen Bestandteilen besteht. NEWTON stellte auch Paare von Farben zusammen, die sich zu weiß ergänzen, und nannte sie Komplementärfarben . NEWTONS Erkenntnisse zum Wesen des farbigen Lichtes bedeuteten einen großen Umschwung im Denken seiner Zeit und setzten sich nur langsam durch. Insbesondere entbrannte ein intensiver wissenschaftlicher Streit mit ROBERT HOOKE (1635–1703) und CHRISTIAAN HUYGENS (1629–1695) darüber, was Licht ist. Während NEWTON das Licht als Strom kleiner Teilchen ansah und damit versuchte, die unterschiedlichsten optischen Erscheinungen zu erklären, waren HOOKE und HUYGENS Vertreter der Auffassung, dass Licht eine Wellenerscheinung ist. Aufgrund der Autorität, die NEWTON in wissenschaftlichen Kreisen besaß, konnte er verhindern, dass die huygenssche Theorie Anerkennung fand. Bis Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts war seine Theorie bestimmend. Untersuchungen zur Beugung und Interferenz von Licht führten Anfang des 19. Jahrhundert dazu, dass die Wellentheorie wieder in den Vordergrund trat. Erst der berühmte deutsche Physiker ALBERT EINSTEIN (1879–1955) wies nach, das Licht sowohl Wellen- als auch Teilcheneigenschaften hat. Um die Farbfehler bei der Abbildung mit Linsen zu umgehen, baute NEWTON 1668 als Erster ein Spiegelteleskop , mit dem er die Jupitermonde und die Phasen der Venus beobachtete Ausgehend von den Gesetzen der Planetenbewegung, die JOHANNES KEPLER (1571-1630) gefunden hatte, leitete NEWTON das Gravitationsgesetz her. Dieses Gesetz ist die Grundlage der gesamten Himmelsmechanik. Mit den drei nach ihm benannten Grundgesetzen der Mechanik wurde er zum Begründer der klassischen Mechanik. Erst mit der Relativitätstheorie und der Quantentheorie erfuhr die newtonsche Theorie eine Einschränkung.

Newtons grundlegendes wissenschaftliches Werk

In seinem grundlegenden Werk „Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica“ (Mathematische Grundlagen der Naturwissenschaft 1687) sind alle wesentlichen Grundlagen der klassischen Mechanik dargestellt. Es umfasst drei Bücher. Im ersten Buch werden grundlegende Begriffe wie Masse und Kraft definiert. Dann folgen die drei newtonschen Gesetze oder Axiome, die heute als Trägheitsgesetz , als newtonsches Grundgesetz und als Wechselwirkungsgesetz bezeichnet werden. Darüber hinaus beschäftigt sich Newton in diesem Teil mit der Massenanziehung (Gravitation). Im zweiten Buch behandelt NEWTON die Bewegung von Körpern in einem Medium und stellt Überlegungen zur Lichtgeschwindigkeit und zur Schallgeschwindigkeit an. Im dritten Buch werden anhand allgemeiner Regeln die mathematischen Ergebnisse mit Erfahrungstatsachen aus der Natur verknüpft und Folgerungen für die Praxis gezogen. So charakterisiert Newton die Massenanziehung (Gravitation) als überall auftretende Wechselwirkung zwischen Körpern und erklärt damit

• Ebbe und Flut ,
• die Planetenbahnen und
• Störungen in der Mondbahn .

NEWTON im Original zu lesen ist schwer. Seine Texte sind konzentriert, mathematisch durchdrungen und frei von jeglichen Wiederholungen oder Zusammenfassungen. Beispiel: NEWTON beweist die Behauptung, die auf die Jupitermonde wirkende Kraft weise zum Jupiter und nehme quadratisch mit der Entfernung ab, folgendermaßen:

„Der erste Teil des Satzes folgt aus Erscheinung 1 und aus den Sätzen 2 und 3 des I. Buches; der zweite Teil aus Erscheinung 1 sowie aus dem Korrelarium VI des 4. Satzes im selben Buch.“

Besonders auf dem europäischen Kontinent wurde die newtonsche Mechanik zunächst wenig anerkannt. Es ist das Verdienst des französischen Philosophen und Schriftstellers VOLTAIRE (1694–1778), die newtonsche Mechanik auf dem Kontinent verbreitet zu haben. Als einer der Hauptvertreter der französischen Aufklärung interpretierte er die newtonsche Mechanik aus politischen Gründen im Sinne universeller Weltgesetze, auf die alles zurückführbar sei. Das ist Ausgangspunkt für die Mechanisierung des Weltbildes, die ihren Höhepunkt bei P. S. LAPLACE (1749–1827) findet. Industrie und Gewerbe konnten jedoch trotz hoch entwickelter Mechanik von der Wissenschaft zunächst wenig profitieren. Die Feinheiten newtonscher Dynamik waren wegen der rückständigen Technologie zur damaligen Zeit noch nicht nutzbar. NEWTON hat Geschossbahnen unter Berücksichtigung des Luftwiderstandes berechnet, aber die Abschussgeschwindigkeiten waren mit den Geschützen seiner Zeit so wenig reproduzierbar, dass die empirische Erfahrung der Kanoniere völlig ausreichte. Lediglich in der Navigation und im Uhrenbau wurden wissenschaftliche Ergebnisse erfolgreich genutzt.

Auszüge aus seinen Werken

Auszüge aus NEWTONs Werken : In Erinnerung an eine Unterhaltung mit NEWTON über die Entdeckung des Gravitationsgesetzes heißt es:

Nach dem Mittagessen, da es ein schöner warmer Tag war, gingen wir in den Garten und tranken Tee zu zweit im Schatten einiger Apfelbäume. Im Verlaufe der Unterhaltung bemerkte er zu mir, dass er sich genau in derselben Situation befand, als die Idee der Gravitation in ihm auftauchte. Sie wurde durch den Fall eines Apfels ausgelöst, als er, in Gedanken vertieft, hier saß. Warum muss dieser Apfel immer lotrecht zu Boden fallen - meditierte er - warum kann er sich nicht zur Seite oder nach oben bewegen, immer nur in Richtung des Mittelpunktes der Erde? Die Ursache dafür ist offensichtlich, dass die Erde ihn anzieht. Es muss also die Materie eine Anziehungsfähigkeit besitzen und diese Fähigkeit muss im Erdmittelpunkt konzentriert und nicht seitwärts gelegen gedacht werden. Darum fällt der Apfel vertikal, d. h. Richtung des Erdmittelpunktes. Wenn die Materie die Materie anzieht, so muss diese Anziehung proportional zur Quantität dieser Materie sein. So zieht auch der Apfel die Erde an, genau so, wie die Erde den Apfel. Siehe, hier haben wir eine Wirkung, Gravitation genannt, welche sich auf das ganze Universum ausbreitet. (Aus: W. STUKELEY: Memoirs of Sir Isaac Newton's Life. 1752. Erinnerung an eine Unterhaltung am 15. April 1726)

In den „Mathematischen Prinzipien der Naturlehre“ heißt es zum Zusammenhang zwichen Mase und Gewichtskraft:

Hieraus ergibt sich ein Verfahren, sowohl die Körper in bezug auf die Menge ihrer Materie miteinander zu vergleichen als auch den Unterschied des Gewichts ein und desselben Körpers an verschiedenen Orten zu bestimmen und so die Änderung der Schwere zu finden. Durch die schärfsten Versuche habe ich stets gefunden, dass die Menge der Materie in einzelnen Körpern ihrem Gewicht proportional ist.

In den „Mathematischen Prinzipien der Naturlehre“ finden sich auch folgenden allgemeinen Hinweise wie:

Alle Schwierigkeit der Physik besteht nämlich dem Anschein nach darin, aus den Erscheinungen der Bewegung die Kräfte der Natur zu erforschen und hierauf durch diese Kräfte die übrigen Erscheinungen zu erklären.

Der absolute Raum ist unvergänglich und bleibt vermöge seiner Natur und ohne eine Beziehung auf einen anderen Gegenstand stets gleich und unbeweglich. Die absolute, wahre und mathematische Zeit fließt vermöge ihrer Natur ohne Beziehung auf einen anderen Vorgang gleichförmig ab. (Aus: I. NEWTON: Mathematische Prinzipien der Naturlehre)

Ausführlich beschreibt NEWTON optische Untersuchungen zur Farbzerlegung von weißem Licht:

Das Sonnenlicht besteht aus Strahlen verschiedener Brechbarkeit. In einem sehr dunklen Zimmer brachte ich hinter einer runden in dem Fensterladen befindlichen Öffnung von 1/3 Zoll Durchmesser ein Glasprisma an. Letzteres sollte den Lichtstrahl, der durch die Öffnung eindrang, ablenken, ihn aufwärts nach der gegenüberliegenden Wand des Zimmers werfen und dort ein farbiges Bild der Sonne erzeugen. Die Achse des Prismas, das heißt die durch die Mitte des Prismas von einem Ende zum anderen parallel der brechenden Kante verlaufende Linie, befand sich in diesem und den folgenden Versuchen in senkrechter Stellung zu den einfallenden Lichtstrahlen. Um diese Achse drehte ich das Prisma langsam und sah dabei das farbige Sonnenbild zuerst hinab- und dann wieder hinaufsteigen. Zwischen der Ab- und Aufwärtsbewegung, in dem Augenblicke, wo das Bild stille zu stehen schien, stellte ich das Prisma fest. Nun ließ ich das gebrochene Licht senkrecht auf einen Bogen weißes Papier fallen, der auf der gegenüberliegenden Wand des Zimmers angebracht war, und beobachtete Gestalt und Größe des dort entstehenden Sonnenbildes. Dasselbe war langgezogen und von 2 geraden parallelen Linien begrenzt; die Enden waren halbkreisförmig. Seitlich war es recht scharf begrenzt, an den Enden jedoch verschwommen und undeutlich, indem das Licht dort allmählich bis zum gänzlichen Verschwinden abnahm. (Aus: Opticks or a treatise of the reflections, refractions and colours of light by Sir Isaac Newton, London 1704)

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Isaac Newton

Isaac Newton war ein englischer Mathematiker , Physiker und Astronom . Er hat so viele wichtige Dinge für die Wissenschaft herausgefunden, dass man ihn heute zu den bedeutendsten Naturforscher aller Zeiten zählt. Geboren wurde er im Jahr 1642, kurz nach dem Tod von Galileo Galilei und er starb im Jahr 1726.

Newton studierte in der berühmten englischen Universitätsstadt Cambridge und machte seinen Abschluss mit Bestnoten. Dann brach die große Pest aus. Newton konnte nicht weiter an der Universität bleiben, da diese geschlossen wurde und kehrte auf das Landgut seiner Eltern zurück. Dort beschäftigte sich viel mit Problemen der Optik , das ist die Lehre vom Licht . Außerdem versuchte er die Bewegung von Himmelskörpern zu verstehen und zu erklären. Bei seinen Berechnungen entwickelte er auch viele neue Methoden in der Algebra, das ist ein Zweig der Mathematik .

