Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- 1 Newton's philosophical analysis of space and time
- 2 Newton's concepts of force and mass, with notes on the Laws of Motion
- 3 Curvature in Newton's dynamics
- 4 The methodology of the Principia
- 5 Newton's argument for universal gravitation
- 6 Newton and celestial mechanics
- 7 Newton's optics and atomism
- 8 Newton's metaphysics
- 9 Analysis and synthesis in Newton's mathematical work
- 10 Newton, active powers, and the mechanical philosophy
- 11 The background to Newton's chymistry
- 12 Newton's alchemy
- 13 Newton on prophecy and the Apocalypse
- 14 Newton and eighteenth-century Christianity
- 15 Newton versus Leibniz: from geometry to metaphysics
- 16 Newton and the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence
- Bibliography
- Index
10 - Newton, active powers, and the mechanical philosophy
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 May 2006
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- 1 Newton's philosophical analysis of space and time
- 2 Newton's concepts of force and mass, with notes on the Laws of Motion
- 3 Curvature in Newton's dynamics
- 4 The methodology of the Principia
- 5 Newton's argument for universal gravitation
- 6 Newton and celestial mechanics
- 7 Newton's optics and atomism
- 8 Newton's metaphysics
- 9 Analysis and synthesis in Newton's mathematical work
- 10 Newton, active powers, and the mechanical philosophy
- 11 The background to Newton's chymistry
- 12 Newton's alchemy
- 13 Newton on prophecy and the Apocalypse
- 14 Newton and eighteenth-century Christianity
- 15 Newton versus Leibniz: from geometry to metaphysics
- 16 Newton and the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Among the notable eighteenth-century expositions of Newton's achievements were Henry Pemberton's A View of Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophy (1728), Willem Jacob 's Gravesande's Mathematical Elements of Natural Philosophy confirm'd by experiments: or, an introduction to Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophy (6th edn, 1747), and Colin Maclaurin's posthumous An Account of Sir Isaac Newton's Philosophical Discoveries (1748). To the modern eye, there is something puzzling about these titles. We note the terms “philosophy,” “natural philosophy,” and “philosophical,” and we wonder what they mean in this setting. Take Maclaurin's Account, the best of the genre, and written by one of the leading Newtonians of the day. Newton made great scientific discoveries, and we can learn what most of them are from reading An Account, but what philosophical discoveries did he make? Maclaurin describes Newton's work in mechanics, rational and celestial, and in physics, theoretical and experimental (though not optics). But Newton the philosopher? To answer these questions requires a preliminary disentanglement of the disciplinary classifications that clustered around the business of “philosophy” in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to Newton , pp. 329 - 357Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002
- 9
- Cited by