Isaac Newton

Isaac Newton

Created by :
Siri Konglok No. 31 M. 3/9

Content

Preface
Introduction
Biography
Spiritual belief
Some pictures of spiritual activities
Reference

Preface

Since the ancients esteemed the science of mechanics of
greatest importance in the investigation of natural things, and
the moderns, rejecting substantial forms and occult qualities,
have endeavoured to subject the phenomena of nature to the
laws of mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated
mathematics as far as it relates to natural philosophy. The
ancients considered mechanics in a twofold respect; as rational,
which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and practical. To
practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from which
mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with
perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so
distinguished from geometry that what is perfectly accurate is
called geometrical; what is less so, is called mechanical.
However, the errors are not in the art, but in the artificers. He
that works with less accuracy is an imperfect mechanic; and if
any could work with perfect accuracy he would be the most
perfect mechanic of all.

He consider natural philosophy rather than arts and write not
concerning manual but natural powers, and consider chiefly
those things which relate to gravity, levity, elastic force, the
resistance of fluids, and the like forces, whether attractive or
impulsive; and therefore I offer this work as the mathematical
principles of natural philosophy, for the whole burden of
philosophy seems to consist in this – from the phenomena of
motions to investigate the forces of nature, and then from these
forces to demonstrate the other phenomena.

I wish we could derive the phenomena of Nature from
mechanical principles, for I am induced by many reasons to
suspect that they all may depend upon certain forces by which
the particles of bodies, by some causes hitherto unknown, are
either mutually impelled towards one another, and cohere in
regular figures, or are repelled and recede from one another.
These forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto
attempted the search of Nature in vain; but I hope the principles
here laid down will afford some light either to this or some truer
method of natural philosophy.

Introduction

The Principia , arguably the most important book published in
modern European history, began by offering the reader three
basic principles, which have come to be known as Newton’s
three laws of motion:

1. Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform
motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that
state by forces impressed upon it.

2. The change in motion is proportional to the motive force
impressed, and is made in the direction of the straight line in
which that force is impressed.

3. To every action there is always an equal reaction. Even today,
these three laws are the basic axioms on which physics rests, and
the first principles that every high school physics student learns.

From this opening, Newton proceeded to the meat of his book,
the principle of gravitation and its role in the solar system. He
showed how his inverse square law worked perfectly with
Kepler’s elliptical orbits; how planets are deflected into orbit
around the sun by the pull of the sun’s gravity, and how the
same principle can be used to explain the orbit of the moon and
of Jupiter’s moons; he demonstrated that Descartes’ theory of
vortices lacked the same explanatory power. Working from
Halley’s research on the subject, he declared that comets
transcribed orbits around the sun just as planets did; he
calculated the mass of each planet; he used the pull of the sun’s
gravity to account for the flattening of the Earth at the poles
and the bulge at the equator; he used the gravitational pull of the
moon and sun to explain the ocean tides. In his account, the
entire universe was held together in a web of gravitational pulls,
acting on every star, planet, moon and comet; thus Newton
rendered the whole universe explainable by a law–subject to the
insight of mathematics and the human mind.

I have found some quotes from Isaac Newton’s Principia
Mathematica which I will list below.

“ …from the same principles, I now demonstrate the frame of the System of
the World.

“ Hypotheses non fingo. I feign no hypotheses.

“ The description of right lines and circles, upon which geometry is founded,
belongs to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but
requires them to be drawn.

“ I will not define time, space, place and motion, as being well known to all.

“ Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but requires them to be
drawn; for it requires that the learner should first be taught to describe these
accurately, before he enters upon geometry; then it shows how by these
operations problems may be solved.

“ We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both
true and sufficient to explain their appearances.

“ I have not as yet been able to discover the reason for these properties of
gravity from phenomena, and I do not feign hypotheses.

Biography

Isaac Newton was a physicist and mathematician who developed
the principles of modern physics, including the laws of motion
and is credited as one of the great minds of the 17th-century
Scientific Revolution.

In 1687, he published his most acclaimed work, Philosophiae
Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural
Philosophy), which has been called the single most influential
book on physics. In 1705, he was knighted by Queen Anne of
England, making him Sir Isaac Newton.

About his early life and family, Newton was born on January 4,
1643, in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England. Using the "old"
Julian calendar, Newton's birth date is sometimes displayed as
December 25, 1642.

Newton was the only son of a prosperous local farmer, also
named Isaac, who died three months before he was born. A
premature baby born tiny and weak, Newton was not expected
to survive.

When he was 3 years old, his mother, Hannah Ayscough
Newton, remarried a well-to-do minister, Barnabas Smith, and
went to live with him, leaving young Newton with his maternal
grandmother.

When it turns to his education, Newton was enrolled at the
King's School in Grantham, a town in Lincolnshire, where he
lodged with a local apothecary and was introduced to the
fascinating world of chemistry.

His mother pulled him out of school at age 12. Her plan was to
make him a farmer and have him tend the farm. Newton failed
miserably, as he found farming monotonous. Newton was soon
sent back to King's School to finish his basic education.

Perhaps sensing the young man's innate intellectual abilities, his
uncle, a graduate of the University of Cambridge's Trinity
College, persuaded Newton's mother to have him enter the
university. Newton enrolled in a program similar to a work-study
in 1661, and subsequently waited on tables and took care of
wealthier students' rooms.