Zu Ehren von Newton sind viele Dinge in der Wissenschaft nach im benannt worden. Die Maßeinheit der Kraft heißt Newton und wird mit N abgekürzt. Auch ein Krater auf dem Mond heiß Newton.

Newtons grundlegendes Werk „Mathematische Grundlagen der Naturwissenschaft “ umfasst drei Bücher. Kritik an seinen Veröffentlichungen ertrug er nicht, deshalb zog er sich später zurück und konzentrierte sich auf religiöse Studien.

Was fand Newton über das Licht heraus?

Wenn Licht durch Glas oder Wasser strahlt, wird es abgelenkt. Das weiß jeder, der seinen Arm in ein Wasserbecken hält. Er sieht dann aus, als sei er abgeknickt. Man nennt das auch Brechung des Lichts. Newton erforschte das genauer.

Newton lenkte einen Lichtstrahl in einen dunklen Raum durch einen schmalen Spalt und dann durch ein Prisma. Das ist ein dreieckiger Glaskörper. Das Licht, das hinten aus dem Prisma kam, war nicht mehr weiß, sondern es fächerte sich in die Regenbogenfarben auf. Newton konnte so zeigen, dass weißes Licht aus vielen Einzelfarben zusammengesetzt ist. Da jede Farbe im Glasprisma unterschiedlich gebrochen wird, spaltet sich das weiße Licht auf. Auf diese Weise entsteht auch ein Regenbogen .

Newton entwickelte die erste kreisförmige Farbordnung, mit der Farbe Weiß in der Mitte. Jedes Fernrohr , das mit Linsen aufgebaut ist, verändert das einfallende Licht. Deshalb erfand er das Spiegelteleskop .

Was fand Newton über die Schwerkraft heraus?

Newton entdeckte, dass die Schwerkraft überall im Weltall wirkt und erklärte so die Bahnbewegungen der Planeten , die Johannes Kepler schon beschrieben hatte. Auch Ebbe und Flut konnte er so erklären. Zusätzlich bewies er auch, dass die Anziehungskraft auf sehr weite Entfernungen wirkt. Das bedeutet, dass sich alle Gegenstände gegenseitig anziehen, egal wie weit sie voneinander entfernt sind. Diese Anziehungskraft ist umso stärker, je schwerer die Körper sind und je näher sie sich kommen. Diese Regel ist als Newtons Gravitationsgesetz bekannt.

Neben dieser Schwerkraft hat Newton auch noch erkannt, dass bewegte Körper ihre Bewegungsrichtung und Geschwindigkeit behalten, wenn keine anderen Kräfte das beeinflussen. Der Mond fällt nur deshalb nicht auf die Erde , weil er sich schnell um sie herumbewegt. Gäbe es die Erde nicht, würde der Mond geradeaus wegfliegen. Die Anziehungskraft zwischen Erde und Mond ist genau so groß, dass der Mond auf einer Bahn um die Erde kreist.

Es wird gern erzählt, dass Newton durch einen fallenden Apfel auf die Idee kam, die Schwerkraft zu erforschen. Vermutlich hat er diese Geschichte aber später selbst erfunden.

Wenn weißes Licht durch ein Glasprisma fällt, dann spaltet es sich in die Regenbogenfarben auf.

Der Farbkreis nach Newton

Newtons Spiegelteleskop

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Isaac Newton

Isaac Newton (1642–1727) is best known for having invented the calculus in the mid to late 1660s (most of a decade before Leibniz did so independently, and ultimately more influentially) and for having formulated the theory of universal gravity — the latter in his Principia , the single most important work in the transformation of early modern natural philosophy into modern physical science. Yet he also made major discoveries in optics beginning in the mid-1660s and reaching across four decades; and during the course of his 60 years of intense intellectual activity he put no less effort into chemical and alchemical research and into theology and biblical studies than he put into mathematics and physics. He became a dominant figure in Britain almost immediately following publication of his Principia in 1687, with the consequence that “Newtonianism” of one form or another had become firmly rooted there within the first decade of the eighteenth century. His influence on the continent, however, was delayed by the strong opposition to his theory of gravity expressed by such leading figures as Christiaan Huygens and Leibniz, both of whom saw the theory as invoking an occult power of action at a distance in the absence of Newton's having proposed a contact mechanism by means of which forces of gravity could act. As the promise of the theory of gravity became increasingly substantiated, starting in the late 1730s but especially during the 1740s and 1750s, Newton became an equally dominant figure on the continent, and “Newtonianism,” though perhaps in more guarded forms, flourished there as well. What physics textbooks now refer to as “Newtonian mechanics” and “Newtonian science” consists mostly of results achieved on the continent between 1740 and 1800.

1.1 Newton's Early Years

1.2 newton's years at cambridge prior to principia, 1.3 newton's final years at cambridge, 1.4 newton's years in london and his final years, 2. newton's work and influence, primary sources, secondary sources, other internet resources, related entries, 1. newton's life.

Newton's life naturally divides into four parts: the years before he entered Trinity College, Cambridge in 1661; his years in Cambridge before the Principia was published in 1687; a period of almost a decade immediately following this publication, marked by the renown it brought him and his increasing disenchantment with Cambridge; and his final three decades in London, for most of which he was Master of the Mint. While he remained intellectually active during his years in London, his legendary advances date almost entirely from his years in Cambridge. Nevertheless, save for his optical papers of the early 1670s and the first edition of the Principia , all his works published before he died fell within his years in London. [ 1 ]

Newton was born into a Puritan family in Woolsthorpe, a small village in Linconshire near Grantham, on 25 December 1642 (old calendar), a few days short of one year after Galileo died. Isaac's father, a farmer, died two months before Isaac was born. When his mother Hannah married the 63 year old Barnabas Smith three years later and moved to her new husband's residence, Isaac was left behind with his maternal grandparents. (Isaac learned to read and write from his maternal grandmother and mother, both of whom, unlike his father, were literate.) Hannah returned to Woolsthorpe with three new children in 1653, after Smith died. Two years later Isaac went to boarding school in Grantham, returning full time to manage the farm, not very successfully, in 1659. Hannah's brother, who had received an M.A. from Cambridge, and the headmaster of the Grantham school then persuaded his mother that Isaac should prepare for the university. After further schooling at Grantham, he entered Trinity College in 1661, somewhat older than most of his classmates.

These years of Newton's youth were the most turbulent in the history of England. The English Civil War had begun in 1642, King Charles was beheaded in 1649, Oliver Cromwell ruled as lord protector from 1653 until he died in 1658, followed by his son Richard from 1658 to 1659, leading to the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II in 1660. How much the political turmoil of these years affected Newton and his family is unclear, but the effect on Cambridge and other universities was substantial, if only through unshackling them for a period from the control of the Anglican Catholic Church. The return of this control with the restoration was a key factor inducing such figures as Robert Boyle to turn to Charles II for support for what in 1660 emerged as the Royal Society of London. The intellectual world of England at the time Newton matriculated to Cambridge was thus very different from what it was when he was born.

Newton's initial education at Cambridge was classical, focusing (primarily through secondary sources) on Aristotlean rhetoric, logic, ethics, and physics. By 1664, Newton had begun reaching beyond the standard curriculum, reading, for example, the 1656 Latin edition of Descartes's Opera philosophica , which included the Meditations , Discourse on Method , the Dioptrics , and the Principles of Philosophy . By early 1664 he had also begun teaching himself mathematics, taking notes on works by Oughtred, Viète, Wallis, and Descartes — the latter via van Schooten's Latin translation, with commentary, of the Géométrie . Newton spent all but three months from the summer of 1665 until the spring of 1667 at home in Woolsthorpe when the university was closed because of the plague. This period was his so-called annus mirabilis . During it, he made his initial experimental discoveries in optics and developed (independently of Huygens's treatment of 1659) the mathematical theory of uniform circular motion, in the process noting the relationship between the inverse-square and Kepler's rule relating the square of the planetary periods to the cube of their mean distance from the Sun. Even more impressively, by late 1666 he had become de facto the leading mathematician in the world, having extended his earlier examination of cutting-edge problems into the discovery of the calculus, as presented in his tract of October 1666. He returned to Trinity as a Fellow in 1667, where he continued his research in optics, constructing his first reflecting telescope in 1669, and wrote a more extended tract on the calculus “De Analysi per Æquations Numero Terminorum Infinitas” incorporating new work on infinite series. On the basis of this tract Isaac Barrow recommended Newton as his replacement as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, a position he assumed in October 1669, four and a half years after he had received his Bachelor of Arts.

Over the course of the next fifteen years as Lucasian Professor Newton presented his lectures and carried on research in a variety of areas. By 1671 he had completed most of a treatise length account of the calculus, [ 2 ] which he then found no one would publish. This failure appears to have diverted his interest in mathematics away from the calculus for some time, for the mathematical lectures he registered during this period mostly concern algebra. (During the early 1680s he undertook a critical review of classical texts in geometry, a review that reduced his view of the importance of symbolic mathematics.) His lectures from 1670 to 1672 concerned optics, with a large range of experiments presented in detail. Newton went public with his work in optics in early 1672, submitting material that was read before the Royal Society and then published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society . This led to four years of exchanges with various figures who challenged his claims, including both Robert Hooke and Christiaan Huygens — exchanges that at times exasperated Newton to the point that he chose to withdraw from further public exchanges in natural philosophy. Before he largely isolated himself in the late 1670s, however, he had also engaged in a series of sometimes long exchanges in the mid 1670s, most notably with John Collins (who had a copy of “De Analysi”) and Leibniz, concerning his work on the calculus. So, though they remained unpublished, Newton's advances in mathematics scarcely remained a secret.

This period as Lucasian Professor also marked the beginning of his more private researches in alchemy and theology. Newton purchased chemical apparatus and treatises in alchemy in 1669, with experiments in chemistry extending across this entire period. The issue of the vows Newton might have to take in conjunction with the Lucasian Professorship also appears to have precipitated his study of the doctrine of the Trinity, which opened the way to his questioning the validity of a good deal more doctrine central to the Roman and Anglican Churches.

Newton showed little interest in orbital astronomy during this period until Hooke initiated a brief correspondence with him in an effort to solicit material for the Royal Society at the end of November 1679, shortly after Newton had returned to Cambridge following the death of his mother. Among the several problems Hooke proposed to Newton was the question of the trajectory of a body under an inverse-square central force:

It now remaines to know the proprietys of a curve Line (not circular nor concentricall) made by a centrall attractive power which makes the velocitys of Descent from the tangent Line or equall straight motion at all Distances in a Duplicate proportion to the Distances Reciprocally taken. I doubt not but that by your excellent method you will easily find out what the Curve must be, and it proprietys, and suggest a physicall Reason of this proportion. [ 3 ]

Newton apparently discovered the systematic relationship between conic-section trajectories and inverse-square central forces at the time, but did not communicate it to anyone, and for reasons that remain unclear did not follow up this discovery until Halley, during a visit in the summer of 1684, put the same question to him. His immediate answer was, an ellipse; and when he was unable to produce the paper on which he had made this determination, he agreed to forward an account to Halley in London. Newton fulfilled this commitment in November by sending Halley a nine-folio-page manuscript, “De Motu Corporum in Gyrum” (“On the Motion of Bodies in Orbit”), which was entered into the Register of the Royal Society in early December 1684. The body of this tract consists of ten deduced propositions — three theorems and seven problems — all of which, along with their corollaries, recur in important propositions in the Principia .

