San Francisco — The physicist whose most significant breakthrough was portrayed in the original Apple logo, is the latest event being celebrated today by a “Google Doodle” that depicts an apple falling from a tree: an event that inspired him to formulate his theory of gravity, and established him as one of the world’s greatest scientists. This impressive piece comes as the world organizes parties beneath apple trees to commemorate the birth of Sir Isaac Newton, who was born on Christmas day in 1642.
As the story goes, Sir Isaac Newton, the famed physicist who was inspired to hypothesize his theory of gravitation by an apple falling on his head as he was taking a walk in a garden, was born on December 25, 1642 but after England switched to the Gregorian calendar, in 1752, his birthday became January 4, 1643. He died, aged 84, on March 31, 1727.
Google’s Doodle Pays Tribute To Isaac Newton
Google frequently celebrates many important events by changing its Doodles — the visually attractive logos that sit above its search box on the otherwise minimalist page — since the past few months but this is the first animated logo. Newton’s doodle is unusual in being the first to include an action — a falling apple — and in having a photographic quality. However, Google did display animated “Happy New Year” messages to users who clicked on its I’m Feeling Lucky box on January 1.
Famed primarily for his Principia Mathematica (1687), which contained his laws of motion and law of universal gravitation, went against traditional ideas that must have seemed “obvious” to many non-scientists.
Legend has it that Newton developed his theory of gravity after seeing an apple fall in his orchard. He had been trying to understand how the moon stayed in orbit around the earth and reasoned that it was by the same force that caused the apple to fall to earth. This broke with Aristotelian physics, which assumed that some sort of force was necessary to keep things in motion.
Newton’s hypothesis of gravity also described the moon’s influence on the tides, “for there will be a stronger attraction upon that part of the water that is nearest to the body, and a weaker upon that part which is more remote,” he wrote.