Émilie du Châtelet · Science
Du Châtelet’s championing of <em>vis viva</em> (living force, mass times velocity squared) against the Newtonians’ momentum (mass times velocity): the 's Gravesande clay-ball experiments, her argument in the <em>Institutions</em>, and the long road from mv² to kinetic energy and the square in <em>E = mc²</em>.
You learned that du Châtelet defended Leibniz’s vis viva (mv²) against the Cartesian and Newtonian measure of force (mv), using 's Gravesande’s clay-ball experiments, and that mv² is the ancestor of kinetic energy. Explain the experiment and why the depth of the dent grows as the square of the sp…
Leads to Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz.
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