Save for a few weeks away from Cambridge, from late 1684 until early 1687, Newton concentrated on lines of research that expanded the short ten-proposition tract into the 500 page Principia , with its 192 derived propositions. Initially the work was to have a two book structure, but Newton subsequently shifted to three books, and replaced the original version of the final book with one more mathematically demanding. The manuscript for Book 1 was sent to London in the spring of 1686, and the manuscripts for Books 2 and 3, in March and April 1687, respectively. The roughly three hundred copies of the Principia came off the press in the summer of 1687, thrusting the 44 year old Newton into the forefront of natural philosophy and forever ending his life of comparative isolation.

The years between the publication of the Principia and Newton's permanent move to London in 1696 were marked by his increasing disenchantment with his situation in Cambridge. In January 1689, following the Glorious Revolution at the end of 1688, he was elected to represent Cambridge University in the Convention Parliament, which he did until January 1690. During this time he formed friendships with John Locke and Nicolas Fatio de Duillier, and in the summer of 1689 he finally met Christiaan Huygens face to face for two extended discussions. Perhaps because of disappointment with Huygens not being convinced by the argument for universal gravity, in the early 1690s Newton initiated a radical rewriting of the Principia . During these same years he wrote (but withheld) his principal treatise in alchemy, Praxis ; he corresponded with Richard Bentley on religion and allowed Locke to read some of his writings on the subject; he once again entered into an effort to put his work on the calculus in a form suitable for publication; and he carried out experiments on diffraction with the intent of completing his Opticks , only to withhold the manuscript from publication because of dissatisfaction with its treatment of diffraction. The radical revision of the Principia became abandoned by 1693, during the middle of which Newton suffered, by his own testimony, what in more recent times would be called a nervous breakdown. In the two years following his recovery that autumn, he continued his experiments in chymistry and he put substantial effort into trying to refine and extend the gravity-based theory of the lunar orbit in the Principia , but with less success than he had hoped.

Throughout these years Newton showed interest in a position of significance in London, but again with less success than he had hoped until he accepted the relatively minor position of Warden of the Mint in early 1696, a position he held until he became Master of the Mint at the end of 1699. He again represented Cambridge University in Parliament for 16 months, beginning in 1701, the year in which he resigned his Fellowship at Trinity College and the Lucasian Professorship. He was elected President of the Royal Society in 1703 and was knighted by Queen Anne in 1705.

Newton thus became a figure of imminent authority in London over the rest of his life, in face-to-face contact with individuals of power and importance in ways that he had not known in his Cambridge years. His everyday home life changed no less dramatically when his extraordinarily vivacious teenage niece, Catherine Barton, the daughter of his half-sister Hannah, moved in with him shortly after he moved to London, staying until she married John Conduitt in 1717, and after that remaining in close contact. (It was through her and her husband that Newton's papers came down to posterity.) Catherine was socially prominent among the powerful and celebrated among the literati for the years before she married, and her husband was among the wealthiest men of London.

The London years saw Newton embroiled in some nasty disputes, probably made the worse by the ways in which he took advantage of his position of authority in the Royal Society. In the first years of his Presidency he became involved in a dispute with John Flamsteed in which he and Halley, long ill-disposed toward the Flamsteed, violated the trust of the Royal Astronomer, turning him into a permanent enemy. Ill feelings between Newton and Leibniz had been developing below the surface from even before Huygens had died in 1695, and they finally came to a head in 1710 when John Keill accused Leibniz in the Philosophical Transactions of having plagiarized the calculus from Newton and Leibniz, a Fellow of the Royal Society since 1673, demanded redress from the Society. The Society's 1712 published response was anything but redress. Newton not only was a dominant figure in this response, but then published an outspoken anonymous review of it in 1715 in the Philosophical Transactions . Leibniz and his colleagues on the Continent had never been comfortable with the Principia and its implication of action at a distance. With the priority dispute this attitude turned into one of open hostility toward Newton's theory of gravity — a hostility that was matched in its blindness by the fervor of acceptance of the theory in England. The public elements of the priority dispute had the effect of expanding a schism between Newton and Leibniz into a schism between the English associated with the Royal Society and the group who had been working with Leibniz on the calculus since the 1690s, including most notably Johann Bernoulli, and this schism in turn transformed into one between the conduct of science and mathematics in England versus the Continent that persisted long after Leibniz died in 1716.

Although Newton obviously had far less time available to devote to solitary research during his London years than he had had in Cambridge, he did not entirely cease to be productive. The first (English) edition of his Opticks finally appeared in 1704, appended to which were two mathematical treatises, his first work on the calculus to appear in print. This edition was followed by a Latin edition in 1706 and a second English edition in 1717, each containing important Queries on key topics in natural philosophy beyond those in its predecessor. Other earlier work in mathematics began to appear in print, including a work on algebra, Arithmetica Universalis , in 1707 and “De Analysi” and a tract on finite differences, “Methodis differentialis” in 1711. The second edition of the Principia , on which Newton had begun work at the age of 66 in 1709, was published in 1713, with a third edition in 1726. Though the original plan for a radical restructuring had long been abandoned, the fact that virtually every page of the Principia received some modifications in the second edition shows how carefully Newton, often prodded by his editor Roger Cotes, reconsidered everything in it; and important parts were substantially rewritten not only in response to Continental criticisms, but also because of new data, including data from experiments on resistance forces carried out in London. Focused effort on the third edition began in 1723, when Newton was 80 years old, and while the revisions are far less extensive than in the second edition, it does contain substantive additions and modfications, and it surely has claim to being the edition that represents his most considered views.

Newton died on 20 March 1727 at the age of 84. His contemporaries' conception of him nevertheless continued to expand as a consequence of various posthumous publications, including The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended (1728); the work originally intended to be the last book of the Principia , The System of the World (1728, in both English and Latin); Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John (1733); A Treatise of the Method of Fluxions and Infinite Series (1737); A Dissertation upon the Sacred Cubit of the Jews (1737), and Four Letters from Sir Isaac Newton to Doctor Bentley concerning Some Arguments in Proof of a Deity (1756). Even then, however, the works that had been published represented only a limited fraction of the total body of papers that had been left in the hands of Catherine and John Conduitt. The five volume collection of Newton's works edited by Samuel Horsley (1779–85) did not alter this situation. Through the marriage of the Conduitts' daughter Catherine and subsequent inheritance, this body of papers came into the possession of Lord Portsmouth, who agreed in 1872 to allow it to be reviewed by scholars at Cambridge University (John Couch Adams, George Stokes, H. R. Luard, and G. D. Liveing). They issued a catalogue in 1888, and the university then retained all the papers of a scientific character. With the notable exception of W. W. Rouse Ball, little work was done on the scientific papers before World War II. The remaining papers were returned to Lord Portsmouth, and then ultimately sold at auction in 1936 to various parties. Serious scholarly work on them did not get underway until the 1970s, and much remains to be done on them.

Three factors stand in the way of giving an account of Newton's work and influence. First is the contrast between the public Newton, consisting of publications in his lifetime and in the decade or two following his death, and the private Newton, consisting of his unpublished work in math and physics, his efforts in chymistry — that is, the 17th century blend of alchemy and chemistry — and his writings in radical theology — material that has become public mostly since World War II. Only the public Newton influenced the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, yet any account of Newton himself confined to this material can at best be only fragmentary. Second is the contrast, often shocking, between the actual content of Newton's public writings and the positions attributed to him by others, including most importantly his popularizers. The term “Newtonian” refers to several different intellectual strands unfolding in the eighteenth century, some of them tied more closely to Voltaire, Pemberton, and Maclaurin — or for that matter to those who saw themselves as extending his work, such as Clairaut, Euler, d'Alembert, Lagrange, and Laplace — than to Newton himself. Third is the contrast between the enormous range of subjects to which Newton devoted his full concentration at one time or another during the 60 years of his intellectual career — mathematics, optics, mechanics, astronomy, experimental chemistry, alchemy, and theology — and the remarkably little information we have about what drove him or his sense of himself. Biographers and analysts who try to piece together a unified picture of Newton and his intellectual endeavors often end up telling us almost as much about themselves as about Newton.

Compounding the diversity of the subjects to which Newton devoted time are sharp contrasts in his work within each subject. Optics and orbital mechanics both fall under what we now call physics, and even then they were seen as tied to one another, as indicated by Descartes' first work on the subject, Le Monde, ou Traité de la lumierè . Nevertheless, two very different “Newtonian” traditions in physics arose from Newton's Opticks and Principia : from his Opticks a tradition centered on meticulous experimentation and from his Principia a tradition centered on mathematical theory. The most important element common to these two was Newton's deep commitment to having the empirical world serve not only as the ultimate arbiter, but also as the sole basis for adopting provisional theory. Throughout all of this work he displayed distrust of what was then known as the method of hypotheses – putting forward hypotheses that reach beyond all known phenomena and then testing them by deducing observable conclusions from them. Newton insisted instead on having specific phenomena decide each element of theory, with the goal of limiting the provisional aspect of theory as much as possible to the step of inductively generalizing from the specific phenomena. This stance is perhaps best summarized in his fourth Rule of Reasoning, added in the third edition of the Principia , but adopted as early as his Optical Lectures of the 1670s:

In experimental philosophy, propositions gathered from phenomena by induction should be taken to be either exactly or very nearly true notwithstanding any contrary hypotheses, until yet other phenomena make such propositions either more exact or liable to exceptions. This rule should be followed so that arguments based on induction may not be nullified by hypotheses.

Such a commitment to empirically driven science was a hallmark of the Royal Society from its very beginnings, and one can find it in the research of Kepler, Galileo, Huygens, and in the experimental efforts of the Royal Academy of Paris. Newton, however, carried this commitment further first by eschewing the method of hypotheses and second by displaying in his Principia and Opticks how rich a set of theoretical results can be secured through well-designed experiments and mathematical theory designed to allow inferences from phenomena. The success of those after him in building on these theoretical results completed the process of transforming natural philosophy into modern empirical science.

Newton's commitment to having phenomena decide the elements of theory required questions to be left open when no available phenomena could decide them. Newton contrasted himself most strongly with Leibniz in this regard at the end of his anonymous review of the Royal Society's report on the priority dispute over the calculus:

It must be allowed that these two Gentlemen differ very much in Philosophy. The one proceeds upon the Evidence arising from Experiments and Phenomena, and stops where such Evidence is wanting; the other is taken up with Hypotheses, and propounds them, not to be examined by Experiments, but to be believed without Examination. The one for want of Experiments to decide the Question, doth not affirm whether the Cause of Gravity be Mechanical or not Mechanical; the other that it is a perpetual Miracle if it be not Mechanical.

