Infinitesimals, differences, and the Method of
Fluxions were foremost in the minds of the leading mathematicians.
I know too well that a great majority of Englishmen are fond of The Indefinite which they Measure by Newton's Doctrine of the
Fluxions of an Atom, A Thing that does not Exist.
Maclaurin, A treatise on
fluxions, Edinburgh: printed by T.W.
The past is not past, the future folds back upon itself, and the present is shot through with
fluxions of past and future that destabilize it.
It also reveals Newman as sophisticated thinker about calculus, Newtonian
fluxions, evolution, and physical science.
In launching the dissertation, I fortified myself further with his new and landmark essay "The Voice of the Shuttle." At its midpoint, I, together with the rest of us, was rhetorically excused for being "probably impatient" (BF, 347) with its phonetic microstylistics, its phantasmal (and infinitesimal) discriminations no doubt laying themselves open to Bishop Berkeley's complaint about Newton's "
fluxions" as the mere "ghosts of departed qualities" (BF, 347).
This author has analyzed the chronological timelines of numerous scientific discoveries, including these: Euclidian Geometry, Newton's derivation of
fluxions (calculus), Newton's development of a theory of universal gravitation, unified geometry, thermionic emission, and Pauli's exclusion principle in physics (Harmon, 1973).
in the system (1), r is differential equations of the first degree that include only those generalized coordinates [q.sub.j] (j = 1, 2, r) and their
fluxions [[??].sub.j] not presented in the equation of the second
fluxions [[??].sub.j] (Eq.
This highly abstract approach to natural philosophy mirrors Leibniz's preference for an algebraic version of the calculus (as opposed to the geometrical '
fluxions' favored by Newton).