Task 4 - Sir Isaac Newton1 Explain the information about the person Sir Isaac Newton:
Sir Isaac Newton, an English physicist and mathematician played a major role in the scientific revolution of the 17th century. Isaac Newton was born in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England on January 4 1643. Three months before Isaac’s birth, his father who was a local farmer died and when Newton was at the age of 3 his mother went to live with her newly wedded husband leaving Newton with his grandmother. At age 12, Newton was reunited with his mother following the death of her second husband. His mother pulled him out of the King’s School in Grantham as her plan was to make him a farmer and have him tend the farm, however Newton failed at this which lead to him getting sent back to school in order to finish his basic education. When Newton arrived at University of Cambridge’s Trinity College, the scientific revolution of the 17-century was in full force. During his first three years, Newton was taught the standard curriculum but was more interested in advanced science. Spare time was spent reading from the modern philosophers. It was at this time that Newton kept a second set of notes titles “Quaestions Quaedam Philosophicae” (Certain Philosophical Questions). This revels that he has discovered the new concept of nature that provided the framework for the scientific revolution. It was during the time when Cambridge University was closed due to the Great Plague in 1665, that Newton returned home to pursue his own private study. He conceived the method of infinitesimal calculus, set foundations for his theory of light and colour, and gained significant insight into the laws of planetary motion. These insights led to the publication of Principia in 1687. Also at this time, Newton experienced his inspiration of gravity with the falling apple. This insight led him to apply the concept to explain the motion of the Moon and the orbits of the planets. This work continued and refined Galileo’s earlier work that the Earth revolved around the Sun and not the other way around. Newton had been taught Aristotle at Cambridge, but he completely overturned those ideas and developed the fundamental concepts of motion, which forms the basis of modern physics. Aristotle’s views on motion didn’t distinguish the effects of friction, so Newton taught the common-sense observation that objects in motion slow down unless a force is applied to keep them moving. He realised this was only because friction from the ground, from air-resistance or from gravity caused this slowing down and that in the absence of any forces to change them, an object would continue forever in motion, once they began to move. This understanding allowed the development of mathematical equations and methods to explain the motion of all objects, from atoms to galaxies to occur. As a professor, Sir Isaac Newton delivered an annual course of lecture about his work on optics being the initial topic. Part of his work on optics included the use of a reflecting telescope that he designed and constructed in 1668, which was his first major public scientific achievement. This invention helped him prove his theory of light and colour. Newton became head of the Royal Mint in 1696 and kept this position until death. In 1703 he was made President of the Royal Society and in 1705 he was knighted for political reasons. Sir Isaac Newton died in his sleep in 1727 after moving in to his niece’s house near Winchester. Although Newton’s work set the stage for modern physics and mathematics, he stood at the bridge between superstition, religion and science. |