Grav Mass Day, Newtonmas

The ancient Greek scientist Archimedes discovered in the 3rd century BC the law of hydrostatics and aerostatics when taking a bath DI Mendeleev saw a table with a system of chemical elements in a dream One of the fundamental laws of physics was discovered from an apple falling on his head - the theory of universal gravitation It was developed in 1666 by Sir Isaac Newton The force of gravity, within the framework of classical dynamics, explains the interaction of bodies not only on Earth, but also of planets, stars and meteorites in the Universe An unusual holiday has been established in honor of the law discovered by Newton December 25th is Gravimass Day The initiator of the Grav Mass Day celebration is programmer Richard Matthew Stallman from the USA Being a public figure and an atheist, he proposed celebrating Isaac Newton's birthday on December 25, as opposed to Christmas, as a symbol of the triumph of science over religion Therefore, the holiday has a second name - Newtonmas ("Newton's Christmas") Central to Newton's law are the mass of objects and the gravitational constant, the value of which was determined experimentally by the scientist Therefore, these two concepts appear in the name of the funny celebration Members of the Newton Association began celebrating Newtonmas in 1890, long before Stallman For this purpose, they first met at Christmas in 1890 at the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, located in London The authorship of the neologism "gravimass" also belongs not to Stallman, but to the writer James Patrick Hogan He worked in the science fiction genre, being a design engineer and programmer in his main specialty Since 1968, Hogan began writing as an amateur, and 10 years later he devoted himself entirely to literary creativity He owns a collection of short stories called Merry Gravmas In honor of the holiday, Stallman, remembering how Newton developed the theory, recommends decorating the Christmas tree and other trees with apples, oranges and other fruits When the fruits fall, anyone will be able to witness the action of the law of universal gravitation Members of the identity should jokingly greet each other with phrases from Hogan's book "Happy Gravitational Mass!" and answer “Let the force be proportional to your acceleration!” Gravimass Day, which falls on December 25, the birthday of Isaac Newton, promotes the popularization of physics and its fundamental laws Therefore, the holiday is celebrated by both scientists and people far from science, who pay tribute to the contribution made to its development by the English mathematician, astronomer, and founder of classical mechanics Isaac Newton