JOVANA
Library Glossary Getting Started Three Levels Fields How it works Mission
Join the mission
Back to the library
物理学 1687

自然哲学的数学原理

艾萨克·牛顿

三条运动定律与一条引力定律,同时支配着苹果与行星。

Choose your version
In depth · the introduction

牛顿发现,同样几条规则,既解释了落地的苹果,也解释了月球的轨道,还有潮水的涨落。

核心想法

牛顿的第一步,是彻底厘清「运动究竟如何发生」,归结为三条定律。其一:除非有力作用其上,否则物体会保持它原有的状态——静止不动,或沿直线滑行。其二:力会按其大小成比例地改变物体的运动,而越重的东西,在同样一推之下变化越小。其三:每一次推,都伴随着一次同样大小的反推。这三句话,至今仍是每个物理学生最先学到的东西。

他的第二步,更为大胆,那就是引力。他提出,每一小块物质都会对其他每一小块物质施加同一种力——东西越重,力越强;而它会以一种精确的方式随距离减弱(距离远一倍,力就只剩四分之一)。一条规则,横跨整片空间,把苹果、月球、行星与潮汐,系进了同一个体系。

它是如何诞生的

1665 年,瘟疫使剑桥停课,年轻的牛顿退回到伍尔索普的家族农庄。日后他说,正是在那段「瘟疫之年」里,他的创造力达到了顶峰——勾勒微积分,用棱镜分解光线,并开始琢磨:那股让苹果坠落的力,会不会一直伸到月球那么远?(那座果园里确曾掉下一只苹果;「灵光乍现」的版本是个齐整的传说,但那个问题,是真的。)

这个想法此后基本搁置、未曾发表,达二十年之久。直到 1684 年,天文学家爱德蒙·哈雷登门,问他:在一个平方反比的力之下,行星会沿什么曲线运行?牛顿当即答道:椭圆——他早已算了出来。哈雷大为惊讶,竟然这样的证明从未发表,便又是劝说、又是亲自出资,催成了这部书的写作。其成果,便是 1687 年以拉丁文问世的《原理》,三卷厚重的著作,重塑了运动之学。

它为何重要

在牛顿之前,天空是神秘的领地;在他之后,它成了算术。他表明,宇宙依照我们能够写下、并用以预测未来的定律运转——明年某颗行星会在何处,某颗彗星何时归来,潮水会涨到多高。这正是现代科学与工程的奠基性承诺:自然是有法度的,而那些法度,等着我们去找出、去使用。

一个可以想象的画面

有一个小窍门,能让「轨道」这件事变得讲得通。扔出一个球,它会划一道弧落到地上——因为它一边往前走,引力一边把它往下拉。扔得越用力,落点越远。现在,想象你把它扔得极快,快到在它下落的同时,脚下的大地正以同样的速度向远处弯去——球一直在坠落,却始终不再靠近地面。这就是轨道:横着坠落得如此之快,以至于你一次又一次地「错过」了地球。月球,正是永远在做这件事。

牛顿山顶大炮的互动示意图。一个炮口速度滑块发射炮弹;随着速度增大,弹道依次从坠回地面,变为圆形轨道,再到拉长的椭圆,最终成为飞离地球、奔向太空的曲线。

后来发生了什么

牛顿的宇宙,像钟表一样运转了两个世纪。下一次伟大的统一,来自詹姆斯·克拉克·麦克斯韦:1860 年代,他把电、磁与光,叠合进同一组场方程——把牛顿那个「普适定律」的梦想,延伸到了一片全新的领域。

随后,在 1905 与 1915 年,阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦更改写了牛顿的整座舞台。他表明,绝对空间与绝对时间并不存在,并把引力重新设想为:不是越过虚空伸来的一种力,而是质量使时空发生的弯曲。牛顿定律,作为爱因斯坦理论在日常尺度上的极限被保留了下来——用在苹果、桥梁与火箭上,精确得惊人,至今仍是我们飞往月球所用的那套力学。

The original document
Original source text

公理,即运动的定律

Isaac Newton · Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica · 1687 · Axioms, or Laws of Motion (Motte trans., 1729)
Law I
Every body perseveres in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed thereon.
Projectiles persevere in their motions, so far as they are not retarded by the resistance of the air, or impelled downwards by the force of gravity. A top, whose parts by their cohesion are perpetually drawn aside from rectilinear motions, does not cease its rotation, otherwise than as it is retarded by the air.
Law II
The alteration of motion is ever proportional to the motive force impressed; and is made in the direction of the right line in which that force is impressed.
If any force generates a motion, a double force will generate double the motion, a triple force triple the motion, whether that force be impressed altogether and at once, or gradually and successively.
Law III
To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction: or the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts.
Whatever draws or presses another is as much drawn or pressed by that other. If you press a stone with your finger, the finger is also pressed by the stone.

论万有引力(第三卷)

Book III · Of the System of the World · Propositions on gravity
There is a power of gravity tending to all bodies, proportional to the several quantities of matter which they contain.
That all the planets gravitate towards one another we have proved before; as well as that the force of gravity towards every one of them, considered apart, is reciprocally as the square of the distance of places from the centre of the planet.
And this is the force by which the moon is retained in its orbit, and by which bodies fall toward the earth. The force which retains the celestial bodies in their orbits is the very same force we commonly call gravity; for the moon, were it deprived of all motion, would, by its gravity, fall toward the earth.
And therefore the force by which the moon is retained in its orbit is that very same force which we commonly call gravity.

宇宙体系

From “A Treatise of the System of the World” · Newton's own thought experiment
The greater the velocity with which a body is projected, the farther it goes before it falls to the earth. We may therefore suppose the velocity to be so increased, that it would describe an arc of 1, 2, 5, 10, 100, 1000 miles before it arrived at the earth, till at last, exceeding the limits of the earth, it should pass quite by without touching it.
A body projected from the top of a high mountain, parallel to the horizon, with a sufficient velocity, would not fall to the earth at all, but go forward into the celestial spaces, and proceed in its motion in infinitum. And the same reasoning that holds for the projectile holds also for the moon, which is perpetually drawn off from a rectilinear course toward the earth, and made to revolve in a curve.
And by the same principle the planets are kept in their orbits about the sun, and the satellites about their primary planets — the one force of gravity governing them all.

总释

The General Scholium · added to the 2nd edition, 1713
Hitherto we have explained the phenomena of the heavens and of our sea by the power of gravity, but have not yet assigned the cause of this power. This is certain, that it must proceed from a cause that penetrates to the very centres of the sun and planets, and operates according to the quantity of the solid matter which they contain, and propagates its virtue on all sides to immense distances, decreasing always as the inverse square of the distances.
I have not been able to discover the cause of those properties of gravity from phenomena, and I frame no hypotheses. … It is enough that gravity does really exist, and act according to the laws which we have explained, and abundantly serves to account for all the motions of the celestial bodies, and of our sea.
“Hypotheses non fingo.” — General Scholium