Thesis ID: CBB001560501

Equilibrium and Explanation in 18th-Century Mechanics (2007)

unapi

Hepburn, Brian S. (Author)


University of Pittsburgh
Machamer, Peter K.


Publication Date: 2007
Edition Details: Advisor: Machamer, Peter K.
Physical Details: 141 pp.
Language: English

The received view of the Scientific Revolution is that it was completed with the publication of Isaac Newton's (1642-1727) Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica in 1687. Work on mechanics in the century or more following was thought to be merely filling in the mathematical details of Newton's program, in particular of translating his mechanics from its synthetic expression into analytic form. I show that the mechanics of Leonhard Euler (1707-1782) and Joseph-Louis Lagrange (1736-1813) did not begin with Newton's Three Laws. They provided their own beginning principles and interpretations of the relation between mathematical description and nature. Functional relations among the quantified properties of bodies were interpreted as basic mechanical connections between those bodies. Equilibrium played an important role in explaining the behavior of physical systems understood mechanically. Some behavior was revealed to be an equilibrium condition; other behavior was understood as a variation from equilibrium. Implications for scientific explanation are then drawn from these historical considerations, specifically an alternative account of mechanical explanation and unification. Trying to cast mechanical explanations (of the kind considered here) as Kitcher-style argument schema fails to distinguish legitimate from spurious explanations. Consideration of the mechanical analogies lying behind the schema are required.

...More

Description With a focus on the work of Lagrange, Euler, and Newton. Cited in Diss. Abstr. Int. A 68/09 (2008). Pub. no. AAT 3284573.


Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001560501/

Similar Citations

Article Gallavotti, Giovanni; (2013)
Aspects of Lagrange's Mechanics and their Legacy (/isis/citation/CBB001320790/)

Book Capecchi, Danilo; Drago, Antonino; (2005)
Lagrange e la storia della meccanica (/isis/citation/CBB000740070/)

Article Ariga, Nobumichi; (2006)
Euler's Variational Mechanics (/isis/citation/CBB000774076/)

Article Maltese, Giulio; (2000)
On the Relativity of Motion in Leonhard Euler's Science (/isis/citation/CBB000740281/)

Article Nakata, Ryoichi; (2002)
The General Principle for Resolving Mechanical Problems in d'Almbert, Clairaut and Euler (/isis/citation/CBB000330337/)

Book Suisky, Dieter; (2009)
Euler as Physicist (/isis/citation/CBB000954470/)

Article Hepburn, Brian; (2010)
Euler, vis viva, and Equilibrium (/isis/citation/CBB001021663/)

Book Assayag, Gérard; Feichtinger, Hans Georg; Rodrigues, José Francisco; (2002)
Mathematics and Music: A Diderot Mathematical Forum (/isis/citation/CBB000330004/)

Chapter Huggett, Nick; (2012)
What Did Newton Mean by “Absolute Motion”? (/isis/citation/CBB001500345/)

Chapter Marius Stan; (2017)
Newton’s Concepts of Force among the Leibnizians (/isis/citation/CBB491004939/)

Book J. B. Shank; (2018)
Before Voltaire: The French Origins of “Newtonian” Mechanics, 1680-1715 (/isis/citation/CBB213401894/)

Chapter Maltese, Giulio; (2006)
On the Changing Fortune of the Newtonian Tradition in Mechanics (/isis/citation/CBB000774503/)

Article Bruce Pourciau; (2020)
The Principia’s second law (as Newton understood it) from Galileo to Laplace (/isis/citation/CBB715090012/)

Article Frisch, Uriel; Villone, Barbara; (2014)
Cauchy's Almost Forgotten Lagrangian Formulation of the Euler Equation for 3D Incompressible Flow (/isis/citation/CBB001421685/)

Book Paolo Freguglia; Mariano Giaquinta; (2016)
The Early Period of the Calculus of Variations (/isis/citation/CBB578052686/)

Authors & Contributors
Pulte, Helmut
Maltese, Giulio
Mariano Giaquinta
Mueller, Olaf L.
Villone, Barbara
Frisch, Uriel
Concepts
Physics
Mechanics
Mathematics
Motion (physical)
Newtonianism
Forces
Time Periods
18th century
17th century
19th century
20th century
Places
Germany
France
Europe
Institutions
Académie des Sciences, Paris
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment