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Originally Posted by RascalPuff  In 1959, Truly Yours encountered the following statement by Newton. This post requests that Readers please say what they think of it.
; for I am induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend upon certain forces by which the particles of bodies, by some causes hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled towards each other, and cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from each other; which forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the search of nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid down will afford some light either to this or some truer method of philosophy." - Sir Isaac Newton 1687[/i][/size]
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"...particles of bodies... either mutually impelled towards each other... or are repelled and recede from each other..."
Upon having this statement brought to their attention, some people have denied that it exists in the Preface to the Principia. Upon having it proved to them, the same deniers have called it obscure and inconsequential.
Others have said that I have assigned a meaning to it that Newton did not intend...
Some consternated witnesses have described it as being among the most profound revelations they've experienced...
This thread is intended to evoke Reader's responses - regarding, how any published statement by Sir Isaac Newton can be reasonably described as 'obscure'... Particularly when that statement occurs in the 3 page Preface to the Principia Mathematica.
Moreover, what meaning does the Reader assign to (what I call) Newton's 'gravitational alternative' (that gravity may be an impelling or a repelling force, in those words...)?
Is Newton allowing for an opposite vector for the conventionally considered impelling force of attraction, or, is such an interpretation the assignment of a meaning that Newton did not intend; and, if Newton did not intend that gravity may be a repelling force, what did he intend in writing that alternative - in those words - in his Preface to the Principia?
Please tell me what you think of this ('gravitational alternative').
Thank you.
- RP |
Hello, RascalPuff -
In my opinion Newton's idea of what you call the "gravitational alternative", i.e. that gravitation is both an impelling and repelling force, is exactly right. I have tried to explain this phenomenon both in my blog as well as in my article on how earthquakes are triggered, but to really understand it, I suggested a few paradigm shifts - and that is probably just as difficult as becoming a true scientist after having been raised to only believe what the Bible says and not what your eyes see...
Anyway, in our High School physics classes we are taught that mass is a scalar - i.e. it just sits there quietly and does nothing unless acted upon by some force. Newton's "law of inertia" even specifically mentions "a body at rest". And this view is justified if we only consider what happens in our immediate surroundings on the surface of the Earth - to which, of course, people in Newton's time were always confined. But nowadays, in the age of space travel, we are slowly discovering that gravitation is something more and something slightly different than the simple force of attraction we always thought it was.
In short, thanks to our progress in astrophysics, we are now capable of visualizing much better the workings of the universe, in which, of course, one can never find a mass, either a star or a single speck of dust, which is "at rest". This is why I first introduced the most important necessary change in our way of thinking, namely the paradigm shift from the lazy couch potato of a "scalar mass" to the busily rushing around of the "vector mass". A vector mass is, of course, nothing else but an active scalar mass - i.e. a momentum with direction - but is a shorter and more precise designation. Don't you agree?
And just like a socially active person, the active vector mass likes to interact with other active vector masses and - lo and behold - it does so in the same way as we humans do in dancing waltzes, namely twirling around while holding on to each other. This is essentially gravitation in orbits. The attractive and repelling forces between two vector masses depend on their mass and velocity ratios as well as the distance from each other. Gravity itself is caused by an imbalance in the said ratios.
Well, I guess I could go on and on with my explanation, but perhaps you can get the gist of my ideas out of my blog and article. I would be interested to know what you think of this my interpretation of Newton's "alternative gravitation".
Congratulations on reading Newton's words so carefully and warm regards,
Spiral Path