Isaac Newton short biography outlined in this article.

Isaac Newton short biography

Isaac Newton- English mathematician, astronomer, physicist, mechanic, who laid the foundations of classical mechanics. He explained the movement celestial bodies– planets around the Sun and the Moon around the Earth. His most famous discovery was the law of universal gravitation

Was born December 25, 1642 years in a farming family in the town of Woolsthorpe near Grantham. His father died before he was born. From the age of 12 he studied at Grantham School. At that time he lived in the house of the pharmacist Clark, which may have awakened in him a craving for chemical sciences

1661 entered Trinity College, Cambridge University as a subsizer. After graduating from college in 1665, Newton received a bachelor's degree. 1665–67, during the plague, was in his native village of Woolsthorpe; These years were the most productive in Newton's scientific work.

In 1665-1667, Newton developed ideas that led him to the creation of differential and integral calculus, the invention of a reflecting telescope (made by himself in 1668), and the discovery of the law of universal gravitation. Here he conducted experiments on the decomposition (dispersion) of light. It was then that Newton outlined a program for further scientific growth

In 1668 he successfully defended his master's degree and became a senior member of Trinity College.

In 1889 receives one of the departments at Cambridge University: the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics.

In 1671, Newton built his second reflecting telescope - larger and best quality than the first one. The demonstration of the telescope made a strong impression on his contemporaries, and soon after (in January 1672) Newton was elected a member of the Royal Society of London - the English Academy of Sciences.

Also in 1672, Newton presented his research on a new theory of light and colors to the Royal Society of London, which caused heated controversy with Robert Hooke. Newton had ideas about monochromatic light rays and the periodicity of their properties, substantiated by the finest experiments. In 1687, he published his grandiose work “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy” (“Principles”).

Since 1696, by Royal Decree, Newton has been appointed caretaker Mint. His energetic reform is quickly restoring confidence in the UK monetary system. 1703 – Newton’s election as President of the Royal Society, which he ruled for 20 years. 1703 – Queen Anne knighted Newton for his scientific services. last years devoted a lot of his life to theology and ancient and biblical history.

An Englishman, whom many consider to be the greatest scientist of all times. Born into a family of small landed nobles in the vicinity of Woolsthorpe (Lincolnshire, England). I did not find my father alive (he died three months before the birth of his son). By joining remarriage, his mother left two-year-old Isaac in the care of his grandmother. Many researchers of his biography attribute the peculiar eccentric behavior of an already adult scientist to the fact that until the age of nine, when his stepfather died, the boy was completely deprived of parental care.

For some time young Isaac studied the wisdom Agriculture at a vocational school. As often happens with later great people, there are still a lot of legends about his eccentricities in that early period of his life. So, in particular, they say that one day he was sent to pasture to guard the cattle, which had safely scattered in an unknown direction, while the boy was sitting under a tree and enthusiastically reading a book that interested him. Whether this is true or not, the teenager’s thirst for knowledge was soon noticed - and he was sent back to the Grantham gymnasium, after which the young man successfully entered Trinity College, Cambridge University.

Newton quickly mastered curriculum and moved on to study the works of leading scientists of the time, in particular the followers of the French philosopher René Descartes (1596-1650), who adhered to mechanistic views of the Universe. In the spring of 1665, he received a bachelor's degree - and then the most amazing things happened. incredible events in the history of science. In the same year, the last epidemic of bubonic plague broke out in England, funeral bells were increasingly tolled, and the University of Cambridge was closed. Newton returned to Woolsthorpe for almost two years, taking with him only a few books and his remarkable intellect to boot.

When Cambridge University reopened two years later, Newton had already (1) developed differential calculus, a separate branch of mathematics, (2) laid out the foundations modern theory colors, (3) deduced the law of universal gravitation and (4) solved several mathematical problems that no one had been able to solve before him. As Newton himself said, “I was in the prime of my inventive powers in those days, and Mathematics and Philosophy have never since captivated me as much as they did then.” (I often ask my students, telling them once again about Newton’s achievements: “What You did you manage to do it during the summer holidays?”)

Soon after returning to Cambridge, Newton was elected to the academic council of Trinity College, and his statue still adorns the university church. He gave a course of lectures on color theory, in which he showed that color differences are explained by the basic characteristics of the light wave (or, as they now say, wavelength) and that light has a corpuscular nature. He also designed a reflecting telescope, and this invention brought him to the attention of the Royal Society. Long-term studies of light and colors were published in 1704 in his fundamental work “Optics” ( Optics).

