Anthony's+Week+4

A question many people like to debate is “Who is the greatest scientist ever?” One of the most common answers is Isaac Newton. Everyone knows the Newton who invented calculus, was the father of modern physics, developed the theory of gravity, and so on. However, not that many people really know who Newton was, what his life was like, and how his research really went. Newton the scientist is well know, Newton the man is not. The personality of Isaac Newton is often misrepresented or not understood at all. The assumption that with his dedication to scientific work, he couldn’t be a religious person is absolutely false. Newton was a devout Protestant. Newton, for a man of such great scientific work, was also not as dedicated as some people would believe. While he obviously did some of the greatest scientific work ever, he abandoned his studies later in life and took up Government positions in London. The reason he left his studies was because he was not very mentally sound. He was most likely depressed after growing up with a resent towards his family. According to JJ O’Connor and E F Robinson in their online biography of Newton, at the age of nineteen, Newton listed one of his sins (pointing out his devotion to religion) as “’Threatening my mother and father Smith to burn them and their house over them.’” What finally drove him away from his research was a second nervous breakdown. Newton also had a furious temper. One of Newton’s assistants, William Whiston, is quoted in O’Conner and Robinsons’ article as say “’Newton was of the most fearful, cautious, and suspicious tempers that I have ever known.’” This is not the mindset one would expect of arguably the greatest scientist to ever live. How Newton developed his law of universal gravitation is also often thought to have occurred in a way which is totally false. We all have this nice story of Newton sitting in an orchard under a tree and an apple falling on his head, and Newton instantly figures out gravity. Again, this is totally false. Newton developed his theory of gravity by combining to seemingly unrelated things, centripetal forces, and Kepler’s Laws. He applied the ideas of centripetal forces to Kepler’s Laws, and developed the inverse square law. He then took his new idea that all matter attracts matter, combined it with this inverse square law, and then came up with the law of gravitation. So in effect, he only added the two together and found the sum. Also, while Newton understood that gravity is an attractive force between matter, he had no idea why it occurred. =Another one of Newton’s great accomplishments was the development of calculus. There is an idea taught to many high school students (myself included) that Newton worked alongside with Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz. Staying with the pattern established above, this is wrong. Newton was actually in competition was Leibniz over who should rightfully be called the inventor of calculus. Newton took advantage of his position as President of the Royal Society to hold an “impartial” committee to decide who had invented the calculus. The decision of the committee was written by Newton (anonymously) and without any surprises declared that Newton was the true inventor of calculus. = = Not only are there all these misconceptions about the work Newton is famous for, there is also so much more work that he did in his life. Optics and the study of light was a major part of Newton’s research. Newton was the first to realize that white light is actually comprised of many other rays of light all refracted differently. Also, centuries before Einstein published his theory on the photoelectric effect and the discovery of photons, Newton was arguing that “ that light consists of the motion of small particles rather than waves” (taken from the biography by O’Connor and Robinson). Alchemy was also a major part of Newton’s research. According to William R. Newman in his collection entitiled “The Chymistry of Newton” manuscripts in Newton’s own handwriting were found in 1936. Of the 329 writings, almost a third of dealt with alchemy. Newton partook in numerous alchemical experiments in his life. = = In the end we can break Isaac Newton in two branches. There is the legend, which involves the apple tree, and cooperation with Leibniz, and the notion of Newton as the strict scientist. Then there is the real Isaac Newton, the depressed, easily angered man who was devoted to the Protestant faith, that along with his well known work, experimented in the dark mysterious science know n as alchemy. Will the real story of Isaac Newton ever be widely known? Most likely not, because why would we attach so many negatives to the man who we believe to have all but single handedly invented modern science. =