Sir Isaac Sir Isaac NewtonNewton

Eric JolleyNatalie Surut

Melynda Lindhorst

“If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.”

Childhood

• December 25, 1642 (or January 4, 1643)

• He was born prematurely to a widowed mother.

• At 2-years-old, his mother Hannah left him with his grandmother to remarry.

• Isolation and separation from his mother fueled psychotic tendencies that lasted throughout his life.

Schooling

• Attended King’s School at Grantham in order to prepare for entrance into Cambridge University.

• 1661, upon his arrival at Cambridge, Newton finds that the school has yet to embrace the scientific revolution.

• As an undergraduate, he immerses himself in the works of Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, and other prominent figures of the scientific revolution.

• 1665, Newton earns his bachelor’s degree without any honors or distinctions.

Woolsthorpe

• Returned to Woolsthorpe during the plague.

• Developed– Method of Fluxions– Foundations for his

theory of light and color

– Insight into the issue of planetary motion

Cambridge & Royal Society

• 1667, Newton returns to Cambridge.• His former mathematics professor picks Newton

as his successor. He becomes the Lucasian professor of mathematics.

• After being elected to the Royal Society, he made his first paper public, sparking controversy and criticism.

• This criticism continued until 1678 when he suffered a major emotional breakdown and death of his mother.

• Newton cut himself off from the rest of the world and devoted himself to his research.

Isolation

• Studied alchemy.• Alchemy would

become a basis to his thoughts on repulsion and attraction.

• Robert Hooke sends letters to Newton.

Planetary Motion

• Hooke asked for Newton’s thoughts on planetary motion with reference to Kepler’s laws. Newton refused to share anything, though his interest in astronomy was reawakened.

• Instead, Newton brainstormed with John Flamsteed.

• A year after Hooke’s correspondence, it is thought that Newton solved planetary motion but was reluctant to share it.

Planetary Motion

• 1684, Edmond Halley approached Newton at Cambridge to ask him about planetary motion.

• Newton produced De motu coporum in gyrum (On the Motions of Bodies in Orbit) in response.

Principia Mathematica

• After De motu, it took Newton two years to write the Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy).

• The Royal Society refused to publish it.• Halley privately financed the entire

venture.• The Principia Mathematic was published

in 1687.

Parliament & Theology

• 1689, Newton is elected to be a representative of Cambridge before Parliament.

• 1693, he suffers his second nervous breakdown and retires.

• Continues theological studies and writes– Historical Account of Two

Notable Corruptions of the Scriptures

– Two Letters from Isaac Newton to M le Clerc (1754)

Bernoulli’s Mathematical Challenge & The Mint

• 1696, Challenge:– Determine the brachistochrone between two given points not in the same vertical line– Determine a curve such that, if a straight light drawn through a fixed point “A” meet in

two points P1, P2, then AP1m+AP2m will be constant

• Finished both questions in twelve hours.• Also at this time, Newton becomes Warden of the

Royal Mint in London.• 1699, French Academy of Sciences recognizes

Newton’s position as a mathematician and natural philosopher. He also becomes Master of the Royal Mint.

• 1701, retires from Cambridge.

Presidency & Knighthood

• 1703, Newton is elected president of the Royal Society and is re-elected after year afterwards.

• Published Optiks in 1704. Also wrote a manuscript predicting the end of the world in 2060.

• 1705, Newton is knighted by Queen Anne.

Principia & Death

• 1713, second edition of the Principia is published. Added to the theory of the motion of the moon and planets.

• The content of the first book was split in two.• The third book, De mundi systemate, goes into

further detail and analysis of the ideas in the first two books. Also features observation of the moon’s orbit and Newton’s belief of a heliocentric solar system.

• March 31, 1727, Newton dies in his sleep. High amounts of mercury are found in his body.