UK Mega 2021: Lincolnshire
36 Lincolnshire Legends: Sir Isaac Newton
This a straightforward series which was published for the 2021 UK Mega, held at the nearby Lincolnshire Showground. The series celebrates the many famous people who were either born in, lived in or associated with the glorious county of Lincolnshire!
Sir Isaac Newton. Scientist, mathematician, academic and philosopher
Sir Isaac Newton (25th December 1642 – 20th March 1726 was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, theologian, and author (described in his time as a "natural philosopher") who is widely recognised as one of the greatest mathematicians and most influential scientists of all time and as a key figure in the scientific revolution. His book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), first published in 1687, established classical mechanics. Newton also made seminal contributions to optics, and shares credit with German mathematician Leibniz for developing calculus.
In Principia, Newton formulated the laws of motion and gravity that formed the dominant scientific viewpoint until it was superseded by the theory of relativity. Newton used his mathematical description of gravity to derive Kepler's laws of planetary motion, account for tides, the trajectories of comets, the precession of the equinoxes and other phenomena, eradicating doubt about the Solar System's heliocentricity. He demonstrated that the motion of objects on Earth and celestial bodies could be accounted for by the same principles.
Newton built the first practical reflecting telescope and developed a sophisticated theory of colour based on the observation that a prism separates white light into the colours of the visible spectrum. His work on light was collected in his highly influential book Opticks, published in 1704. He also formulated an empirical law of cooling, made the first theoretical calculation of the speed of sound, and introduced the notion of a Newtonian fluid. In addition to his work on calculus, as a mathematician Newton contributed to the study of power series, generalised the binomial theorem to non-integer exponents, developed a method for approximating the roots of a function, and classified most of the cubic plane curves.
Isaac Newton was born on Christmas Day, "an hour or two after midnight" at Woolsthorpe Manor in Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth. From the age of about twelve until he was seventeen, Newton was educated at The King's School, Grantham, which taught Latin and Greek and probably imparted a significant foundation of mathematics. He was removed from school and returned to Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth by October 1659.
Between the summer of 1665 and the spring of 1667, Isaac Newton made two extended visits to Woolsthorpe in order to escape the plague affecting Cambridge and London. Woolsthorpe inspired many of his key discoveries, incluidng his experiments with light through a prism, which he undertook in his 'bedchamber' there. The apple tree which allegedly inspired his famous observations on the nasture of gravity stands in the manor house garden and still bears fruit to this day.