Newton's advocacy of the “wrong” theory of light (wave concepts dominated at that time) led to a conflict with Robert Hooke ( cm. Hooke's Law), head of the Royal Society. In response, Newton proposed a hypothesis that combined corpuscular and wave concepts of light. Hooke accused Newton of plagiarism and made claims to priority in this discovery. The conflict continued until Hooke's death in 1702 and made such a depressing impression on Newton that he withdrew from intellectual life for six years. However, some psychologists of that time attributed this to a nervous disorder that worsened after the death of his mother.

In 1679, Newton returned to work and gained fame by studying the trajectories of the planets and their satellites. As a result of these studies, also accompanied by disputes with Hooke about priority, the law of universal gravitation and Newton's laws of mechanics, as we now call them, were formulated. Newton summarized his research in the book “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy” ( Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica), presented to the Royal Society in 1686 and published a year later. This work, which marked the beginning of the then scientific revolution, brought Newton worldwide recognition.

His religious views, his strong commitment to Protestantism also attracted the attention of Newton to wide circles of the English intellectual elite, and especially the philosopher John Locke (John Locke, 1632-1704). Spending more and more time in London, Newton became involved in political life capital and in 1696 was appointed superintendent of the Mint. Although this position had traditionally been considered a sinecure, Newton approached his work with the utmost seriousness, considering the recoinage of English coins as an effective measure in the fight against counterfeiters. It was at this time that Newton was involved in another priority dispute, this time with Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716), over the discovery of differential calculus. At the end of his life, Newton published new editions of his major works, and also served as President of the Royal Society, while holding the life-long position of Director of the Mint.

NEWTON, ISAAC(Newton, Isaac) (1643–1727) - English mathematician, physicist, alchemist and historian, who laid the foundations of mathematical analysis, rational mechanics and all mathematical science, and also made a fundamental contribution to the development of physical optics.

Isaac (in English his name is pronounced Isaac) was born in the town of Woolsthorpe in Lincolnshire on Christmas Day, December 25, 1642 (January 4, 1643 in a new style) after the death of his father. Newton's childhood was spent in conditions of material prosperity, but was deprived of family warmth. The mother soon remarried - to an already middle-aged priest from a neighboring town - and moved in with him, leaving her son with his grandmother in Woolsthorpe. Over the next years, the stepfather had virtually no contact with his stepson. It is noteworthy that almost ten years after the death of his stepfather, nineteen-year-old Newton included in the confession he prepared for St. Day. Trinity has a long list of their sins and childhood threats to their stepfather and mother to burn down their house. Some suffered from mental breakdown in childhood modern researchers explain Newton’s painful unsociability and bileness, which later manifested itself in his relationships with others.

Newton received his primary education at the surrounding village schools, and then at the Grammar School, where he studied mainly Latin and the Bible. Due to the revealed abilities of her son, the mother abandoned her intention to make her son a farmer. In 1661 Newton entered St. College. Trinity (Trinity College) of the University of Cambridge and three years later received - thanks to the mysterious favor of fate that accompanied him throughout his life - one of 62 scholarships that entitled him to subsequent admission to Fellows of the college.

The early period of Newton's amazing creative activity occurred during his student years during the terrible plague years of 1665 and 1666, when classes at Cambridge were partially suspended. Newton spent a significant part of this time in the village. These years included the emergence of fundamental ideas from Newton, who had virtually no mathematical training before entering the university, that formed the basis for most of his subsequent great discoveries - from elements of series theory (including Newton's binomial) and mathematical analysis to new approaches in physical optics and dynamics, including the calculation of centrifugal force and the emergence of at least a guess about the law of universal gravitation.

In 1667 Newton became a bachelor and junior fellow of the college, and the following year - master and senior fellow of Trinity College. Finally, in the fall of 1669, he received one of the eight privileged royal chairs of Cambridge - the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics, inherited by him from Isaac (Isaac) Barrow, who left it.

According to the college's charter, its members were required to take the priesthood. This also awaited Newton. But by this time he had fallen into the most terrible heresy for a true Christian: a member of the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity doubted the fundamental dogma of the doctrine of the Trinity of God. Newton faced the grim prospect of leaving Cambridge. Even the king could not exempt a Trinity College member from ordination. But it was in his power to allow an exception for a professor who occupied the royal chair, and such an exception for the Lucasian chair (formally not for Newton) was legalized in 1675. Thus, the last obstacle to Newton’s career at the university was miraculously removed. He acquired a firm position without being burdened with almost any responsibilities. Newton's overly complex lectures were not popular with students, and in subsequent years the professor sometimes found no listeners in the audience.

