Newton's interpretation of Newton's second law (Q851097)

The wording of Newton's second law of motion has been the subject of discussion ever since its publication in the Principia in 1687, and in recent decades several historians have taken it up. The fairly common view is that the law describes the effect of impulses upon the struck body rather than forces in the form \(F=ma\) that came to be taken as definitive [\textit{G. Maltese}, La storia de \(F =ma\). La seconda legge del moto nel XVIII secolo, Florence: Olschki (1992)]. Some commentators have added that Newton also gave the law a continuous reading consistent with the later reading, and for a few of them that the double interpretation may be reconciled, or at least be permitted, by the use of infinitesimals and limits, which were main tools of Newton's fluxional calculus. Some of Newton's own diagrams, such as the famous one showing the orbit of a body about a centre of attraction, present a sequence of (infinitesimally?) neighbouring points of its orbit; but the author maintains that in all cases of use of the second law a continuous effect is being analysed. The issue is at the fore especially where the ''force'' is applied obliquely to the current direction of motion of the struck body, when the consequent deflection of the path is of prime concern. His own diagrams show discrete positions of the body (for example, p. 162), but this may be due to the needs of visualising and explaining the analysis (as indeed might apply to Newton himself). The author also argues that some of Newton's corollaries in the book follow more easily from a continuous reading of the law than from an impulse interpretation. His case is put forward with strength, but the double reading still has its attractions; maybe it was used intentionally by Newton in order to cover the desired range of phenomena. Some interesting remarks are also given about the influence upon Newton of Galileo, however Newton came to know of his works.