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Out of these four rules a new, engaged method for conducting science emerged that stood in stark contrast to the previous passive and theoretical Cartesian and Aristotelian-scholastic methods. Propositions are born from natural sources and placed back into the natural world to be tested empirically.[[CiteRef::Smith (2002)]] As the four rules were absorbed into the ensuing mosaic, the calculus became deeply incorporated in the experimental method, as it was used to mathematically calculate empirical predictions from natural laws, and then evaluate how exactly the prediction matched the observed reality. Newton claimed to have derived his law of universal gravitation using this method as applied to Kepler's laws of planetary motion. In the Cartesian natural philosophy, the centripetal force had already been defined as the agent that pulled the moon towards the Earth, keeping its orbit circular rather than linear. Newton appealed to rules 1) and 2) to claim that the centripetal force, and the force that compelled objects to move downwards towards the Earth, were merely two different expressions of the same thing. Newton then went on to apply the third rule, and argue that this force, which he called gravity, must be a universal property of all material objects. From here, he went on to argue for the unification of superlunary and sublunary phenomena.[[CiteRef::Harper (2002)|pp. 183-184]]
Historical research provides evidence that the scientific community did not use Newton's own criteria in evaluating his work. Newton's theories did not become accepted outside of England until after its prediction of the oblate spheroid shape of the Earth was confirmed by expeditions to Lapland and Peru. Newton's theories became accepted via a hypothetico-deductive method based on confirmed novel predictions that distinguished it from the rival Cartesian vortices, rather than via Newton's own inductive method. [[CiteRef::Barseghyan (2015)|p. 48-49]][[CiteRef::Terrall (1992)]] Although not all of the ontological changes [[CiteRef::McMullin (2001)]] According to the mosaic described in The McMullin, Newton''Principia'' were immediately accepted, s method ran contrary to the new experimental philosophy consensus that he described influenced contemporary scientists within the same century had been emerging among natural philosophers of his time, in favor of it’s publicationhypothesis. [Newtons philosophy[CiteRef::McMullin (2001)]] Both prominent 17th century natural philosophers Christiaan Huygens and John Locke are known to have taken the experimental philosophy, if not necessarily the full content of Newton’s theories, to heart.[[CiteRef::Janiak (2016)]] By 1700 the acceptance of “experimental philosophy” methodological structure had overtaken that of Cartesianism in England.[[CiteRef::Janiak (2016)]]
|Criticism=Although many natural philosophers in the 17th century were convinced by Newton’s views on the the proper method of conducting science, many were not willing to abandon the Cartesian mechanical philosophy. Contemporary philosopher Leibniz in particular was concerned that the theory of gravity as a regression in natural philosophy, as Newton could not account for the source of gravity. To the Cartesians, it was more important that all motion in the universe could be given a direct cause, which was only possible under the mechanical philosophy, even if this amounted to a larger gap between theory and experimental evidence.[[CiteRef::Janiak (2016)]]
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