Reference Index
Reference Index Abbé Catalan [21] Archimedes [1] Aristotle [1], [7], [13], [16] Bellerophon [pref] Bernoulli, Johann I…
Chapter 21. Of the Force of Bodies
Chapter 21 entitled “Of the Force of Bodies” is not about force in the modern sense, but about living force and its conservation, i.e.,…
Chapter 20. Of Dead Forces, or Pressing Forces, and the Equilibrium of Powers
At the beginning of Chapter 20, Du Châtelet distinguishes between two kinds of moving, or motive forces (InstPhy, § 519):…
Chapter 19. Of the Motion of Projectiles
This chapter deals with a special case of the motion of bodies, namely with projectile motion. Projectile motion is a form of motion experienced…
Chapter 18. Of the Oscillation of Pendulums
This chapter explores how gravitational forces act on objects by exploring the motion of pendulums. Du Châtelet defines “pendulum” as follows (InstPhy, § 443):…
Chapter 17. Of Rest, and the Fall of Bodies on an Inclined Plane
Chapter 17 is about the fall of the bodies along an inclined plane. According to the gravitational law, the action of gravity is always uniform,…
Chapter 16. Of Newtonian Attraction
Newton’s law of universal gravitation describes all the phenomena that were explained in the three preceding chapters. However, what is gravity? Gravity is the…
Chapter 15. Of Mr. Newton’s Discoveries on Heaviness
Nothing has caused philosophers so much trouble as to explain the phenomenon of gravity. Du Châtelet continues that, according to the principle of sufficient reason, everything…
Chapter 14. Of the Phenomena of Heaviness, Continued
The Chapter begins with a brief summary of the previous chapter, namely with Galileo’s law of free fall. It asserts that if two objects are…
Chapter 13. Of Heaviness
We call “pesanteur” (heaviness; gravity) the force by which every body being left to itself falls toward the surface (center) of the earth. The…
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