A brief introduction to Newton's life

On January 4, 1643, Isaac Newton was born in Woolsthorpe Manor, a small village in the countryside of Lincolnshire, England. At the time of Newton's birth, England did not adopt the pope's latest calendar, so his birthday is recorded as Christmas Day 1642.

In 1648, Newton was sent to school. When he was a boy, Newton was not a child prodigy. His grades were average, but he loved reading and reading books that introduced various methods of making simple mechanical models, and was inspired by them to make some weird gadgets by himself, such as windmills, Wooden clocks, folding lanterns and more.

In 1654, Newton entered the Kinges Royal School in Kowloon, which is more than ten kilometers away from his home. Newton's mother originally wanted him to become a farmer, but Newton himself had no intention of doing this and loved reading instead.

Later, due to difficulties in life, his mother asked Newton to drop out of school and work at home to support the family. But Newton buried himself in his books whenever he had the chance, and often even forgot to work.

On June 3, 1661, he entered Trinity College of Cambridge University. At that time, teaching at the academy was based on the teachings of Aristotle, but Newton preferred to read the more advanced ideas of some modern philosophers such as Descartes and astronomers such as Galileo, Copernicus, and Kepler.

In 1665, he discovered the generalized binomial theorem and began to develop a new mathematical theory that later became known as calculus. In 1665, Newton received his degree while the university was closed to prevent the Great Plague in London.

For the next two years, Newton continued to study calculus, optics, and the law of gravity at home.

In 1669, he was awarded the Lucasian Professorship of Mathematics.

In 1689, he was elected as a member of Parliament. Newton was a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences from 1689 to 1690 and 1701. He became president of the Royal Society in 1703 and served for 24 years. He was second only to Joseph Banks among previous presidents and was also a member of the French Academy of Sciences. of members.

In 1696, Newton moved to London with the support of Charles Montagu, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, to supervise the Royal Mint, which he remained until his death.

In 1705, Newton was knighted by Queen Anne.

On March 31, 1727 (Grean calendar), the great Isaac Newton passed away and was buried in Westminster Abbey like many outstanding British people. His tombstone is engraved with: Let people hail such a great human glory once existed in the world.

Extended information:

No matter how many mysteries and controversies there were in Newton's life, it was not enough to reduce Newton's influence. In 1726, Voltaire once said that Newton was the greatest man because "he ruled our minds with the power of truth instead of enslaving us with force."

In fact, if you consult the index of a scientific encyclopedia, you will find two to three times more material on Newton, his laws, and discoveries than on any single scientist.

Leibniz was not a friend of Newton, and they had a very heated argument. But he wrote: "From the beginning of the world until the time when Newton lived, most of the contributions to the development of mathematics were made by Newton."

The great French scientist Laplace wrote: "The Principia is the most outstanding masterpiece among the products of human wisdom." Lagrange often said that Newton was the greatest genius in history.

In the "List of 100 People Who Influenced the Process of Human History" written by American scholar Mike Hart, Newton ranked second, second only to Muhammad. The book points out: In the hundreds of years after Newton was born, people's lifestyles have undergone earth-shaking changes, and most of these changes are based on Newton's theories and discoveries.

In the past 500 years, with the rise of modern science, most people's daily lives have undergone revolutionary changes. Compared with people 1500 years ago, we dress differently, eat differently, work differently, and what’s more different from them is that we still have a lot of leisure time.

Scientific discovery not only brought about technological and economic revolutions, it also completely changed politics, religious thought, art and philosophy.

Baidu Encyclopedia-Isaac Newton