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Test Tubes and Tantrums

Factual: Science & Nature

William Hartson examines some of the great arguments in the history of science.


When great science minds collide the insults traded and the bile spilt can be both personal and scandalous. William Hartston examines some of the great arguments of science.


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Test Tubes and Tantrums: Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

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01/07/2004

Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

BBC Radio 4 - Test Tubes and Tantrums, Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm LeibnizSearch BBC

The great clash that occurred between Newton and Leibniz over the discovery of calculus.

When Leibniz published his paper on calculus in 1684 and didn't even mention Newton a schism in science opened that would not heal for some 140 years. 


It is probably impossible to overestimate the importance to science of differential and integral calculus. It is now generally accepted that Newton and Leibniz discovered it independently of each other, Newton first formulating his methods around 1665. 

But when Leibniz, a German civil servant, published his work in 1684 and didn't even mention the name of the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, who had helped him in letters on more than one occasion, blood boiled in the lounges of learned societies and on podiums of lecture halls across Europe, and a schism in science opened up that would hold back British science and thinking, and would not heal for some 140 years. 

Newton was buried in Westminster Abbey, a national hero. Leibniz, who has since been described as the last universal genius, died a poor failure, with only his former secretary attending his funeral.


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