Isaac Newton: The guy sat under trees, got hit by apples, and wore funny wigs. He also gets all the credit for way too many things. Isaac Newton published his method for finding roots of a polynomial in Method of Fluxions in 1736. It was the method we are all too familiar with: find a tangent, find it’s root, continue. He even gave an example of how to find a root of x^3 - 2x - 5 = 0. It is a great method, no doubt. The same method was published by an English mathematician by the name of Joseph Raphson. In his book Analysis aequationum universalis, he too described how to find the root of a function using what we know as Newton’s method. Oh, and one small detail, Raphson’s book was published in 1690, almost 50 years before Newton’s. Hmm. That’s odd. Isaac Newton, the revered mathematician, decides that he wants to have his name associated with a particular algorithm, so he writes a book detailing it years later and gets all the credit. Personally, I think I’d like to have my name associated to the Pythagorean Theorem, but to each his own. So when I first googled Raphson, I did find several references to the method we know and love, which was named the “Newton-Raphson method.” So a reasonable chunk of the scientific community has given the guy his due credit. Nevertheless, I would like to start a new era where the great Isaac Newton no longer has his name associated to that incredibly annoying, tedious, time-wasting … thing… we have to do on homework and prelims. Rather I suggest Raphson should get all the blame. So, next time we have a question about “Newton’s Method,” we shouldn’t be cursing the majestic scientist, rather we should be cursing Joseph Raphson.

Oh and btw, while Newton’s book was published int 1736, it appears that it was written in 1671. So if you want to continue cursing Newton, that’s fine with me.

http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Biographies/Raphson.html