The validity of Newton's lemma 28 (Q5953249)

``Lemma 28 in Book I of Isaac Newton's \textit{Principia} is a startingly simple proof that the areas of oval figures are not expressible in algebraic equations with a finite number of terms.'' \textit{D. T. Whiteside} had pointed to what he considered flaws in the lemma in his edition of ``The Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton'', Vol. 6, pp. 302-309 (1974; Zbl 0296.01007). ``The purpose of this note is to point out the weaknesses of Whiteside's arguments in order to clarify the scope and validity of Lemma 28'' (quotations from the text of the article). NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEThe author shows that Whiteside's objections are based on a family of oval curves which are not smoothly mappable to a circle and hence not algebraically integrable. Newton, however, had in mind ovals which are (expressed in modern terms) infinitely smooth: such ovals are not expressible in finite algebraic equations. (This implies that the Kepler problem of smooth orbits, in which Newton is here concerned, could not be solved by finite Cartesian algebra, but required the application of infinite series).