Newton could have said much the same about the question of what light consists of, waves or particles, for while he felt that the latter was far more probable, he saw it still not decided by any experiment or phenomenon in his lifetime. Leaving questions about the ultimate cause of gravity and the constitution of light open was the other factor in his work driving a wedge between natural philosophy and empirical science.

The many other areas of Newton's intellectual endeavors made less of a difference to eighteenth century philosophy and science. In mathematics, Newton was the first to develop a full range of algorithms for symbolically determining what we now call integrals and derivatives, but he subsequently became fundamentally opposed to the idea, championed by Leibniz, of transforming mathematics into a discipline grounded in symbol manipulation. Newton thought the only way of rendering limits rigorous lay in extending geometry to incorporate them, a view that went entirely against the tide in the development of mathematics in the eighteenth and nineteenth ceturies. In chemistry Newton conducted a vast array of experiments, but the experimental tradition coming out of his Opticks , and not his experiments in chemistry, lay behind Lavoisier calling himself a Newtonian; indeed, one must wonder whether Lavoisier would even have associated his new form of chemistry with Newton had he been aware of Newton's fascination with writings in the alchemical tradition. And even in theology, there is Newton the anti-Trinitarian mild heretic who was not that much more radical in his departures from Roman and Anglican Christianity than many others at the time, and Newton, the wild religious zealot predicting the end of the Earth, who did not emerge to public view until quite recently.

There is surprisingly little cross-referencing of themes from one area of Newton's endeavors to another. The common element across almost all of them is that of a problem-solver extraordinaire , taking on one problem at a time and staying with it until he had found, usually rather promptly, a solution. All of his technical writings display this, but so too does his unpublished manuscript reconstructing Solomon's Temple from the biblical account of it and his posthumously published Chronology of the Ancient Kingdoms in which he attempted to infer from astronomical phenomena the dating of major events in the Old Testament. The Newton one encounters in his writings seems to compartmentalize his interests at any given moment. Whether he had a unified conception of what he was up to in all his intellectual efforts, and if so what this conception might be, has been a continuing source of controversy among Newton scholars.

Of course, were it not for the Principia , there would be no entry at all for Newton in an Encyclopedia of Philosophy. In science, he would have been known only for the contributions he made to optics, which, while notable, were no more so than those made by Huygens and Grimaldi, neither of whom had much impact on philosophy; and in mathematics, his failure to publish would have relegated his work to not much more than a footnote to the achievements of Leibniz and his school. Regardless of which aspect of Newton's endeavors “Newtonian” might be applied to, the word gained its aura from the Principia . But this adds still a further complication, for the Principia itself was substantially different things to different people. The press-run of the first edition (estimated to be around 300) was too small for it to have been read by all that many individuals. The second edition also appeared in two pirated Amsterdam editions, and hence was much more widely available, as was the third edition and its English (and later French) translation. The Principia , however, is not an easy book to read, so one must still ask, even of those who had access to it, whether they read all or only portions of the book and to what extent they grasped the full complexity of what they read. The detailed commentary provided in the three volume Jesuit edition (1739–42) made the work less daunting. But even then the vast majority of those invoking the word “Newtonian” were unlikely to have been much more conversant with the Principia itself than those in the first half of the 20th century who invoked ‘relativity’ were likely to have read Einstein's two special relativity papers of 1905 or his general relativity paper of 1916. An important question to ask of any philosophers commenting on Newton is, what primary sources had they read?

The 1740s witnessed a major transformation in the standing of the science in the Principia . The Principia itself had left a number of loose-ends, most of them detectable by only highly discerning readers. By 1730, however, some of these loose-ends had been cited in Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle's elogium for Newton [ 4 ] and in John Machin's appendix to the 1729 English translation of the Principia , raising questions about just how secure Newton's theory of gravity was, empirically. The shift on the continent began in the 1730s when Maupertuis convinced the Royal Academy to conduct expeditions to Lapland and Peru to determine whether Newton's claims about the non-spherical shape of the Earth and the variation of surface gravity with latitude are correct. Several of the loose-ends were successfully resolved during the 1740's through such notable advances beyond the Principia as Clairaut's Théorie de la Figure de la Terre ; the return of the expedition from Peru; d'Alembert's 1749 rigid-body solution for the wobble of the Earth that produces the precession of the equinoxes; Clairaut's 1749 resolution of the factor of 2 discrepancy between theory and observation in the mean motion of the lunar apogee, glossed over by Newton but emphasized by Machin; and the prize-winning first ever successful description of the motion of the Moon by Tobias Mayer in 1753, based on a theory of this motion derived from gravity by Euler in the early 1750s taking advantage of Clairaut's solution for the mean motion of the apogee.

Euler was the central figure in turning the three laws of motion put forward by Newton in the Principia into Newtonian mechanics. These three laws, as Newton formulated them, apply to “point-masses,” a term Euler had put forward in his Mechanica of 1736. Most of the effort of eighteenth century mechanics was devoted to solving problems of the motion of rigid bodies, elastic strings and bodies, and fluids, all of which require principles beyond Newton's three laws. From the 1740s on this led to alternative approaches to formulating a general mechanics, employing such different principles as the conservation of vis viva , the principle of least action, and d'Alembert's principle. The “Newtonian” formulation of a general mechanics sprang from Euler's proposal in 1750 that Newton's second law, in an F=ma formulation that appears nowhere in the Principia , could be applied locally within bodies and fluids to yield differential equations for the motions of bodies, elastic and rigid, and fluids. During the 1750s Euler developed his equations for the motion of fluids, and in the 1760s, his equations of rigid-body motion. What we call Newtonian mechanics was accordingly something for which Euler was more responsible than Newton.

Although some loose-ends continued to defy resolution until much later in the eighteenth century, by the early 1750s Newton's theory of gravity had become the accepted basis for ongoing research among almost everyone working in orbital astronomy. Clairaut's successful prediction of the month of return of Halley's comet at the end of this decade made a larger segment of the educated public aware of the extent to which empirical grounds for doubting Newton's theory of gravity had largely disappeared. Even so, one must still ask of anyone outside active research in gravitational astronomy just how aware they were of the developments from ongoing efforts when they made their various pronouncements about the standing of the science of the Principia among the community of researchers. The naivety of these pronouncements cuts both ways: on the one hand, they often reflected a bloated view of how secure Newton's theory was at the time, and, on the other, they often underestimated how strong the evidence favoring it had become. The upshot is a need to be attentive to the question of what anyone, even including Newton himself, had in mind when they spoke of the science of the Principia .

To view the seventy years of research after Newton died as merely tying up the loose-ends of the Principia or as simply compiling more evidence for his theory of gravity is to miss the whole point. Research predicated on Newton's theory had answered a huge number of questions about the world dating from long before it. The motion of the Moon and the trajectories of comets were two early examples, both of which answered such questions as how one comet differs from another and what details make the Moon's motion so much more complicated than that of the satellites of Jupiter and Saturn. In the 1770s Laplace had developed a proper theory of the tides, reaching far beyond the suggestions Newton had made in the Principia by including the effects of the Earth's rotation and the non-radial components of the gravitational forces of the Sun and Moon, components that dominate the radial component that Newton had singled out. In 1786 Laplace identified a large 900 year fluctuation in the motions of Jupiter and Saturn arising from quite subtle features of their respective orbits. With this discovery, calculation of the motion of the planets from the theory of gravity became the basis for predicting planet positions, with observation serving primarily to identify further forces not yet taken into consideration in the calculation. These advances in our understanding of planetary motion led Laplace to produce the four principal volumes of his Traité de mécanique céleste from 1799 to 1805, a work collecting in one place all the theoretical and empirical results of the research predicated on Newton's Principia . From that time forward, Newtonian science sprang from Laplace's work, not Newton's.

The success of the research in celestial mechanics predicated on the Principia was unprecedented. Nothing of comparable scope and accuracy had ever occurred before in empirical research of any kind. That led to a new philosophical question: what was it about the science of the Principia that enabled it to achieve what it did? Philosophers like Locke and Berkeley began asking this question while Newton was still alive, but it gained increasing force as successes piled on one another over the decades after he died. This question had a practical side, as those working in other fields like chemistry pursued comparable success, and others like Hume and Adam Smith aimed for a science of human affairs. It had, of course, a philosophical side, giving rise to the subdiscipline of philosophy of science, starting with Kant and continuing throughout the nineteenth century as other areas of physical science began showing similar signs of success. The Einsteinian revolution in the beginning of the twentieth century, in which Newtonian theory was shown to hold only as a limiting case of the special and general theories of relativity, added a further twist to the question, for now all the successes of Newtonian science, which still remain in place, have to be seen as predicated on a theory that holds only to high approximation in parochial circumstances.

The extraordinary character of the Principia gave rise to a still continuing tendency to place great weight on everything Newton said. This, however, was, and still is, easy to carry to excess. One need look no further than Book 2 of the Principia to see that Newton had no more claim to being somehow in tune with nature and the truth than any number of his contemporaries. Newton's manuscripts do reveal an exceptional level of attention to detail of phrasing, from which we can rightly conclude that his pronouncements, especially in print, were generally backed by careful, self-critical reflection. But this conclusion does not automatically extend to every statement he ever made. We must constantly be mindful of the possibility of too much weight being placed, then or now, on any pronouncement that stands in relative isolation over his 60 year career; and, to counter the tendency to excess, we should be even more vigilant than usual in not losing sight of the context, circumstantial as well as historical and textual, of both Newton's statements and the eighteenth century reaction to them.

• Westfall, Richard S., 1980, Never At Rest: A Biography of Isaac Newton , New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Hall, A. Rupert, 1992 , Isaac Newton: Adventurer in Thought , Oxford: Blackwell.
• Feingold, Mordechai, 2004 , The Newtonian Moment: Isaac Newton and the Making of Modern Culture , Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Iliffe, Rob, 2007, Newton: A Very Short Introduction Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Cohen, I. B. and Smith, G. E., 2002, The Cambridge Companion to Newton , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Cohen, I. B. and Westfall, R. S., 1995, Newton: Texts, Backgrounds, and Commentaries , A Norton Critical Edition, New York: Norton.

How to cite this entry . Preview the PDF version of this entry at the Friends of the SEP Society . Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry at the Internet Philosophy Ontology Project (InPhO). Enhanced bibliography for this entry at PhilPapers , with links to its database.

• MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive
• The Newton Project
• The Newton Project-Canada
• The Chymistry of Isaac Newton , Digital Library at Indiana

Copernicus, Nicolaus | Descartes, René | Kant, Immanuel | Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm | Newton, Isaac: Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica | scientific revolutions | trinity | Whewell, William

Copyright © 2007 by George Smith < george . smith @ tufts . edu >

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I  INTRODUCTION

Newton, Sir Isaac (1642-1727), mathematician and physicist, one of the foremost scientific intellects of all time. Born at Woolsthorpe, near Grantham in Lincolnshire, where he attended school, he entered Cambridge University in 1661; he was elected a Fellow of Trinity College in 1667, and Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in 1669. He remained at the university, lecturing in most years, until 1696. Of these Cambridge years, in which Newton was at the height of his creative power, he singled out 1665-1666 (spent largely in Lincolnshire because of plague in Cambridge) as “the prime of my age for invention”. During two to three years of intense mental effort he prepared  Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica  ( Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy ) commonly known as the  Principia,  although this was not published until 1687.

