Re: Was Galileo Wrong?
From: Earle Jones (earle.jones_at_comcast.net)
Date: 06/12/04
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Date: Sat, 12 Jun 2004 03:28:03 GMT
In article <mb9wc.68$45.11938@news.uchicago.edu>,
mmeron@cars3.uchicago.edu wrote:
> In article <M_8wc.52204$Ly.13384@attbi_s01>, "Robert J. Kolker"
> <robert_kolker@hotmail.com> writes:
> >
> >
> >Earle Jones wrote:
> >
> >> *
> >> Einstein voted (1) - Newton, and (2) - Galileo:
> >>
> >> "In my opinion, the greatest creative geniuses are Galileo and
> >> Newton, whom I regard in a certain sense as forming a unity. And in
> >> this unity Newton is [the one] who has achieved the most imposing
> >> feat in the realm of science."
> >>
> >> A. Einstein (quoted in Moszkowski, Conversations with Einstein)
> >>
> >> earle
> >> *
> >
> >Two points.
> >
> >1. Galileo did not completely free his thinking of Aristotelean issues.
> >His notion of inertia was not linear. Bodies attached to the surface of
> >the earth suddenly fried would maintain circular orbits.
> >
> >2. Galileo was nowhere the mathematician that Newton was. There is
> >simply no comparison. While Galileo made good use of the math he knew,
> >Newton invented new kinds of mathematics, in particular calculus and
> >differential equations to handle motion.
> >
> >In this regard Newton is superior to Einstein who made superlative use
> >of mathematical tools invented by others. Einstein was smart to realized
> >that tensor analysis and Reimannian geometry was tailor made to express
> >his ideas about gravitation. However Einstein did not invent these tools
> >himself. Newton had to forge his mathematicial tools de novo.
> >
> Yep, Newton was something quite unique (though, perhaps, Archimedes
> came close). As Alexander Pope wrote
>
> God said, "let Newton be"
> and there was light.
>
> I'm quoting from memory, so this may be inexact, but should be close.
*
Close.
"Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night:
God said, "Let Newton be!" and all was light."
--Alexander Pope
English poet and critic
(1688 - 1744)
earle
*
--
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\/_/\_\ earle
\/_/ jones
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