Newton

I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper and
deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I thought
Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build a nuke. The
latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by Timothy Farris
introduced me to many things I never thought I would ever understand and
it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn. The only down fall of that
book doesn't mention much of Newton. It mentions him but not enough for me.
So, I need a recommendation for a Newton book, one that describes his laws
of motion and everything else he's done.

--
Michael A. Barlow

"Michael Barlow" wrote in
news
I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what
I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper
and deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I
thought Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build
a nuke. The latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by
Timothy Farris introduced me to many things I never thought I would
ever understand and it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn.
The only down fall of that book doesn't mention much of Newton. It
mentions him but not enough for me. So, I need a recommendation for a
Newton book, one that describes his laws of motion and everything
else he's done.


Well you could read Newton's own book. "The Mathematical Principals of
Natural Philosophy". The original was written in Latin but English
translations are available. It might be heavy going though.

Llanzlan.

Michael Barlow wrote:

I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper and
deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I thought
Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build a nuke. The
latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by Timothy Farris
introduced me to many things I never thought I would ever understand and
it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn. The only down fall of that
book doesn't mention much of Newton. It mentions him but not enough for me.
So, I need a recommendation for a Newton book, one that describes his laws
of motion and everything else he's done.


Suggest you read:

o "Newton's Principia for the Common Reader" by S. Chandrasekhar (1995)
Clarendon Press . Oxford
ISBN 0 19 851744 0

o Newton, Isaac "The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural
Philosophy" Trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman, with the
assistance of Julia Budenz (University of California Press: Berkeley,
1999)

Llanzlan Klazmon The 15th wrote in
7.6:

"Michael Barlow" wrote in
news
I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what
I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper
and deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I
thought Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build
a nuke. The latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by
Timothy Farris introduced me to many things I never thought I would
ever understand and it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn.
The only down fall of that book doesn't mention much of Newton. It
mentions him but not enough for me. So, I need a recommendation for a
Newton book, one that describes his laws of motion and everything
else he's done.


Well you could read Newton's own book. "The Mathematical Principals of

Whoops - that should be Principles - my bad.

LK



Natural Philosophy". The original was written in Latin but English
translations are available. It might be heavy going though.

Llanzlan.

Thanks Sam and Llanzlan, I'll look for them.

--
Michael A. Barlow
"Sam Wormley" wrote in message
...
Michael Barlow wrote:

I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper and
deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I thought
Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build a nuke.
The
latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by Timothy Farris
introduced me to many things I never thought I would ever understand and
it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn. The only down fall of
that
book doesn't mention much of Newton. It mentions him but not enough for
me.
So, I need a recommendation for a Newton book, one that describes his
laws
of motion and everything else he's done.


Suggest you read:

o "Newton's Principia for the Common Reader" by S. Chandrasekhar (1995)
Clarendon Press . Oxford
ISBN 0 19 851744 0

o Newton, Isaac "The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural
Philosophy" Trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman, with the
assistance of Julia Budenz (University of California Press: Berkeley,
1999)

Michael Barlow wrote:
I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper and
deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I thought
Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build a nuke.

The latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by Timothy Farris
introduced me to many things I never thought I would ever understand and
it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn. The only down fall of
that book doesn't mention much of Newton. It mentions him but not enough
for me.

So, I need a recommendation for a Newton book, one that describes his
laws of motion and everything else he's done.

Sam Wormley suggested:
o "Newton's Principia for the Common Reader" by S. Chandrasekhar (1995)
Clarendon Press . Oxford
ISBN 0 19 851744 0

o Newton, Isaac "The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural
Philosophy" Trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman, with the
assistance of Julia Budenz (University of California Press: Berkeley,
1999)

It is perhaps interesting that Cohen has this to say about Chandra's
book: "[It] is an essentially nonhistorical work by one of the world's
foremost astrophysicists. Despite its title, it is written for
readers who are well grounded in mathematics and celestial mechanics.
Chandrasekhar basically devised his own proofs of propositions in
books 1 and 3 and then compared his proofs with Newton's. Readers
should be warned that Chandrasekhar disdainfully and cavalierly
dismisses the whole corpus of historical Newtonian scholarship, relying
exclusively on (and quoting extensively from) comments by scientists,
many of whose statements on historical issues are long out of date and
cannot stand the scrutiny of critical examination. He falls into traps
which an examination of the historical literature would have helped him
to avoid, such as the date of Newton's revisions of book 1, sec. 2, or
the form in which Newton expresses the second law. Chandrasekhar
incorrectly equates Newton's "change in motion" (or change in quantity
of motion or in momentum) with mass x acceleration." In fact, this
error was the subject of a thread not long ago in SAA on the dynamics
of rocket propulsion!