As a firm opponent of the attempt by King James II to make the universities into Catholic institutions, Newton was elected Member of Parliament for the University of Cambridge to the Convention Parliament of 1689, and sat again in 1701-1702. Meanwhile, in 1696 he had moved to London as Warden of the Royal Mint. He became Master of the Mint in 1699, an office he retained to his death. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1671, and in 1703 he became President, being annually re-elected for the rest of his life. His major work,  Opticks,  appeared the next year; he was knighted in Cambridge in 1705.

As Newtonian science became increasingly accepted on the Continent, and especially after a general peace was restored in 1714, following the War of the Spanish Succession, Newton became the most highly esteemed natural philosopher in Europe. His last decades were passed in revising his major works, polishing his studies of ancient history, and defending himself against critics, as well as carrying out his official duties. Newton was modest, diffident, and a man of simple tastes. He was angered by criticism or opposition, and harboured resentment; he was harsh towards enemies but generous to friends. In government, and at the Royal Society, he proved an able administrator. He never married and lived modestly, but was buried with great pomp in Westminster Abbey.

Newton has been regarded for almost 300 years as the founding examplar of modern physical science, his achievements in experimental investigation being as innovative as those in mathematical research. With equal, if not greater, energy and originality he also plunged into chemistry, the early history of Western civilization, and theology; among his special studies was an investigation of the form and dimensions, as described in the Bible, of Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem.

In 1664, while still a student, Newton read recent work on optics and light by the English physicists Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke; he also studied both the mathematics and the physics of the French philosopher and scientist René Descartes. He investigated the refraction of light by a glass prism; developing over a few years a series of increasingly elaborate, refined, and exact experiments, Newton discovered measurable, mathematical patterns in the phenomenon of colour. He found white light to be a mixture of infinitely varied coloured rays (manifest in the rainbow and the spectrum), each ray definable by the angle through which it is refracted on entering or leaving a given transparent medium. He correlated this notion with his study of the interference colours of thin films (for example, of oil on water, or soap bubbles), using a simple technique of extreme acuity to measure the thickness of such films. He held that light consisted of streams of minute particles. From his experiments he could infer the magnitudes of the transparent “corpuscles” forming the surfaces of bodies, which, according to their dimensions, so interacted with white light as to reflect, selectively, the different observed colours of those surfaces.

The roots of these unconventional ideas were with Newton by about 1668; when first expressed (tersely and partially) in public in 1672 and 1675, they provoked hostile criticism, mainly because colours were thought to be modified forms of homogeneous white light. Doubts, and Newton’s rejoinders, were printed in the learned journals. Notably, the scepticism of Christiaan Huygens and the failure of the French physicist Edmé Mariotte to duplicate Newton’s refraction experiments in 1681 set scientists on the Continent against him for a generation. The publication of  Opticks,  largely written by 1692, was delayed by Newton until the critics were dead. The book was still imperfect: the colours of diffraction defeated Newton. Nevertheless,  Opticks  established itself, from about 1715, as a model of the interweaving of theory with quantitative experimentation.

III  MATHEMATICS

In mathematics too, early brilliance appeared in Newton’s student notes. He may have learnt geometry at school, though he always spoke of himself as self-taught; certainly he advanced through studying the writings of his compatriots William Oughtred and John Wallis, and of Descartes and the Dutch school. Newton made contributions to all branches of mathematics then studied, but is especially famous for his solutions to the contemporary problems in analytical geometry of drawing tangents to curves (differentiation) and defining areas bounded by curves (integration). Not only did Newton discover that these problems were inverse to each other, but he discovered general methods of resolving problems of curvature, embraced in his “method of fluxions” and “inverse method of fluxions”, respectively equivalent to Leibniz’s later differential and integral calculus. Newton used the term “fluxion” (from Latin meaning “flow”) because he imagined a quantity “flowing” from one magnitude to another. Fluxions were expressed algebraically, as Leibniz’s differentials were, but Newton made extensive use also (especially in the  Principia ) of analogous geometrical arguments. Late in life, Newton expressed regret for the algebraic style of recent mathematical progress, preferring the geometrical method of the Classical Greeks, which he regarded as clearer and more rigorous.

Newton’s work on pure mathematics was virtually hidden from all but his correspondents until 1704, when he published, with  Opticks , a tract on the quadrature of curves (integration) and another on the classification of the cubic curves. His Cambridge lectures, delivered from about 1673 to 1683, were published in 1707.

The Calculus Priority Dispute

Newton had the essence of the methods of fluxions by 1666. The first to become known, privately, to other mathematicians, in 1668, was his method of integration by infinite series. In Paris in 1675 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz independently evolved the first ideas of his differential calculus, outlined to Newton in 1677. Newton had already described some of his mathematical discoveries to Leibniz, not including his method of fluxions. In 1684 Leibniz published his first paper on calculus; a small group of mathematicians took up his ideas.

In the 1690s Newton’s friends proclaimed the priority of Newton’s methods of fluxions. Supporters of Leibniz asserted that he had communicated the differential method to Newton, although Leibniz had claimed no such thing. Newtonians then asserted, rightly, that Leibniz had seen papers of Newton’s during a London visit in 1676; in reality, Leibniz had taken no notice of material on fluxions. A violent dispute sprang up, part public, part private, extended by Leibniz to attacks on Newton’s theory of gravitation and his ideas about God and creation; it was not ended even by Leibniz’s death in 1716. The dispute delayed the reception of Newtonian science on the Continent, and dissuaded British mathematicians from sharing the researches of Continental colleagues for a century.

IV  MECHANICS AND GRAVITATION

According to the well-known story, it was on seeing an apple fall in his orchard at some time during 1665 or 1666 that Newton conceived that the same force governed the motion of the Moon and the apple. He calculated the force needed to hold the Moon in its orbit, as compared with the force pulling an object to the ground. He also calculated the centripetal force needed to hold a stone in a sling, and the relation between the length of a pendulum and the time of its swing. These early explorations were not soon exploited by Newton, though he studied astronomy and the problems of planetary motion.

Correspondence with Hooke (1679-1680) redirected Newton to the problem of the path of a body subjected to a centrally directed force that varies as the inverse square of the distance; he determined it to be an ellipse, so informing Edmond Halley in August 1684. Halley’s interest led Newton to demonstrate the relationship afresh, to compose a brief tract on mechanics, and finally to write the  Principia.

Book I of the  Principia  states the foundations of the science of mechanics, developing upon them the mathematics of orbital motion round centres of force. Newton identified gravitation as the fundamental force controlling the motions of the celestial bodies. He never found its cause. To contemporaries who found the idea of attractions across empty space unintelligible, he conceded that they might prove to be caused by the impacts of unseen particles.

Book II inaugurates the theory of fluids: Newton solves problems of fluids in movement and of motion through fluids. From the density of air he calculated the speed of sound waves.

Book III shows the law of gravitation at work in the universe: Newton demonstrates it from the revolutions of the six known planets, including the Earth, and their satellites. However, he could never quite perfect the difficult theory of the Moon’s motion. Comets were shown to obey the same law; in later editions, Newton added conjectures on the possibility of their return. He calculated the relative masses of heavenly bodies from their gravitational forces, and the oblateness of Earth and Jupiter, already observed. He explained tidal ebb and flow and the precession of the equinoxes from the forces exerted by the Sun and Moon. All this was done by exact computation.

Newton’s work in mechanics was accepted at once in Britain, and universally after half a century. Since then it has been ranked among humanity’s greatest achievements in abstract thought. It was extended and perfected by others, notably Pierre Simon de Laplace, without changing its basis and it survived into the late 19th century before it began to show signs of failing.  See  Quantum Theory; Relativity.

V  ALCHEMY AND CHEMISTRY

Newton left a mass of manuscripts on the subjects of alchemy and chemistry, then closely related topics. Most of these were extracts from books, bibliographies, dictionaries, and so on, but a few are original. He began intensive experimentation in 1669, continuing till he left Cambridge, seeking to unravel the meaning that he hoped was hidden in alchemical obscurity and mysticism. He sought understanding of the nature and structure of all matter, formed from the “solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles” that he believed God had created. Most importantly in the “Queries” appended to “Opticks” and in the essay “On the Nature of Acids” (1710), Newton published an incomplete theory of chemical force, concealing his exploration of the alchemists, which became known a century after his death.

VI  HISTORICAL AND CHRONOLOGICAL STUDIES

Newton owned more books on humanistic learning than on mathematics and science; all his life he studied them deeply. His unpublished “classical scholia”—explanatory notes intended for use in a future edition of the  Principia —reveal his knowledge of pre-Socratic philosophy; he read the Fathers of the Church even more deeply. Newton sought to reconcile Greek mythology and record with the Bible, considered the prime authority on the early history of mankind. In his work on chronology he undertook to make Jewish and pagan dates compatible, and to fix them absolutely from an astronomical argument about the earliest constellation figures devised by the Greeks. He put the fall of Troy at 904 BC, about 500 years later than other scholars; this was not well received.

VII  RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS AND PERSONALITY

Newton also wrote on Judaeo-Christian prophecy, whose decipherment was essential, he thought, to the understanding of God. His book on the subject, which was reprinted well into the Victorian Age, represented lifelong study. Its message was that Christianity went astray in the 4th century AD, when the first Council of Nicaea propounded erroneous doctrines of the nature of Christ. The full extent of Newton’s unorthodoxy was recognized only in the present century: but although a critic of accepted Trinitarian dogmas and the Council of Nicaea, he possessed a deep religious sense, venerated the Bible and accepted its account of creation. In late editions of his scientific works he expressed a strong sense of God’s providential role in nature.

VIII  PUBLICATIONS

Newton published an edition of  Geographia generalis  by the German geographer Varenius in 1672. His own letters on optics appeared in print from 1672 to 1676. Then he published nothing until the  Principia  (published in Latin in 1687; revised in 1713 and 1726; and translated into English in 1729). This was followed by  Opticks  in 1704; a revised edition in Latin appeared in 1706. Posthumously published writings include  The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended  (1728),  The System of the World  (1728), the first draft of Book III of the  Principia , and  Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St John  (1733).

Contributed By: Alfred Rupert Hall

“Sir Isaac Newton” Microsoft® Encarta®. Copyright © 1998 Microsoft Corporation.

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 MacTutor

Isaac newton.

Threatening my father and mother Smith to burn them and the house over them.

... setting my heart on money, learning, and pleasure more than Thee ...

... changed his mind when he read that parallelograms upon the same base and between the same parallels are equal.

Thus Wallis doth it, but it may be done thus ...

[ Newton ] brought me the other day some papers, wherein he set down methods of calculating the dimensions of magnitudes like that of Mr Mercator concerning the hyperbola, but very general; as also of resolving equations; which I suppose will please you; and I shall send you them by the next.

