Some part of the physical world draws our attention. These two pieces of the history of physics serve well to illustrate the spirit and essence of physics. More than this, it established a model for all physicists to follow. His reasoning extended from the fundamental force law all the way to the resulting motion, with both crucial links devised by him. In his famous Principia Mathematica Newton solved the problem of the Moon’s motion around the Earth. Newton demonstrated that force produces acceleration (not velocity!). More than four thousand years of debate among natural philosophers had not resolved this fundamental issue. The basic relationship between causes (forces) and effects (motion) was not established in Newton’s time. However Newton’s contribution was deeper than this. Not satisfied that his arguments were sound, Newton invented the calculus to help calculate the gravitational force of the Earth on the Moon.īeing the first to find a truly fundamental and universal law of nature would have insured his reputation. Newton was the first to describe a fundamental force of nature mathematically. It is easy to understand why he receives this distinction. Sir Isaac Newton is often mentioned as the person who made the greatest contribution to physics. With the addition of a single term to Ampére’s Law, Maxwell recognized that all classical electromagnetic effects were described by the four equations he compiled. This increasingly complex understanding was built at each step on relatively simple experiments or observations. André Marie Ampére and others described how electric currents can create magnetic effects and Michael Faraday showed that changing magnetic phenomena creates electrical phenomena. Hans Christian Oersted was the first to report a connection between magnetism and electricity when he noticed that a wire carrying an electric current disturbed the needle of a nearby compass. His results were rewritten in a particularly powerful form by the great mathematician Karl Friedrich Gauss. Charles Augustin de Coulomb (and others) performed these experiments. The earliest studies began by isolating positive and negative objects and observing their interactions. The history of Maxwell’s insight illustrates how the physics community works from simple isolated systems toward a fundamental and general law (or set of laws).Īll electrical phenomena involve the interaction between positive and negative charges. The physicist begins with the simplest systems that she or he can identify.
Achieving this understanding is very difficult in the face of the complex interactions that take place around us each day. To the physicist this beauty is enriched when we perceive the underlying simplicity of physical laws. With these relations one can understand such diverse phenomena as electric power generation, the refrigerator magnet that holds up your shopping list, the bonding of chemical elements, and why a balloon will stick to the ceiling after it has been rubbed on your sweater. As an example James Clerk Maxwell summarized all of classical electromagnetic theory into four simple equations Maxwell’s Equations. The physicist attempts to describe the interaction with the most fundamental and general law or principle possible. Physics is the study of the interactions between physical systems. But a collection of facts is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house. Science is built up with facts as a house is with stones.
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