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GP: Geschichte der Physik

GP 3: Funktion und historische Entwicklung von Graphen, Schemata und Diagrammen

GP 3.1: Talk

Tuesday, March 27, 2001, 09:00–09:45, CCH S15

Newton’s Diagram for the Kepler Propositon: trials and tribulation — •Prof. J. Bruce Brackenridge — Dept.s of Physics and History, Lawrence Univ., Appleton, WI 54912-599 USA

The most famous scientific text in Western science is Isaac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, commonly known as the ‘Principia’. The most famous diagram in that work appears in Proposition 11 of Book One: the Kepler proposition, which seeks to find the force necessary to maintain elliptical motion about a focal point. In the statue of Newton in Grantham, England, he holds a copy of the Principia open to Proposition 11 and the diagram is clearly shown. On the Isaac Newton English pound note (now sadly out of circulation) that diagram dominates the side opposite the Queen. The diagram appears in all of the many editions and translations of Principia. Yet central as it is to Newton’s contributions to physics and astronomy, it is often flawed. The new translation by I. Bernard Cohen has it correct, but the 1934 ‘corrected’ version by Cajori of Motte’s 1729 translation has it wrong. Even the English pound note has two versions: the first flawed and the second correct. I will display and comment upon the multiple versions of this famous diagram. The talk will be given in English.