... having no more acquaintance with him I did not think it becoming to urge him to communicate anything.

• investigations of the colours of thin sheets
• 'Newton's rings' and
• diffraction of light.

... that the Attraction always is in a duplicate proportion to the Distance from the Center Reciprocall ...

After his 1679 correspondence with Hooke , Newton, by his own account, found a proof that Kepler's areal law was a consequence of centripetal forces, and he also showed that if the orbital curve is an ellipse under the action of central forces then the radial dependence of the force is inverse square with the distance from the centre.

... asked Newton what orbit a body followed under an inverse square force, and Newton replied immediately that it would be an ellipse. However in 'De Motu..' he only gave a proof of the converse theorem that if the orbit is an ellipse the force is inverse square. The proof that inverse square forces imply conic section orbits is sketched in Cor. 1 to Prop. 13 in Book 1 of the second and third editions of the 'Principia', but not in the first edition.

... all matter attracts all other matter with a force proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.

Be courageous and steady to the Laws and you cannot fail.

Newton was of the most fearful, cautious and suspicious temper that I ever knew.

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• V Vita, The theory of conics in Newton's 'Principia' ( Italian ) , Archimede 30 (3) (1978) , 130 - 141 .
• Th von Kármán, Isaac Newton and aerodynamics, J. Aeronaut. Sci. 9 (1942) , 521 - 522 .
• O U Vonwiller, Galileo and Newton : their times and ours, J. Proc. Roy. Soc. New South Wales 76 (1943) , 316 - 328 .
• C B Waff, Isaac Newton, the motion of the lunar apogee, and the establishment of the inverse square law, Vistas Astronom. 20 (1 - 2) (1976) , 99 - 103 .
• W A Wallace, Newton's early writings : beginnings of a new direction, in Newton and the new direction in science ( Vatican City, 1988) , 23 - 44 .
• R Weinstock, Newton's 'Principia' and inverse-square orbits : the flaw reexamined, Historia Math. 19 (1) (1992) , 60 - 70 .
• R Weinstock, Long-buried dismantling of a centuries-old myth : Newton's 'Principia' and inverse-square orbits, Amer. J. Phys. 57 (9) (1989) , 846 - 849 .
• R Weinstock, Newton's 'Principia' and the external gravitational field of a spherically symmetric mass distribution, Amer. J. Phys. 52 (10) (1984) , 883 - 890 .
• R Weinstock, Dismantling a centuries-old myth : Newton's 'Principia' and inverse-square orbits, Amer. J. Phys. 50 (7) (1982) , 610 - 617 .
• R S Westfall, Technical Newton : Reviews of five books on Newton's dynamics, Isis 87 (4) (1996) , 701 - 706 .
• R S Westfall, The achievement of Isaac Newton : an essay on the occasion of the three hundredth anniversary of the 'Principia', Math. Intelligencer 9 (4) (1987) , 45 - 49 .
• R S Westfall, Newton and the acceleration of gravity, Arch. Hist. Exact Sci. 35 (3) (1986) , 255 - 272 .
• R S Westfall, Newton's marvelous years of discovery and their aftermath : myth versus manuscript, Isis 71 (256) (1980) , 109 - 121 .
• R S Westfall, A note on Newton's demonstration of motion in ellipses, Arch. Internat. Histoire Sci. 22 (86 - 87) (1969) , 51 - 60 .
• R S Westfall, Huygens' rings and Newton's rings : Periodicity and seventeenth century optics, Ratio 10 (1968) , 64 - 77 .
• D T Whiteside, The mathematical principles underlying Newton's Principia, Journal for the History of Astronomy 1 (1970) , 118 - 119 .
• D T Whiteside, How forceful has a force proof to be? Newton's 'Principia', Book 1 : Corollary 1 to Propositions 11 - 13 , Physis Riv. Internaz. Storia Sci. ( N.S. ) 28 (3) (1991) , 727 - 749 .
• D T Whiteside, Newton the mathematician, in Contemporary Newtonian research ( Dordrecht-Boston, Mass., 1982) , 109 - 127 .
• D T Whiteside, Kepler, Newton and Flamsteed on refraction through a 'regular aire' : the mathematical and the practical, Centaurus 24 (1980) , 288 - 315 .
• D T Whiteside, Newton and dynamics, Bull. Inst. Math. Appl. 13 (9 - 10) (1977) , 214 - 220 .
• D T Whiteside, Newton's lunar theory : from high hope to disenchantment, Vistas Astronom. 19 (4) (1975 / 76) , 317 - 328 .
• D T Whiteside, The mathematical principles underlying Newton's 'Principia mathematica', J. Hist. Astronom. 1 (2) (1970) , 116 - 138 .
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• G J Whitrow, Newton's role in the history of mathematics, Notes and Records Roy. Soc. London 43 (1) (1989) , 71 - 92 .
• E T Whittaker, Aristotle, Newton, Einstein, Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh Sect. A. 61 (1942) , 231 - 246 .
• E T Whittaker, Aristotle, Newton, Einstein, Philos. Mag. (7) 34 (1943) , 266 - 280 .
• A J Wojtcuk, Newton's childhood, in Newton and the new direction in science ( Vatican City, 1988) , 261 - 264 .
• H Wussing, Isaac Newton - Leben und Werk, NTM Schr. Geschichte Natur. Tech. Medizin 15 (1) (1978) , 71 - 80 .
• I M Yaglom, Why was higher mathematics simultaneously discovered by Newton and Leibniz? ( Russian ) , in Number and thought 6 ( Moscow, 1983) , 99 - 125 .
• K N Yan, A re-examination into Newton's definition of mass and Mach's criticism, Historia Sci. 40 (1990) , 29 - 40 .
• K N Yan, On Isaac Newton's ideas of gravitation and God, Historia Sci. 34 (1988) , 43 - 56 .
• A P Youschkevitch, Newton and the mathematical natural sciences ( on the 300 th anniversary of the 'Principia' ) ( Russian ) , Mat. v Shkole (1) (1988) , 64 - 67 .
• A P Youschkevitch, Comparaison des conceptions de Leibniz et de Newton sur le calcul infinitésimal, in Leibniz in Paris (1672 - 1676) ( Wiesbaden, 1978) , 69 - 80 .
• M Yurkina, Newton's 'Principia' and the origin of the modern theory of the shape of the Earth ( Russian ) , Istor.-Astronom. Issled. 20 (1988) , 56 - 63 .

Additional Resources ( show )

Other pages about Isaac Newton:

• John Maynard Keynes' Newton the Man
• Newton's Arian beliefs
• Flamsteed v Newton
• Charles Bossut on Leibniz and Newton
• Newton's Principia Preface
• John Collins meets Isaac Newton
• Julian and Gregorian calendars
• Newton-Raphson method
• Woolsthorpe Manor
• The title page of Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica ( The Principia 1687)
• The title page of Analysis per quantitatum series fluxiones (1711)
• Isaac Newton by his contemporaries
• Multiple entries in The Mathematical Gazetteer of the British Isles ,
• Astronomy: The Reaches of the Milky Way
• Astronomy: The Dynamics of the Solar System
• Henry Taylor on Isaac Newton
• Miller's postage stamps
• Heinz Klaus Strick biography

Other websites about Isaac Newton:

• Dictionary of Scientific Biography
• Dictionary of National Biography
• Encyclopaedia Britannica
• The Newton Project ( UK )
• The Galileo Project
• G Don Allen
• Sci Hi blog
• A Google doodle
• Kevin Brown ( More about Newton's birthday )
• Mathematical Genealogy Project
• MathSciNet Author profile

Honours ( show )

Honours awarded to Isaac Newton

• Lucasian Professor 1669
• Fellow of the Royal Society 1672
• President of the Royal Society 1703 - 1727
• Lunar features Crater Newton
• Paris street names Rue Newton (16 th Arrondissement )
• Popular biographies list Number 3
• Google doodle 2010

Cross-references ( show )

• History Topics: A brief history of cosmology
• History Topics: A chronology of π
• History Topics: A history of the calculus
• History Topics: A history of time: 20 th century time
• History Topics: A history of time: Classical time
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Isaac Newton: The man who discovered gravity

A genius with dark secrets.

Isaac Newton changed the way we understand the Universe. Revered in his own lifetime, he discovered the laws of gravity and motion and invented calculus. He helped to shape our rational world view.

But Newton’s story is also one of a monstrous ego who believed that he alone was able to understand God’s creation. His private life was far from rational – consumed by petty jealousies, bitter rivalries and a ruthless quest for reputation.

New ideas lead to a revolutionary new telescope

Newton continued to experiment in his laboratory. This mix of theory and practice led him to many different kinds of discoveries.

His theory of optics made him reconsider the design of the telescope, which up until this point was a large, cumbersome instrument. By using mirrors instead of lenses, Newton was able to create a more powerful instrument, 10 times smaller than traditional telescopes. When the Royal Society heard about Newton’s telescope they were impressed. This gave Newton the courage to tell them what he described as a ‘crucial experiment’ about light and colours.

Watch this clip to find out how Newton's telescope works. Clip from Isaac Newton: The Last Magician (BBC Two).

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Isaac Newton

By: History.com Editors

Updated: October 16, 2023 | Original: March 10, 2015

Isaac Newton is best know for his theory about the law of gravity, but his “Principia Mathematica” (1686) with its three laws of motion greatly influenced the Enlightenment in Europe. Born in 1643 in Woolsthorpe, England, Sir Isaac Newton began developing his theories on light, calculus and celestial mechanics while on break from Cambridge University. 

Years of research culminated with the 1687 publication of “Principia,” a landmark work that established the universal laws of motion and gravity. Newton’s second major book, “Opticks,” detailed his experiments to determine the properties of light. Also a student of Biblical history and alchemy, the famed scientist served as president of the Royal Society of London and master of England’s Royal Mint until his death in 1727.

Isaac Newton: Early Life and Education

Isaac Newton was born on January 4, 1643, in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England. The son of a farmer who died three months before he was born, Newton spent most of his early years with his maternal grandmother after his mother remarried. His education was interrupted by a failed attempt to turn him into a farmer, and he attended the King’s School in Grantham before enrolling at the University of Cambridge’s Trinity College in 1661.

Newton studied a classical curriculum at Cambridge, but he became fascinated by the works of modern philosophers such as René Descartes, even devoting a set of notes to his outside readings he titled “Quaestiones Quaedam Philosophicae” (“Certain Philosophical Questions”). When the Great Plague shuttered Cambridge in 1665, Newton returned home and began formulating his theories on calculus, light and color, his farm the setting for the supposed falling apple that inspired his work on gravity.

Isaac Newton’s Telescope and Studies on Light

Newton returned to Cambridge in 1667 and was elected a minor fellow. He constructed the first reflecting telescope in 1668, and the following year he received his Master of Arts degree and took over as Cambridge’s Lucasian Professor of Mathematics. Asked to give a demonstration of his telescope to the Royal Society of London in 1671, he was elected to the Royal Society the following year and published his notes on optics for his peers.

