I decided to dig a little deeper into my study of 17th century Europe with this short biography of Sir Isaac Newton. Science is most certainly not my forte, but Newton's impact on history is profound.
It's hard to imagine that as recently as a few hundred years ago people had no idea why objects fall to Earth. Nor any real understanding of the orbit of the moon, comets and the planets.
Newton's most important contribution to the world was his discovery of gravity, the law that all objects are attracted to one another. Even now it seems quite extraordinary. The pen on my desk is literally drawn to every other object in the house; and everything else in the world, for that matter.
The distance between the objects, and the mass (the amount of matter) of each object, determine the force of the gravitational pull. But it's there even between the smallest and most distant of objects.
This was nothing short of revolutionary. It was perhaps the first scientific discovery that involved a theory or law involving disconnected objects, which sounds incredible even today. Many refused to believe Newton's theory of gravity for this very reason; how could there exist a force between objects that never even touch? How is it conceivable that the moon actually exerts a force that results in the changing tides of our oceans on Earth.
Newton's famed "apple falling from the tree" story might or might not be true. Contemporary accounts differ, and it doesn't appear in any of his own writings. What he does say is that while thinking near an apple tree, he held up an apple at arms length, comparing it's relative size to that of the moon when viewed from his own perspective. Not surprisingly, Newton was a forerunner in the study of optics, as well as motion, gravity and a variety of other topics.
Newton's theory of gravity (among others) is spelled out in his infamous Principia, published in 1687. Fascinating stuff, that perhaps one day I will be lucky enough to read for myself.
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