sci.physics.electromag

maxwell wrote:


> Wrong again, Bob. Calculus was introduced to SOLVE the equations, not
> to derive the ideas, which were in the tradition of natural philosophy
> - a subject that mathematicians like yourself feel really
> uncomfortable with. Check out Principia.

I read it cover to cover. Newton published -Princiipia- using
traditional geometric language because his calculus methods were
relatively unknown to his target audience. He invented calculus to talk
about motion. Calculus is the language of motion. He could not have
formulated his physics without calculus.

It turns out the later developments of classical mechanics required the
least action principle and the calculus of variations to be stated. See
the works of Jacobi, Lagrange and Hamilton.

Bob Kolker