Through his experiments with refraction, Newton determined that white light was a composite of all the colors on the spectrum, and he asserted that light was composed of particles instead of waves. His methods drew sharp rebuke from established Society member Robert Hooke, who was unsparing again with Newton’s follow-up paper in 1675. 

Known for his temperamental defense of his work, Newton engaged in heated correspondence with Hooke before suffering a nervous breakdown and withdrawing from the public eye in 1678. In the following years, he returned to his earlier studies on the forces governing gravity and dabbled in alchemy.

Isaac Newton and the Law of Gravity

In 1684, English astronomer Edmund Halley paid a visit to the secluded Newton. Upon learning that Newton had mathematically worked out the elliptical paths of celestial bodies, Halley urged him to organize his notes. 

The result was the 1687 publication of “Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica” (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), which established the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravity. Newton’s three laws of motion state that (1) Every object in a state of uniform motion will remain in that state of motion unless an external force acts on it; (2) Force equals mass times acceleration: F=MA and (3) For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

“Principia” propelled Newton to stardom in intellectual circles, eventually earning universal acclaim as one of the most important works of modern science. His work was a foundational part of the European Enlightenment .

With his newfound influence, Newton opposed the attempts of King James II to reinstitute Catholic teachings at English Universities. King James II was replaced by his protestant daughter Mary and her husband William of Orange as part of the Glorious Revolution of 1688, and Newton was elected to represent Cambridge in Parliament in 1689. 

Newton moved to London permanently after being named warden of the Royal Mint in 1696, earning a promotion to master of the Mint three years later. Determined to prove his position wasn’t merely symbolic, Newton moved the pound sterling from the silver to the gold standard and sought to punish counterfeiters.

The death of Hooke in 1703 allowed Newton to take over as president of the Royal Society, and the following year he published his second major work, “Opticks.” Composed largely from his earlier notes on the subject, the book detailed Newton’s painstaking experiments with refraction and the color spectrum, closing with his ruminations on such matters as energy and electricity. In 1705, he was knighted by Queen Anne of England.

Isaac Newton: Founder of Calculus?

Around this time, the debate over Newton’s claims to originating the field of calculus exploded into a nasty dispute. Newton had developed his concept of “fluxions” (differentials) in the mid 1660s to account for celestial orbits, though there was no public record of his work. 

In the meantime, German mathematician Gottfried Leibniz formulated his own mathematical theories and published them in 1684. As president of the Royal Society, Newton oversaw an investigation that ruled his work to be the founding basis of the field, but the debate continued even after Leibniz’s death in 1716. Researchers later concluded that both men likely arrived at their conclusions independent of one another.

Death of Isaac Newton

Newton was also an ardent student of history and religious doctrines, and his writings on those subjects were compiled into multiple books that were published posthumously. Having never married, Newton spent his later years living with his niece at Cranbury Park near Winchester, England. He died in his sleep on March 31, 1727, and was buried in Westminster Abbey .

A giant even among the brilliant minds that drove the Scientific Revolution, Newton is remembered as a transformative scholar, inventor and writer. He eradicated any doubts about the heliocentric model of the universe by establishing celestial mechanics, his precise methodology giving birth to what is known as the scientific method. Although his theories of space-time and gravity eventually gave way to those of Albert Einstein , his work remains the bedrock on which modern physics was built.

Isaac Newton Quotes

• “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.”
• “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies but not the madness of people.”
• “What we know is a drop, what we don't know is an ocean.”
• “Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who sets the planets in motion.”
• “No great discovery was ever made without a bold guess.”

HISTORY Vault: Sir Isaac Newton: Gravity of Genius

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Isaac Newton

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• Piers Landon-Lane
• Infinity Mathematics
• July Thomas

Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) was one of the world's most famous and influential thinkers. He founded the fields of classical mechanics, optics and calculus, among other contributions to algebra and thermodynamics. His concept of a universal law--one that applies everywhere and to all things--set the bar of ambition for physicists since.

Newton held the position of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University in England, a prestigious professorship later shared by Charles Babbage, George Gabriel Stokes , and Stephen Hawking , among others.

Generalized Binomial Theorem

Newton's laws of motion, gravitation, law of cooling, work outside science and mathematics.

The binomial theorem is a formula used to expand out expressions of the form \((x + y)^{r}\).

While Blaise Pascal had already developed the binomial theorem for the case where \(r\) is a nonnegative integer, Newton derived the general case for which \(r\) could be any rational number in 1655, while spending time away from Cambridge avoiding an outbreak of the plague [1] :

\[(x+y)^r = \sum\limits_{k=0}^{r} {r \choose k} x^{r-k} y^{k},\]

where \({r \choose k} = \frac{r (r-1) (r-2) \ldots (r-k+1)}{k!}\). Notice that if \(r\) is an integer, \({r \choose k} = 0\) for \(k > r\). Then the infinite sum in the formula becomes a finite sum, and the expression reduces to the ordinary binomial theorem.

The expressions generated by these expansions were especially useful for calculating approximations of functions. Newton used the formula to calculate the value of \(\pi\) out to 16 decimal places [2] .

If the function \(f(x) = \sqrt{1 + x}\) is expanded out in terms of powers of \(x\) such that \(f(x) = \sum\limits_{k=0}^{\infty} a_{k} x^{k},\) what's the coefficient \(a_{3}\) of the \(x^{3}\) term?

Express your answer as an exact decimal.

Newton discovered three laws that combined would in principle determine the motion of any object. He published his laws in 1687 in the first volume of the Principia Mathematica (Latin for "Mathematical Principles"). These laws explain how any objects will move given the forces acting between them, and the initial position and velocity of the objects.

• First Law : An object moving at some velocity will stay at that velocity unless acted upon by some force.
• Second Law : The acceleration \(\vec{a}\) of an object is given by \(\vec{F} = m\vec{a}\), where \(m\) is its mass and \(\vec{F}\) is the net force on the object.
• Third Law : Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

\(\) Wingsuits allow humans to control fall and generate lift. The wingsuit flyer above controls his direction of flight by a direct application of which of Newton's laws?

Image credit: Wikipedia

The first law was in contrast to Aristotelian mechanics, which held that every object had a natural place, and that all objects would tend to go towards their natural place. Newton replaced this goal-centered view of the world with a mechanical, local one. The laws describe a perfectly deterministic universe, one in which the motion and behavior of all objects are theoretically exactly specified given a set of initial conditions and rules for determining the force between objects.

Because of Newton's contribution to the idea of force, the metric unit for force \(\text{N} \equiv (\text{kg}\times \text{m})/\text{s}^2\) is called the Newton.

Newton's laws of motion describe how objects accelerate given specific forces. In order to determine how the position of an object changes from a description of its acceleration, Newton needed to develop a new field of mathematics known as calculus.

Solving for the position, velocity, and acceleration of a moving particle

If a particle has a constant velocity \(v\) at time \(t\), its position at a slightly later time \(t + \Delta t\) is \(x(t) + v \Delta t\). But if the particle is accelerating, this is not quite true. The velocity changes during the period \(\Delta t\). In order to account for this, the time \(\Delta t\) could be split into two intervals, and the velocity at each of those points is used to calculate the position. But this doesn't help, as again the velocity changes between \(t\) and \(t + \frac{1}{2} \Delta t\). Thinking in this way leads to an infinite regress.

Newton introduced calculus as a way of formalizing this reasoning and allowing calculations of position and velocity by considering how these functions behaved as \(\Delta t\) became very small, otherwise known as taking the limit of the function. The process of finding velocity from acceleration or position from velocity is called integration . The process of finding velocity from position or acceleration from velocity is called differentiation .

The mathematician and philosopher Gottfried Leibniz also invented calculus around the same time. There was a large fight in the scientific community over whether Leibniz or Newton had invented it first, or indeed whether one had stolen the ideas from the other. However, the consensus now is that they genuinely did develop the idea independently. Because of this, they used different notation styles for expressing calculus, both of which are in use today. In Newton's notation, the derivative of \(x\) with respect to time is given by \(\dot{x}\), whereas in Leibniz notation, the derivative is \(\frac{dx}{dt}\).

In the third volume of the Principia , Newton described his theory of universal gravitation. His two main insights were that masses attract each other along the line between them, and that every mass attracts every other mass, no matter how large or small. For instance, the force that you exert on the Earth is the same magnitude as the force the Earth exerts on you, just in the opposite direction. Mathematically, this is expressed as

\[\vec{F}_{g} = - \frac{Gm_{1}m_{2}}{r^{2}} \hat{r},\]

where \(F_{g}\) is the force of gravity, \(G\) is the gravitational constant, \(m_1\) and \(m_2\) are the masses of the two objects, and \(\hat{r}\) is the direction of the line between them. The net gravitational force on an object is the vector sum of the forces exerted on it by all other objects in the universe.

One popular story holds that Newton came up with the idea for gravitation when he was sitting under a tree and got hit on the head by an apple. This is not well supported by historical documents, but Newton did at least use falling apples as an analogy for explaining radial forces: "Therefore does this apple fall perpendicularly or towards the centre? If matter thus draws matter, it must be proportion of its quantity. Therefore the apple draws the Earth, as well as the Earth draws the apple." [3] .

While your mass is the same everywhere, your weight , which is the gravitational force you feel as a result of your mass, depends on where you are.

How much lighter are you on the top of Mount Everest than at sea level? Express your answer as the ratio of your weight on Mount Everest to your weight at sea level, to 3 decimal places.

Assume the radius of Earth at sea level is \(6.371 \times 10^6 \text{ m} \) and the height of Mt. Everest is \(8.8 \times 10^3 \text{ m} \).

Types of conic sections

Newton showed that his law could reproduce Kepler's laws of planetary motion, which described how planets move in fixed ellipses around the sun. He then generalized these laws by showing that the paths of objects acting under the gravity of the sun could be any conic sections , including ellipses, but also parabolas , hyperbolas , and lines.

Because the law of gravitation describes a force between two objects no matter how far away they are, Leibniz accused Newton of invoking "spooky action at a distance." [4] This was against a popular philosophy of science at the time, which held that all effects needed to result from local interactions. Today, Einstein's theory of general relativity has replaced Newton's theory, in some sense proving Leibniz right. General relativity agrees with many of the predictions of Newton's theory, but doesn't have action at a distance. Gravitational effects (in the form of warped spacetime) propagate at the speed of light.

Light refracting in a prism: not just an album cover

As with his laws of motion, Newton also overturned Aristotelian beliefs about light. It was thought that white light was completely pure, but Newton showed that it was composed of every other wavelength of light by refracting white light through a prism. The white light splits into distinct beams of light corresponding to all the colors of the rainbow. Newton also invented the color wheel, which arranged all those colors in order, but with violet next to red to show the way humans perceive color:

Opticks " /> Newton's depiction of the color wheel in Opticks

Newton's law of cooling holds that the rate at which an object will change temperature is directly proportional to the temperature difference between it \((T_{obj})\) and its environment \((T_{env}):\)

\[\frac{dT_{obj}}{dt} = k (T_{env} - T_{obj}).\]

If the environment remains at constant temperature, this implies that \(T_{obj}\) will asymptotically approach \(T_{env}:\)

\[T_{obj} = T_{env} + \big(T_{obj}(0) - T_{env}\big) e^{-kt},\]

which can be shown using differential equations .