Cohen goes on to list four more books that dress Newton up in modern
clothing:

The Key to Newton's Dynamics: The Kepler Problem and the
"Principia," by Bruce Brackenridge, with translation of part
of the Principia by Mary Ann Rossi.

Newton's "Principia": The Central Argument--Translations,
Notes, and Expanded Proofs, by Dana Densmore.

Force and Geometry in Newton's "Principia," by Francois de
Gandt, translated by Curtis Wilson.

Les "Principia" de Newton, by Michel Blay and available only
as a short (119 pp.) treatise in French.

In particular, Cohen points to Densmore's book as explaining many of
the geometric bases for Newton's arguments, which modern readers
generally won't be familiar with.

Beyond that commentary, I can't say anything about Chandra's book, as
I haven't read it. I have, however, read significant parts of Cohen's
translation of, and commentary on, the entire Principia Mathematica.
Anyone embarking on this voyage (and it is a voyage, to be sure!) should
be aware that it is intensely geometrical. Students who are used to
an essentially analytical treatment of mechanics may be confused by
the approach taken here. Nonetheless, there is an elegance to the
geometric treatment that is not found in analysis. Unfortunately, that
elegance does not translate to brevity.

As a lightweight example of the sort of argument one might find there,
you could take a look at my derivation of the average position of a
planet in orbit about the Sun, he

http://astro.isi.edu/notes/ellipse.html

If you would rather see integrals than follow that sort of argument,
you probably don't want to slog through Newton directly.

Brian Tung
The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/
Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/
The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/
My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.txt

I wasnt going to chime in on this but... aside from Newton's physics there
was a personal side ( hard to reconcile at times with his scientific genius and
seldom well-treated in the various works with physics as their centre, some of
which
are just plain stupid and historically bogus!).

You might wish to look up some of the social commentaries which have been
written
about Isaac Newton, and even some geneological information related to his
family. It
adds context to the man and his circumstances.

Jerry










Michael Barlow wrote:

I have read all the astronomy beginner books and moved on to what I
would call Intermediate books. Each of these books are going deeper and
deeper in to the depths of physics, Before reading these books I thought
Thermal Dynamics was something you had to learn only to build a nuke. The
latest book "Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" by Timothy Farris
introduced me to many things I never thought I would ever understand and
it's wrote in a way that made it a joy to learn. The only down fall of that
book doesn't mention much of Newton. It mentions him but not enough for me.
So, I need a recommendation for a Newton book, one that describes his laws
of motion and everything else he's done.

--
Michael A. Barlow

Brian Tung wrote:

I have, however, read significant parts of Cohen's
translation of, and commentary on, the entire Principia Mathematica.
Anyone embarking on this voyage (and it is a voyage, to be sure!) should
be aware that it is intensely geometrical. Students who are used to
an essentially analytical treatment of mechanics may be confused by
the approach taken here. Nonetheless, there is an elegance to the
geometric treatment that is not found in analysis. Unfortunately, that
elegance does not translate to brevity.

Did Newton prefer the geometric approach because he had not fully
developed the mathematics for a rigorous analysis? Or was he assuming
his peers would be more comfortable with a geometrical discussion
because they did not have the mathematical tools which he possessed?


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starman wrote:
Did Newton prefer the geometric approach because he had not fully
developed the mathematics for a rigorous analysis? Or was he assuming
his peers would be more comfortable with a geometrical discussion
because they did not have the mathematical tools which he possessed?

No, it seems the geometrical method was preferred then, because the
scientists of the time were better acquainted with what we would consider
obscure properties of conic sections (for example), just as they were
also better acquainted with Greek and Latin. It is a feature of the
time, not Newton in particular, and I don't think anyone at the time
thought it peculiar that geometry was used so predominantly.

I've heard that most of his associates in the Royal Society couldn't
follow all of his math--not because it was all geometrical, but because
it was just over their heads. Don't know how true that really was,
though.

Brian Tung
The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/
Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/
The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/
My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.txt

jerry warner wrote:

I wasnt going to chime in on this but... aside from Newton's physics there
was a personal side ( hard to reconcile at times with his scientific genius and
seldom well-treated in the various works with physics as their centre, some of
which
are just plain stupid and historically bogus!).

You might wish to look up some of the social commentaries which have been
written
about Isaac Newton, and even some geneological information related to his
family. It
adds context to the man and his circumstances.

Jerry

Newton certainly had his idiosyncrasies, among which was the practice of
alchemy! He was both a scientist and a metaphysicist, although he kept
the latter hidden from the public. In those days the two practices were
not at odds with each other.


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