The late 1660s and early 1670s saw Newton's manufacture of a reflecting telescope, for which he was elected to the Royal Society of London (1672). In the same year, he presented to the Society his research on a new theory of light and colors, which caused a heated debate with Robert Hooke (Newton’s pathological fear of public discussions, which developed with age, led, in particular, to the fact that he published Optics only 30 years later, after Hooke’s death). Newton owns ideas about monochromatic light rays and the periodicity of their properties, substantiated by the finest experiments, that underlie physical optics.

In those same years, Newton was developing the foundations of mathematical analysis, which became widely known from the correspondence of European scientists, although Newton himself did not publish a single line on this subject: Newton’s first publication on the foundations of analysis was published only in 1704, and more complete guide– posthumously (1736).

Ten years later Newton general ideas G.V. Leibniz also came to mathematical analysis, and already in 1684 he began publishing his works in this area. It should be noted that the subsequently generally accepted Leibniz notation system was more practical than Newton’s “method of fluxions”, becoming widespread in the continental Western Europe already in the 1690s.

However, as it finally became clear only in the 20th century, the center of gravity of Newton’s interests lay in alchemy in the 1670–1680s. He was actively interested in metal transmutation and gold from the early 1670s.

Newton's seemingly monotonous life in Cambridge was shrouded in mystery. Perhaps the only serious disruption to its rhythm was the two and a half years devoted in the mid-1680s to writing Mathematical principles of natural philosophy(1687), which laid the foundation not only for rational mechanics, but also for the entire mathematical science. During this short period, Newton showed superhuman activity, concentrating on creating Began all creative potential the genius bestowed upon him. Beginnings contained the laws of dynamics, the law of universal gravitation with effective applications to the movement of celestial bodies, the origins of the study of the movement and resistance of liquids and gases, including acoustics. This work has remained for over three centuries the most remarkable creation of human genius.

History of creation Began remarkable. In the 1660s, Hooke also thought about the problem of universal gravitation. In 1674 he published his insightful ideas about the device solar system, the motion of the planets in which consists of uniform rectilinear motion and motion under the influence of general mutual attraction between bodies. Hooke soon became secretary of the Royal Society and late autumn 1679, having consigned to oblivion the previous disputes, invited Newton to speak about the laws of motion of bodies and, in particular, about the idea that “the celestial movements of the planets consist of direct tangential motion and motion due to attraction to the central body.” Three days later, Newton confirmed to Hooke the receipt of his letter, but avoided giving a detailed answer under false pretexts. However, Newton made a rash statement, noting that bodies are deflected to the east when falling on Earth and move in a spiral converging towards its center. The triumphant Hooke respectfully pointed out to Newton that bodies do not fall in a spiral at all, but along some kind of ellipsoidal curve. Hooke then added that bodies on the rotating Earth fall not strictly to the east, but to the southeast. Newton responded with a letter that was striking for his irreconcilable character: “I agree with you,” he wrote, “that a body at our latitude will fall more to the south than to the east... And also with the fact that if we assume its gravity to be uniform, then it will not will descend in a spiral to the very center, but will spin with alternate rise and fall... But... the body will not describe an ellipsoidal curve.” According to Newton, the body will then describe a trajectory like a kind of trefoil, like an elliptical orbit with a rotating line of apses. Hooke, in his next letter, objected to Newton, pointing out that the apses of the orbit of a falling body would not shift. Newton did not answer him, but Hooke, using another pretext, added in his last letter from this cycle: “Now it remains to find out the properties of a curved line... caused by a central attractive force, under the influence of which the speed of evasion from a tangent or uniform rectilinear motion on all distances are inversely proportional to the squares of the distance. And I have no doubt that with the help of your wonderful method you will easily establish what kind of curve this should be and what its properties are...”

We don’t know exactly what happened and in what order over the next four years. Hooke's diaries over the years (as well as many of his other manuscripts) subsequently strangely disappeared, and Newton almost never left his laboratory. Frustrated by his oversight, Newton, of course, had to immediately take up the analysis of the problem clearly formulated by Hooke and, probably, soon received his main fundamental results, proving, in particular, the existence of central forces subject to the law of areas and the ellipticity of planetary orbits when the center of gravity is found in one of their tricks. At this point, Newton apparently considered the development of the principles he developed later in Beginnings the system of the world was complete for himself and calmed down on this.

At the beginning of 1684 in London, a historic meeting took place between Robert Hooke and the future royal astronomer Edmund Halley (who is usually called Halley in Russian) and the royal architect Christopher Wren, at which the interlocutors discussed the law of attraction ~ 1/ R 2 and set the task of deducing the ellipticity of orbits from the law of attraction. In August of that year, Halley visited Newton and asked him what he thought about this problem. In response, Newton said that he already had proof of the ellipticity of orbits, and promised to find his calculations.

