It’s Isaac Newton’s birthday. At least, it’s the anniversary of his birth – January 4, 1643, according the the Gregorian calendar.
If you’re a purist, you might have already marked the anniversary of his birth, on December 25th. As according to the Julian calendar, in use in England, at the time of his birth, the scientific great was born on Christmas Day, 1642.
We’ve all heard the story. A young Isaac Newton is sitting beneath an apple tree contemplating the mysterious universe. Suddenly – boink! – an apple hits him on the head. “Aha!” he shouts, or perhaps, “Eureka!” In a flash, he experiences a stroke of brilliant insight & discovers the laws of gravity. Is the apple-falling business exactly what happened, or is it simply a mythical tale embellished by generations of story tellers over the course of time? In celebration of Sir Isaac Newton’s birthday, we decided to dig up one of our favorite e-news articles from the High Touch High Tech E-News Archives: “Newton’s Apple…The Real Story!” – We get to the core of the matter & investigate the truth behind the most famous apple in science!
In addition to laying out the Laws of Motion, he also did innovative work on the properties of light, as can be seen in this Lego re-enactment. And of course the logo for Apple, Inc. would only have half the symbolism it does if it weren’t for him.
You can discover Newton’s famous contributions to science for yourself with this cool Laws of Motion Interactive!
