Mechanics and the solar system | Math History | NJ Wildberger

The main historical problem in the history of science is: to explain what is going on with the night sky, in particular what the planets are doing. The resolution of this was the greatest achievement of the 17th century. The key figures were Copernicus, Galileo, Brahe, Kepler and most famously Isaac Newton. This interesting story, culminating with Kepler's Laws and their explanation by Newton's Laws of Motion and Law of Gravitation, ought to be studied in depth by all undergraduate students of mathematics! It is notable that the story involves classical geometry in a major way, and gives a great impetus to our study of conic sections and their many remarkable properties. ************************ Screenshot PDFs for my videos are available at the website http://wildegg.com. These give you a concise overview of the contents of the lectures for various Playlists: great for review, study and summary. My research papers can be found at my Research Gate page, at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Norman_Wildberger My blog is at http://njwildberger.com/, where I will discuss lots of foundational issues, along with other things. Online courses will be developed at openlearning.com. The first one, already underway is Algebraic Calculus One at https://www.openlearning.com/courses/algebraic-calculus-one/ Please join us for an exciting new approach to one of mathematics' most important subjects! If you would like to support these new initiatives for mathematics education and research, please consider becoming a Patron of this Channel at https://www.patreon.com/njwildberger Your support would be much appreciated.