Further events developed from cinematography to the 17th century. speed. At the end of 1684, Newton sent the first application text of an essay on the laws of motion to the Royal Society of London. Under pressure from Halley, he began to write a large treatise. He worked with all the passion and dedication of a genius, and in the end Beginnings were written in an amazingly short time - from one and a half to two and a half years. In the spring of 1686 Newton presented the text of the first book to London Began, which contained the formulation of the laws of motion, the doctrine of central forces in connection with the law of areas and the solution of various problems about motion under the influence of central forces, including motion along precessing orbits. In his presentation, he does not even mention the mathematical analysis he created and uses only the theory of limits he developed and the classical geometric methods of the ancients. No mention of the solar system, book one Began also does not contain. The Royal Society, which greeted Newton's work with enthusiasm, was, however, unable to finance its publication: printing Began Halley himself took over. Fearing controversy, Newton changed his mind about publishing a third book. Began, dedicated to the mathematical description of the Solar System. Still, Halley's diplomacy won. In March 1687, Newton sent to London the text of the second book, which expounded the doctrine of hydro-aerodynamic resistance of moving bodies and was silently directed against Descartes’ theory of vortices, and on April 4 Halley received the final third book Began– about the system of the world. On July 5, 1687, printing of the entire work was completed. The pace at which Halley carried out the publication Began three hundred years ago, can well be set as an example for modern publishing houses. Typesetting (from manuscript!), proofreading and printing of the second and third books Began, constituting slightly more than half of the entire composition, took exactly four months.

In preparation Began To print, Halley tried to convince Newton of the need to somehow note Hooke's role in establishing the law of universal gravitation. However, Newton limited himself to only a very ambiguous mention of Hooke, trying with his remark to also drive a wedge between Hooke, Halley and Wren.

Newton's point of view on the role of mathematical proofs in discoveries is, in general, very peculiar - at least when we're talking about about his own priority. Thus, Newton not only did not recognize Hooke’s merits in the formulation of the law of universal gravitation and the formulation of the problem of planetary motion, but he believed that those two sentences that we call Kepler’s first two laws belonged to him - Newton, since it was he who received these laws as consequences from mathematical theory. Newton left only his third law to Kepler, which was only mentioned as Kepler’s law in Beginnings.

Nowadays, we still have to recognize the prominent role of Hooke as Newton's predecessor in understanding the mechanics of the solar system. S.I. Vavilov formulated this idea in the following words: “Write Beginnings in the 17th century no one except Newton could, but it cannot be disputed that the program, plan Began was first sketched by Hooke."

Having completed the publication Began, Newton, apparently, again isolated himself in his (al)chemical laboratory. His final years at Cambridge in the 1690s were particularly clouded by mental depression. Someone then surrounded Newton with care, preventing the widespread spread of rumors about his illness, and as a result, little is known about the actual state of affairs.

In the spring of 1696, Newton received the post of Warden (Warden) of the Mint and moved from Cambridge to London. Here Newton immediately became intensively involved in organizational and administrative activities; under his leadership, in 1696–1698, enormous work was carried out to re-mint all English coins. In 1700 he was appointed to the highly paid position of Director (Master) of the Mint, which he held until his death. In the spring of 1703, Robert Hooke, an irreconcilable opponent and antipode of Newton, died. Hooke's death gave Newton complete freedom in the Royal Society of London, and at the next annual meeting, Newton was elected its president, occupying this chair for a quarter of a century.

In London he approached the court. In 1705, Queen Anne elevated him to the rank of knighthood. Soon Sir Isaac Newton became the generally recognized national pride of England. Discussion of the advantages of his philosophical system over Cartesian and his priority in relation to Leibniz in the discovery of infinitesimal calculus became an indispensable element of conversation in educated society.

In the last years of his life, Newton himself devoted a lot of time to theology and ancient and biblical history.

Died on March 31, 1727, a bachelor in the 85th year of his life. country house, secretly refusing the sacrament and leaving a very significant fortune. A week later, his ashes were solemnly placed in a place of honor in Westminster Abbey.

Relatively full meeting Newton's works were published in London in five volumes (1779–1785). However, his works and manuscripts began to be studied more deeply only in the mid-20th century, when 7 volumes of his correspondence were published ( Correspondence, 1959–1977) and 8 volumes of mathematical manuscripts ( Mathematical Papers, 1967–1981). Published in Russian Mathematical principles of natural philosophy Newton (first edition - 1915/1916, last - 1989), his Optics(1927) and Lectures on optics(1945), selected Mathematical work(1937) and Notes on the book« Prophet Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. Joanna"(1916).

