Leibniz or Newton, who do you think discovered calculus?

Question

Well I know we shouldn't reopen old debates but I feel conflict is always agreeable.

As this is an english speaking, site perhaps there may be bias but let me wait for the best answer.

Answer 1

Language is a medium of human expression through verbal communication while mathematics is a means to logical human thinking by symbolic expression. Instead of raising conflict as to who discovered calculus it is better to consider what influenced both the pioneering philsophers accredited with its discovery. In my opinion it is the all encompassing time spirit of 17'th century inspiring human thought to break away from emperically formulated narrow expressions to a more generalized and broader ones adding rationality to logic and flexibility to explain phenomenal observations. This development can be traced as a natural consequence to the events of the preceding century when Rev.Martin Luther of Mayance (Mainz) in Germany revolted against and broke away from dogmatic exploitation and abuse of of Papal Authority over innocent general populance in the name of God instilling courage in human minds to think logically and act rationally. Advancements in printing and book publishing industry have also added similarly to human communication through availability and purchase of books cheaply within the means of personal economy. Continuing in the same spirit humanity has found a new method of logical communication with the unique means of an universally accepted and understood common language of mathematical symbolism and expressions of thought manipulative operations free from all veriety of verbal languages and redundancy of spoken sounds and attributed meanings. Indeed human mind is never abridged in the extent of observation and comprehesion of phenomenal manifestations ranging from infinitesmal to infinte dimensions nor human thought deficient in eloquence of inner expression as seen from the works of Greek philosophers during the Age of Enlightenment and attested as an example in Zeno's paradoxes. The efforts to resolve differences between inner intuition and external expression that persisted over centuries in the progress of human thought received parametric impetus during the age of Renaissance under the influence of time spirit(Zeitgeist) as seen earlier resulting in enhanced differentiating capabilities of human observation using infinitesimally small differences in negotiating slopes ,.curves , bends and chasms of phenomenal variations within ranges of coprehensible and definable set limits using functional notations and graphical techniques developed by Descartes. Thus culminated the yearnings of human inquiry in gauging God between subtle and gross manifestations ,between definable and transcending limits, bridging the gaps that abridged earlier human thought through the works of His emissaries in the names and forms of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Isaac Newton.

Answer 2

I studied physics and did a lot of math with it, and this came up quite a few times of course.

It really does seem that both invented calculus independently, around the 1670s. Newton, and others, claimed for many years that Leibniz had stolen Newton's ideas - however Newton did not publish any papers till well after Leibniz's own papers, and his manuscripts, discovered after his death, were not dated.

In any case, both were great mathematicians so it is not to be doubted that inventing calculus was well within their means.

This whole dispute, and Newton's pretty ugly attitude in it, meant that Britain used his notation of dots over the letters meaning a derivative, while the rest of the world used Leibniz's notation of dy/dx, plus a large elongated "S" to mean an integral, something which had clearly been invented by Leibniz (no controversy on this one). Some people believe that this kept Britain away from most mathematical progress for maybe a century - which would tend to be confirmed by the lack of great British mathematicians during that period while the French or Germans were pushing.

Today most mathematicians use either Langrange's notation of the primes f'(x), f''(x), etc., or Leibniz's. While Newton's notation is used only in mechanics, and only by physicists with at least a college degree.

And most mathematicians do not really care who invented calculus, at least not during their daily work.


Hope this helps

Answer 3

Neither discovered calculus. Archimedes was the first to use the methods of calculus. Academics like to state that Archimedes knew only of the methods of integral calculus. They do this in ignorance because a derivative and an integral are both limits of infinite average sums. The methods Newton begun with were numerical, i.e. he computed derivatives by finite differences (nothing about limits here). Archimedes did the same with integral calculus. Thus, I would credit Archimedes, not Newton or Leibniz as the discoverers of calculus.

Answer 4

Both discovered calculus,Newton(4 January 1643 – 31 March 1727) lived the same period with leibniz(July 1 1646 – November 14, 1716),

All the same ,none of them actualy discovered calculus,the Kerala school in the 14th century had developed much of differential calculus well before Newton or Leibniz.

Chek wikipedia.

Answer 5

Newton and Leibniz both invented forms of calculus, Leibniz's notation became the more common, but it's all come a long way since then. Only dentists discover calculus (or is that another debate?).

Answer 6

Neither. It all came about in ancient Greece with the work of Eudoxus and Archimedes. There was then a gap of about 500 years before the mathematician astronomer Aryabhata developing infinitesimals and the basic differential equation. The foundations of modern calculus were devised by Bhaskara and Madhava.

Answer 7

I would credit the Greeks for first discovering it, Newton for realising its full potential and Leibniz for rigourising it and giving it formal notation.

Answer 8

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz (1646 - 1716) discovered Calculus.

Answer 9

is this a question about ethics in science instead? we all know that Newton thought of calculus before Leibniz but Newton was a selfish bastard at his heart. he did not want other people to use his tools in answering important questions etc. which kept the lion share of power, fame and recognition to him in his post as a president of the royal society.

to me, the question should have been who gave calculus to mankind and the answer to that is Leibniz.

Answer 10

According to me , both Gottfried Leibneiz and Isaac Newton developed CALCULUS INDEPENDENTLY, and perhaps they invented the same thing just by coincidence.

Answer 11

They were both hacks who stole Calculus from one Mr. Joey " the Fish" Calc... you see Joey was working on his "new Math" in his house which in his native langauge was caled a "ulus", well these other guys stumble by and looked in his window and stole his idea and called it Calculus as a way of making fun of Joey. Joey got his revenge when he had both of those guys beaten within an inch of their collective lives and since they were better known to society than Joey they were credited with "inventing" calculus... Now you know the "rest of the story..."