A thermometer reading \(80^\circ F\) is taken outside. Five minutes later the thermometer reads \(60^\circ F\). After another 5 minutes it reads \(50^\circ F\).

What is the temperature outside \((\)in \(^\circ F)?\)

Assume that this process follows Newton's law of cooling.

In addition to his lasting scientific discoveries, Newton also investigated alchemy, the study of turning one element into another. While the techniques that Newton investigated led nowhere, alchemy was in a sense rediscovered in the form of nuclear physics. It is now strictly possible to turn lead into gold using a particle accelerator. However, at an estimated quadrillion dollars per ounce, it would be a poor financial choice [5] .

Newton was devoutly religious and would frequently study the Bible, attempting to make predictions based on its contents. He once wrote that the world would end no sooner than the year 2060 based on the Book of John [6] .

[1] Westfall, Richard. Never at Rest: A Biography of Isaac Newton. p. 143. 1983.

[2] Newton's Generalization of the Binomial Theorem . Retrieved from http://www.wwu.edu/teachingmathhistory/docs/psfile/newton1-student.pdf on February 22, 2016.

[3] Connor, Steve. The Core of Truth Behind Sir Newton's Apple. The Independent. January 17, 2010. Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/the-core-of-truth-behind-sir-isaac-newtons-apple-1870915.html on February 22, 2016.

[4] Leibniz's Philosophy of Physics. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Published December 17. 2007. Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz-physics/ on February 22, 2016.

[5] Matson, John. Fact Or Fiction?: Lead Can Be Turned Into Gold. Scientific American. January 31, 2014. Retrieved from http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-lead-can-be-turned-into-gold/ on February 22, 2016.

[6] Newton, Sir Isaac. Sir Isaac Newton's Daniel and the Apocalypse. 1733. Retrieved from http://publicdomainreview.org/collections/sir-isaac-newtons-daniel-and-the-apocalypse-1733/ on February 22, 2016.

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Biography of Isaac Newton, Mathematician and Scientist

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Sir Isaac Newton (Jan. 4, 1643–March 31, 1727) was a superstar of physics, math, and astronomy even in his own time. He occupied the chair of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge in England, the same role later filled, centuries later, by Stephen Hawking . Newton conceived of several laws of motion , influential mathematical principals which, to this day, scientists use to explain how the universe works.

Fast Facts: Sir Isaac Newton

• Known For : Developed laws that explain how the universe works
• Born : Jan. 4, 1643 in Lincolnshire, England
• Parents : Isaac Newton, Hannah Ayscough
• Died : March 20, 1727 in Middlesex, England
• Education : Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A., 1665)
• Published Works : De Analysi per Aequationes Numero Terminorum Infinitas (1669, published 1711), Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687), Opticks (1704)
• Awards and Honors : Fellowship of the Royal Society (1672), Knight Bachelor (1705)
• Notable Quote : "If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants."

Early Years and Influences

Newton was born in 1642 in a manor house in Lincolnshire, England. His father had died two months before his birth. When Newton was 3 his mother remarried and he remained with his grandmother. He was not interested in the family farm, so he was sent to Cambridge University to study.

Newton was born just a short time after the death of  Galileo , one of the greatest scientists of all time. Galileo had proved that the planets revolve around the sun, not the earth as people thought at the time. Newton was very interested in the discoveries of Galileo and others. Newton thought the universe worked like a machine and that a few simple laws governed it. Like Galileo, he realized that mathematics was the way to explain and prove those laws.

Laws of Motion

Newton formulated laws of motion and gravitation. These laws are math formulas that explain how objects move when a force acts on them. Newton published his most famous book, "Principia," in 1687 while he was a mathematics professor at Trinity College in Cambridge. In "Principia," Newton explained three basic laws that govern the way objects move. He also described his theory of gravity, the force that causes things to fall down. Newton then used his laws to show that the planets revolve around the suns in orbits that are oval, not round.

The three laws are often called Newton’s Laws. The first law states that an object that is not being pushed or pulled by some force will stay still or will keep moving in a straight line at a steady speed. For example, if someone is riding a bike and jumps off before the bike is stopped, what happens? The bike continues on until it falls over. The tendency of an object to remain still or keep moving in a straight line at a steady speed is called inertia.

The second law explains how a force acts on an object. An object accelerates in the direction the force is moving it. If someone gets on a bike and pushes the pedals forward, the bike will begin to move. If someone gives the bike a push from behind, the bike will speed up. If the rider pushes back on the pedals, the bike will slow down. If the rider turns the handlebars, the bike will change direction.

The third law states that if an object is pushed or pulled, it will push or pull equally in the opposite direction. If someone lifts a heavy box, they use force to push it up. The box is heavy because it is producing an equal force downward on the lifter’s arms. The weight is transferred through the lifter’s legs to the floor. The floor also presses upward with an equal force. If the floor pushed back with less force, the person lifting the box would fall through the floor. If it pushed back with more force, the lifter would fly up in the air.

Importance of Gravity

When most people think of Newton, they think of him sitting under an apple tree observing an apple fall to the ground. When he saw the apple fall, Newton began to think about a specific kind of motion called gravity. Newton understood that gravity was a force of attraction between two objects. He also understood that an object with more matter or mass exerted the greater force or pulled smaller objects toward it. That meant that the large mass of the Earth pulled objects toward it. That is why the apple fell down instead of up and why people don’t float in the air.

He also thought that maybe gravity was not just limited to the Earth and the objects on the earth. What if gravity extended to the Moon and beyond? Newton calculated the force needed to keep the Moon moving around the earth. Then he compared it with the force that made the apple fall downward. After allowing for the fact that the Moon is much farther from the Earth and has a much greater mass, he discovered that the forces were the same and that the Moon is also held in orbit around Earth by the pull of earth’s gravity.

Disputes in Later Years and Death

Newton moved to London in 1696 to accept the position of warden of the Royal Mint. For many years afterward, he argued with Robert Hooke over who had actually discovered the connection between elliptical orbits and the inverse square law, a dispute that ended only with Hooke's death in 1703.

In 1705, Queen Anne bestowed a knighthood upon Newton, and thereafter he was known as Sir Isaac Newton. He continued his work, particularly in mathematics. This led to another dispute in 1709, this time with German mathematician Gottfried Leibniz. They both quarreled over which of them had invented calculus.

One reason for Newton's disputes with other scientists was his overwhelming fear of criticism, which led him to write, but then postpone publication of, his brilliant articles until after another scientist created similar work. Besides his earlier writings, "De Analysi" (which didn't see publication until 1711) and "Principia" (published in 1687), Newton's publications included "Optics" (published in 1704), "The Universal Arithmetic" (published in 1707), the "Lectiones Opticae" (published in 1729), the "Method of Fluxions" (published in 1736), and the "Geometrica Analytica" (printed in 1779).

On March 20, 1727, Newton died near London. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, the first scientist to receive this honor. 

Newton’s calculations changed the way people understood the universe. Prior to Newton, no one had been able to explain why the planets stayed in their orbits. What held them in place? People had thought that the planets were held in place by an invisible shield. Newton proved that they were held in place by the sun’s gravity and that the force of gravity was affected by distance and mass. While he was not the first person to understand that the orbit of a planet was elongated like an oval, he was the first to explain how it worked.

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7 Fascinating Facts about Sir Isaac Newton

Today we celebrate Newton’s birthday as January 4th. Originally, according to the “old” Julien calendar, he was born on Christmas Day in 1642. No matter what the case, Newton lived an amazing life. Here are a few interesting tidbits about this important figure in the scientific revolution:

Newton’s life got off to a rough start

He never knew his father Isaac, who had died months before he was born. Newton’s own chances of survival seemed slim at the beginning. He was a premature and sickly infant that some thought would not live long. Newton was dealt another difficult blow when he was only three years old. His mother, Hannah, remarried, and his new stepfather, Reverend Barnabas Smith, wanted nothing to do with Isaac. The child was raised by his maternal grandmother for many years. The loss of his mother left Newton with a lingering insecurity that followed him the rest of life.

Newton was deeply religious from a young age

He felt compelled to jot down a list of his sins in one of his notebooks. Already a student at Trinity College at Cambridge University at the time, he divided these sins into acts that happened before and after Whitsunday 1662, or the seventh Sunday after Easter. Newton took even small lapses quite seriously, such as having unclean thoughts or using the Lord’s name. The list also showed a darker side of Newton, including him making threats to burn his mother and stepfather in their home.

Newton got a career boost from the Great Plague of 1665

He completed his bachelor’s degree at Cambridge University’s Trinity College in 1665 and wanted to continue his studies, but an epidemic of the bubonic plague soon altered his plans. The university closed its doors not long after the disease had begun its deadly sweep through London. During the first seven months of the outbreak, roughly 100,000 London residents had died.

Back at his family home, Woolsthorpe Manor, Newton actually began working on some of his most important theories. It was here that he explored ideas of planetary motion and made progress on his understanding of light and color. Newton may have also made advances in his theory about gravity by observing an apple fall from a tree in his garden.

Long before his breakthrough work was published, Newton was considered one of England’s leading thinkers

He was named the Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge in 1669, taking over the post from his mentor Isaac Barrow. Later geniuses to hold this position included Charles Babbage (also known as “the father of computing”), Paul Dirac and Stephen Hawking .

Newton got into several conflicts with other scientists and mathematicians

He and Robert Hooke , a scientist perhaps best known for his microscopic experiments, had a long-lasting grudge match. Hooke thought Newton’s theory of light was wrong and denounced the physicist’s work. The pair later clashed over planetary motion with Hooke claiming that Newton had taken some of his work and included it in Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica .

Newton also argued with German mathematician Gottfried Leibniz over who discovered infinitesimal calculus first. Leibniz claimed that Newton had stolen his ideas. The Royal Society launched an investigation into the matter in 1712. With Newton as the president of the society since 1703, it was no surprise that the organization favored Newton in its findings. It was later determined that the two mathematicians had probably made their discoveries independent of each other.

In his later life, Newton enjoyed a political career

He was elected to Parliament as a representative for Cambridge in 1689 and returned to Parliament from 1701 to 1702. Newton was also active in the economic life of his country. In 1696, he was appointed Warden of the Royal Mint. Newton became the master of the mint three years later and actually changed the English pound from a sterling to gold standard.

Newton was given a send-off fit for a king

He was a famous and wealthy man at the time of his death in 1727, and he was mourned by the nation. His body lay in state in Westminister Abbey, and the Lord Chancellor was one of his pallbearers. Newton was laid to rest in the famed abbey, which also hosts the remains of such monarchs as Elizabeth I and Charles II . His elaborate tomb stands in the abbey’s nave and features a sculpture of reclining Newton with an arm resting on a stack of his great printed works. Other scientists, such as Charles Darwin , were later buried near Newton. The Latin inscription on the tomb praises him for possessing “a strength of mind almost, and mathematical principles peculiarly his own,” according to the official Westminister Abbey website.

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