Gleb Mikhailov

Isaac Newton is an English scientist, historian, physicist, mathematician and alchemist. He was born into a farming family in Woolsthorpe. Newton's father died before his birth. Soon after the death of her beloved husband, the mother married a second time to a priest who lived in a neighboring town and moved in with him. Isaac Newton, whose brief biography is written below, and his grandmother remained in Woolsthorpe. Some researchers explain the scientist’s bilious and unsociable character with this emotional shock.

At the age of twelve, Isaac Newton entered Grantham School, and in 1661 he entered Trinity College, Cambridge University. To earn money, the young scientist performed the duties of servants. The mathematics teacher at the college was I. Barrow.

During the plague epidemic in 1965-1967, Isaac Newton was in his home village. These years were his most productive scientific activity. It was here that he developed the ideas that later led Newton to the creation of a reflecting telescope (Isaac Newton made it on his own in 1968) and to the discovery of the law of universal gravitation. Also here he conducted experiments involving the decomposition of light.

In 1668, the scientist was awarded the title, and a year later Barrow transferred his chair (physics and mathematics) to him. Isaac Newton, whose biography is of interest to many researchers, occupied it until 1701.

In 1671, Isaac Newton invents his second mirror telescope. It was bigger and better than the previous one. The demonstration of this telescope made a very strong impression on contemporaries. Soon after this, Isaac Newton was elected a member of the Royal Society. At the same time, he presented to the scientific community his research on a new theory of colors and light, which caused sharp disagreements with

Isaac Newton also developed the basis. This became known from the correspondence of European scientists, although the scientist himself did not publish a single note on this matter. The first publication on the basics of analysis was published in 1704, and the complete manual was published posthumously in 1736.

In 1965, Isaac Newton became superintendent of the Mint. This was facilitated by the fact that the scientist was once interested in alchemy. Newton supervised the reminting of all English coins. It was he who put in order the coinage of England, which until then had been in disarray. For this, in 1966, the scientist received the lifelong title of director of the English court, which was highly paid at that time. In the same year, Isaac Newton became a member of the Paris Academy of Sciences. In 1705 great for grandiose scientific works raised him to the rank of knight.

In the last years of his life, Newton devoted a lot of time to theology, as well as biblical and ancient history. The great scientist was buried in the national English pantheon -

There are names and creations in the history of science that not only constituted an era in the development of knowledge and technology, but also retained their enduring significance for centuries. The name rightfully belongs to them Isaac Newton- the greatest English physicist, mathematician, astronomer. Newton's genius revealed many secrets of nature and illuminated new horizons of the universe for humanity.

In the immortal work “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy,” published in 1687, Newton formulated the three laws of motion that formed the basis of classical mechanics and physics, and outlined his theory of universal gravitation, which connected the course of the heavenly bodies - the Sun, planets, and comets - into a single family. Newton created a new, mechanical system of the world. This is his great scientific feat.

His contribution to optics and mathematics was also enormous: he put forward a hypothesis about light as a stream of special particles, discovered simple, monochromatic rays in a diverse range of colors, and created, along with Leibniz, the method of differential and integral calculus.

Newton's discoveries have stood the most severe test. Tested by time and practice. The progress of natural science, its revolutionary transformations created new, more general and advanced concepts that included Newton’s laws, which are the same fundamental principle practical activities people, like the geometry of Euclid and the hydrostatics of Archimedes.

Newton's discoveries were of great importance. He continued and completed the work begun by Copernicus and Galileo. No wonder when asked how he managed to make such significant discoveries, Newton replied: “I stood on the shoulders of giants.”

Newton's theological research was assessed by the outstanding French philosopher Paul Holbach. “…. Great Newton“,” he wrote, “becomes just a child when, leaving physics and obvious facts, he delves into the fantastic world of theology.”

Some are trying to interpret Newton’s great scientific legacy in a religious spirit, to prove the harmony of science and religion using his example, but scientific views and Newton’s religious ideas did not form true agreement or unity. And it was not his religious views that constituted his glory and greatness. Now any poor student knows the name of Newton and the laws of nature discovered by his genius. And his interpretation of biblical prophecy is not particularly interesting.

The greatness and immortality of Isaac Newton lies in the gigantic step that humanity, with the help of his scientific creativity, took on the path of the victorious march of reason, on the path of knowledge of the world.