Another topic is about his scientific revolution. When Newton
arrived at Cambridge, the Scientific Revolution of the 17th
century was already in full force. The heliocentric view of the
universe—theorized by astronomers Nicolaus Copernicus and
Johannes Kepler, and later refined by Galileo—was well known
in most European academic circles.

Philosopher René Descartes had begun to formulate a new
concept of nature as an intricate, impersonal and inert machine.
Yet, like most universities in Europe, Cambridge was steeped in
Aristotelian philosophy and a view of nature resting on a
geocentric view of the universe, dealing with nature in qualitative
rather than quantitative terms.

During his first three years at Cambridge, Newton was taught
the standard curriculum but was fascinated with the more
advanced science. All his spare time was spent reading from the
modern philosophers. The result was a less-than-stellar
performance, but one that is understandable, given his dual
course of study.

It was during this time that Newton kept a second set of notes,
entitled "Quaestiones Quaedam Philosophicae" ("Certain
Philosophical Questions"). The "Quaestiones" reveal that
Newton had discovered the new concept of nature that
provided the framework for the Scientific Revolution. Though
Newton graduated without honors or distinctions, his efforts
won him the title of scholar and four years of financial support
for future education.

In 1665, the bubonic plague that was ravaging Europe had come
to Cambridge, forcing the university to close. After a two-year
hiatus, Newton returned to Cambridge in 1667 and was elected
a minor fellow at Trinity College, as he was still not considered a
standout scholar.

In the ensuing years, his fortune improved. Newton received his
Master of Arts degree in 1669, before he was 27. During this
time, he came across Nicholas Mercator's published book on
methods for dealing with infinite series.

Newton quickly wrote a treatise, De Analysi, expounding his own
wider-ranging results. He shared this with friend and mentor
Isaac Barrow, but didn't include his name as author.

In June 1669, Barrow shared the unaccredited manuscript with
British mathematician John Collins. In August 1669, Barrow
identified its author to Collins as "Mr. Newton ... very young ...
but of an extraordinary genius and proficiency in these things."

Newton's work was brought to the attention of the mathematics
community for the first time. Shortly afterward, Barrow resigned
his Lucasian professorship at Cambridge, and Newton assumed
the chair.

Let’s turn to Issac Newton’s discoveries, Newton made
discoveries in optics, motion and mathematics. Newton
theorized that white light was a composite of all colors of the
spectrum, and that light was composed of particles.

His momentous book on physics, Principia, contains information
on nearly all of the essential concepts of physics except energy,
ultimately helping him to explain the laws of motion and the
theory of gravity. Along with mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm
von Leibniz, Newton is credited for developing essential
theories of calculus.

About his inventions, Newton's first major public scientific
achievement was designing and constructing a reflecting
telescope in 1668. As a professor at Cambridge, Newton was
required to deliver an annual course of lectures and chose optics
as his initial topic. He used his telescope to study optics and help
prove his theory of light and color.

The Royal Society asked for a demonstration of his reflecting
telescope in 1671, and the organization's interest encouraged
Newton to publish his notes on light, optics and color in 1672.
These notes were later published as part of Newton's Opticks:
Or, A treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of
Light.

And his very well-known experiment, the 3 laws of motion, In
1687, following 18 months of intense and effectively nonstop
work, Newton published Philosophiae Naturalis Principia
Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), most
often known as Principia.

Principia is said to be the single most influential book on physics
and possibly all of science. Its publication immediately raised
Newton to international prominence.

Principia offers an exact quantitative description of bodies in
motion, with three basic but important laws of motion:

First Law
A stationary body will stay stationary unless an external force is
applied to it.

Second Law
Force is equal to mass times acceleration, and a change in
motion (i.e., change in speed) is proportional to the force
applied.

Third Law
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Spiritual belief

Newton was certainly one of the greatest scientists who ever
lived. He laid out the three laws of motion in his extraordinary
Principia Mathematica. He discovered the law of universal
gravitation, the famous inverse-distance-squared law. He wrote
much about light and optics after performing his own original
experiments on light. He invented calculus. He rejected the
authority of the Greek philosopher Aristotle and promoted
experiment-based science.

But it is not commonly known that Newton was also a devout
Christian who wrote extensively about Christianity. We learn
from his writings that he deeply studied the Bible along with
writings of early Christian leaders. Notably, Newton concluded
that the dogma of a Triune god was false doctrine and therefore
refused ordination in the Anglican Church, a most unpopular
decision that almost cost him his position at Cambridge
University. Newton also believed that a general apostasy from
Christ’s doctrines occurred early on in the history of the
Christian church, and he wrote that a restoration of the Lord’s
church would come at some future time.

Although none of Newton’s religious writings were published
during his lifetime, after his death in 1727, John Conduitt,
executor of Newton’s will, published some of his theological
manuscripts. Eventually the remainder came forth when the
manuscripts were auctioned off in 1936. In this paper we will
examine some of Newton’s copious writings on religion.

Some pictures of spiritual activities

Reference

- https://www.biography.com/scientist/isaac-newton
- https://rsc.byu.edu/converging-paths-truth/brief-surve

y-sir-isaac-newtons-views-religion
- http://sirisaacnewton.info/writings/isaac-newtons-prin

cipia-preface/