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Wednesday, September 15, 2021

09-15-2021-0435 - Method of Fluxions

Method of Fluxions (latin De Methodis Serierum et Fluxionum) [1] is a book by Isaac Newton. The book was completed in 1671, and published in 1736. Fluxion is Newton's term for a derivative. He originally developed the method at Woolsthorpe Manor during the closing of Cambridge during the Great Plague of London from 1665 to 1667, but did not choose to make his findings known (similarly, his findings which eventually became the Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica were developed at this time and hidden from the world in Newton's notes for many years). Gottfried Leibnizdeveloped his form of calculus independently around 1673, 7 years after Newton had developed the basis for differential calculus, as seen in surviving documents like “the method of fluxions and fluents..." from 1666. Leibniz however published his discovery of differential calculus in 1684, nine years before Newton formally published his fluxion notation form of calculus in part during 1693.[2] The calculus notation in use today is mostly that of Leibniz, although Newton's dot notation for differentiation  for denoting derivatives with respect to time is still in current use throughout mechanics and circuit analysis.

Newton's Method of Fluxions was formally published posthumously, but following Leibniz's publication of the calculus a bitter rivalry erupted between the two mathematicians over who had developed the calculus first, provoking Newton to reveal his work on fluxions.

The method of fluxions and infinite series cover.jpg


Cover of book published in 1736

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_Fluxions


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