Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Volumes 1-2

by Isaac Newton, François Jacquier, Thomas Leseur

This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

Genres: Science, Philosophy, Nonfiction

802 pages, Paperback

First published February 13, 2010

About the author

Sir Isaac Newton, FRS , was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, and alchemist. His Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, published in 1687, is considered to be the most influential book in the history of science. In this work, Newton described universal gravitation and the three laws of motion, laying the groundwork for classical mechanics, which dominated the scientific view of the physical universe for the next three centuries and is the basis for modern engineering. Newton showed that the motions of objects on Earth and of celestial bodies are governed by the same set of natural laws by demonstrating the consistency between Kepler's laws of planetary motion and his theory of gravitation, thus removing the last doubts about heliocentrism and advancing the scientific revolution.

In mechanics, Newton enunciated the principles of conservation of momentum and angular momentum. In optics, he invented the reflecting telescope and developed a theory of colour based on the observation that a prism decomposes white light into a visible spectrum. He also formulated an empirical law of cooling and studied the speed of sound.

In mathematics, Newton shares the credit with Gottfried Leibniz for the development of the differential and integral calculus. He also demonstrated the generalised binomial theorem, developed the so-called "Newton's method" for approximating the zeroes of a function, and contributed to the study of power series.

Newton was also highly religious (though unorthodox), producing more work on Biblical hermeneutics than the natural science he is remembered for today.

In a 2005 poll of the Royal Society asking who had the greater effect on the history of science, Newton was deemed much more influential than Albert Einstein.

Reviews

[Woodward Library]

Lior Silberman, Assistant Professor, Mathematics recommends . . .
Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica by Isaac Newton


Why is this a favourite book?


I consider this book as the crowning achievement of human civilization. By establishing that the universe is governed by mathematical principles, it revolutionized our understanding of the universe; even more, it changed the way we think about the universe, and perhaps most importantly it redefined our expectations from ourselves.

[Almustafa Couch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought it was a good book for its time most of the scientific theories he wrote about have long since been superseded,like that of fixed stars.In spite of that and a few other things it was a great book really worth sticking with,though I have no doubt someone with an education along the lines of the book would find it better than I did. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in scientific research and advance who has literacy in science.