Naked Science Forum

General Science => General Science => Topic started by: Geezer on 08/02/2011 03:57:01

Title: If Newton had SuperCalc, would we have Calculus?
Post by: Geezer on 08/02/2011 03:57:01

A highly speculative question I admit, but if Newton had access to SuperCalc, or one of it's derivatives (hehe), like Excel, would he even have bothered to develop The Calculus?

Title: If Newton had SuperCalc, would we have Calculus?
Post by: lightarrow on 08/02/2011 13:15:14

He woudn't have written anything of mathematics or physics: he would have passed all his life trying to understand the Supercalc's functioning  [;)]

Title: If Newton had SuperCalc, would we have Calculus?
Post by: imatfaal on 08/02/2011 17:00:22

I am glad that Sir Isaac spent his time developing strange mathematical procedures and self-experimenting; if he had been a child of the 1970-80 his great intellect would have been devoted to separating me from my money in new and inventive ways. 

Title: If Newton had SuperCalc, would we have Calculus?
Post by: yor_on on 10/02/2011 19:21:42

Don't you think he would have found it he** on wheels to find his place inside physics, considering his interest in the slightly 'unusual' :)

Alchemy I mean.

Wouldn't it been sweet if it actually had worked out. Wonder how society would look then? And physics :) All dressed in black robes mumbling incantation over different colored powders, turning levers and directing the rays of the sun. Yep, I think it would have been interesting, although no weirder than what we have as it is :)