newton theory of gravitation?

Answer 1

two substances have an affinity to attract to one another. The one with more mass will dominate. We are attracted to Earth, and atoms to each other. Did that help?

Answer 2

Any body that has mass will attract other bodies with mass.
Any body with mass will be attracted by other bodies with mass.

The force is proportional to the product of the masses.
The force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance.

Depending on the units you use (e.g., kg for mass, m for distance, N for force), you need a 'constant' to adjust the answer.

This constant (G) is 6.672x10^-11 N m^2 / kg^2
If you use pounds, slugs and feet (as Newton may have), your constant will be different. A slug is a unit of mass: it is the mass that will be accelerated at 1 ft/s^2 when submitted to a force of 1 pound. On Earth's surface, a mass of one slug would weigh 32.2 pounds.

F = G * m1 * m2 / d^2

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or, as Newton said in Book III (Principia):

Theorem 7: "There is a power of gravity tending to all bodies, proportional to the several quantities of matter which they contain."

In Book I, "quantity of matter" is defined to be what we, today, call mass.

Theorem 8: "In two spheres, mutually gravitating, each towards the other, if the matter in planes on all sides round about and equi-distant from the centres is similar, the weight of either sphere towards the other will be reciprocally as the square of the distance between their centres."

This is a 2-part: first, showing that we can calculate as if the entire mass of a planet is represented at the centre (if the layers are regular); then showing that mutual gravity is proportional to the inverse of the distance squared.

F is proportional to m1 * m2 / d^2


Well, Newton actually wrote this in Latin, so these are not his actual words...

Answer 3

force between 2 pt. masses is directly proportional to:
-- product of their masses
-- 1/ square of distance between them
F=GMm/r.r