Alan E. Shapiro - Böcker

Building upon his pioneering investigation of the colours of thin films, Isaac Newton developed two influential theories, one on the structure of matter, explaining the colours of bodies and the other on fits, describing the periodicity of light. Professor Alan Shapiro, editor of The Optical Papers of Isaac Newton, recounts the development of these theories based on his study of Newton's unpublished manuscripts and analyses their experimental foundation. He also shows the essential role that Newton's philosophy of science played in the formulation and reception of these theories. The second part of the book describes a vigourous dispute over Newton's theory of coloured bodies waged by physicists and chemists for nearly fifty years, from the late eighteenth century to the early nineteenth century. Professor Shapiro's analysis of this previously unknown dispute and of the reasons for the chemist's attack on Newton's theory illuminates the nature and relation of physics and chemistry during this seminal period of their development.

The first volume of a three-volume complete edition of Newton's optical papers contains his Optical Lectures, delivered at Cambridge University between 1670 and 1672. The Lectures is Newton's first major scientific treatise, and consequently it represents a crucial link between his early years of discovery and his mature investigations and publications, such as the Optiks in 1704. It is divided into two parts: the first part devoted to color and the second to refraction. Originally published in 1984, this edition made available the complete text, together with translation and commentary, of both surviving versions of the Lectures, a draft and a vastly expanded revision. Until the time of publication, scholars had to depend on an uncritical text of the revision and an inadequate partial English translation, both published shortly after Newton's death. Professor Shapiro's critical edition has made a great contribution to the study of Newtonian science.

Newton's Opticks is the most influential optical and experimental work of the eighteenth century. This final volume of The Optical Papers of Isaac Newton contains manuscripts that document the evolution of the Opticks through its three principal published editions. It shows how Newton constructed the book that for over a century was the leading treatise on optics, a fecund source of natural philosophical speculations, and which is now considered a classic of science. The volume opens with the manuscript of the first edition (1704) and the first draft of the Opticks in Latin, which he soon abandoned for English. This is followed by the manuscripts of the queries that Newton added to the Latin translation in 1706 and the second English edition in 1717. Other, shorter manuscripts are included, as are copious notes and commentary, making this a valuable resource for historians and philosophers of science, and historians of philosophy.

A collection of twenty original essays on the history of science and mathematics. The topics covered embrace the main themes of Whiteside's scholarly work, emphasising Newtonian topics: mathematics and astronomy to Newton; Newton's manuscripts; Newton's Principia; Newton and eighteenth-century mathematics and physics; after Newton: optics and dynamics. The focus of these themes gives the volume considerable coherence. This volume of essays makes available important original work on Newton and the history of the exact sciences. This volume has been published in honour of D. T. Whiteside, famous for his edition of The Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton.