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牛顿(1642～1727年)

Newton, Isaac

受封为艾泽克爵士（Sir Isaac）

英国物理学家和数学家。自耕农之子，由其祖母扶养长大。他就读剑桥大学（1661～1665），在那里发现了笛卡儿的作品。他的实验让光通过菱镜，导致白光多相和微粒的发现，奠定了物理光学原理的基础。1668年造出第一个反射式望远镜，1669年成为剑桥大学的数学教授。他发展出微积分的基础，虽然这项作品超过三十年未发表。他最闻名的着作《数学原理》（1687）源於他与哈雷的通信。书中描述他在运动定律（参阅Newton's laws of motion）、轨道力学、潮汐理论和万有引力理论方面的工作，被视为现代科学的开创性着作。1703年获选为伦敦皇家学会的主席，1705年成为第一位封爵的科学家。在其生涯中曾与几位同僚激烈争论，包括虎克（关於引力平方反关系的着作权）和莱布尼兹（关於微积分的着作权）。与莱布尼兹的争议支配了牛顿生活的最後二十五年，如今确定的是，牛顿首先发展出微积分，但莱布尼兹首先发表这个题材。牛顿被视为古今最伟大的科学家之一。

English version：

1642～1727年

Newton, Isaac

English physicist and mathematician. The son of a yeoman, he was raised by his grandmother. He was educated at Cambridge University (1661-65), where he discovered the work of Rene Descartes. His experiments passing sunlight through a prism led to the discovery of the heterogeneous, corpuscular nature of white light and laid the foundation of physical optics. He built the first reflecting telescope in 1668 and became a professor of mathematics at Cambridge in 1669. He worked out the fundamentals of calculus, though this work went unpublished for more than 30 years. His most famous publication, Principia Mathematica (1687), grew out of correspondence with Edmond Halley. It describes his works on the laws of motion (see Newton's laws of motion), orbital dynamics, tidal theory, and the theory of universal gravitation, and is regarded as the seminal work of modern science. He was elected president of the Royal Society of London in 1703 and became the first scientist ever to be knighted in 1705. During his career he engaged in heated arguments with several of his colleagues, including Robert Hooke (over authorship of the inverse square relation of gravitation) and G. W. Leibniz (over the authorship of calculus). The battle with Leibniz dominated the last 25 years of his life; it is now well established that Newton developed calculus first, but that Leibniz was the first to publish on the subject. Newton is regarded as one of the greatest scientists of all time.

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