Isaac Newton, a mathematician and physicist, was born to
Isaac Newton and Hannah Ayscougin in Woolsthorpe,
Lincolnshire, England on December 25, 1642, three months
after his father died. When Newton was two, his mother
remarried to a wealthy man, Reverend Barnabas Smith.
Instead of being a happy family once again, Newton found
things different. He was sent off to live with his grandmother,
Margery Ayscough, when his mother remarried. When his
step-father died, Newton's mother went back to Woolsthorpe
to claim him again. However, he wasn't interested in a
reunion with her.
Newton's house
As a child, Newton didn't like school and was thought to be idle and inattentive. His mother, thinking he was the best one to handle her estate and affairs, pulled Newton out of school. However he had no interest in doing that and his uncle convinced his mother to let Newton go back to school to prepare to enter a university. Although he didn't show that any academic promise in his work the first time at school, many people thought and felt that he had academic promise. Because of that he was readmitted to the Free Grammar School. After that completion, he attended Trinity College in Cambridge to study law. The philosophy of Aristotle dominated Cambridge, but some freedom of study was also allowed in the third year. Newton studied the works of Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, and especially Boyle. He portrayed himself early as a free thinker by stating, "Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my best friend is truth."
Newton became interested in mathematics when he found that he couldn't
understand the mathematics in a book he had bought. Wanting to understand,
he read the works of other great mathematicians. Before 1665 when
the plague hit England, Newton was never considered to be thought
of as a scientific genius. During the plague, Newton began revolutionary
advances in mathematics, optics, physics, and astronomy. He also
laid the foundations for differential and integral calculus. Newton
tried to publish his first public paper in 1672, but was unsuccessful.
He later tried again in 1675, but was again unsuccessful because of the
controversy with Robert Hooke. Rejected twice, Newton withdrew from
publishing another paper.
Unknown to Newton's scholars, Newton's findings were nothing like a mistake.
It opened theoretical avenues not found in the mechanical philosophy. Newton
devoted the period from August 1684 to spring 1686 to this task, and the
result became one of the most important and influential works on physics
of all times, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica. It
includes the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation,
which states the following:
Laws of
Motion
First Law-Every
object remains in a state of rest or of uniform motion
in a straight line unless acted upon by an outside force.
Second law-The acceleration of an object is
directly proportional to the net force acting upon it.
The constant of proportionality is the mass. (F=MA)
Third law-For every action, There is an equal or opposite reaction.
LAW OF UNIVERSAL
GRAVITATION
Law of Universal
Gravitation- Two objects exert a attraction
force on each other. The products of the two object's mass
are proportional to the magnitude of the force of attraction.
In 1693, Newton suffered from a nervous breakdown and retired from his
research. Researchers have said the breakdown was due to: chemical poisoning
as a result of his alchemy experiments; frustration with his researches;
the ending of a personal friendship with Fatio de Duillier, a Swiss-born
mathematician resident in London; and problems resulting from his religious
beliefs. He also said it was due to lack of sleep and depression.
Newton then decided to leave Cambridge but did not resign his positions
until 1701. Newton was a well-off man, being the Master of the Mint.
In 1703 and each year after, he was elected president of the Royal Society
and was also the first scientist to be knighted by Queen Anne. He
is also said to be "the greatest genius who ever lived, and the most fortunate;
for we cannot find more than once a system of the world to establish."
Newton died in 1727 of nothing more than old age.
Other works include:
Geopgraphia generalis
Opticks
The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended
The System of the World
Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John
Firstly, this law states that if you do place a force on an object, it will accelerate, i.e., change its velocity, and it will change
LINKS:
http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Newton.html
http://www.newton.cam.ac.uk/newtlife.html
http://www.newton.cam.ac.uk/newtlife.html
http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/People/Newton/RouseBall/RB_Newton.html
http://galileoandeinstein.physics.virginia.edu/lectures/newton.html
CREATED BY: NANCY QUACH & DAMON LUONG