Pb by Vinge 197 24681097531 Copy © Cale of Tesla 196 The of Dai Gowan ad Jn. Goode nto ener tora en SSnicl fy how cwannl wah oe Cony DBitgerond Pca Ace oi “hick ajo condo att slot Up tay tad orev Sas eae ou 2 oRvenes Chee wakes the ple pt Senn iy fxm of tig ove er ha it STRREaE Tpalehclendehars sinks conn ny al cn Bang tnpone on te bse Fr ple Gr Bin by “Baten Cyt 1998 Viersse Rapdom Howse, 20 Val edge Road, ondon SWIV2SA Random Howe Australi) Limited Bi Ale Se, Ntons Pst, Sey ‘New South Wales 2061, Aus Random Howse New Zealand Lined 18 Poland Rosd, Genel, Akl 10, New Zend Random Howse South Ake (Py Limited Eli $A Jee Read Paton 2093, Ransom Howse UK Lined Reg No. 954009 ‘CIP xaopu ead fo this bok ieavalabe fom be Bch Isu0 09 973621 7 pets wid by Random House UK Lid ve mtu, Fecal producs made fom wood grown nus {ores Themanutacuring pocesconfornt the ‘vse gaan be coun fog ined and bound in Gre ein by ‘Gon 8c Wyman, Reading, Beka David L. Goodstein and Judith R. Goodstein FEYNMAN’S LOST LECTURE The Motion of Planets Around the Sun VINTAGE3 Feynman's Proof of the Law of Ellipses “Simple things have simple demonstrations," Feynman wrote in his lecture notes. Them he crossed out the second “simple” and replaced it with “elementary.” The simple thing he had in mind was Kepler's first aw, the law of ellipses. The demonstration he was about to present ‘would indeed be elementary, in the sense tha it used no mathematics ‘more advanced than high school geometry, but it would be far from simple "To begin with, Feynman reminds us that an ellipse is kind of longated circle that can be made with two tcks,astring, and « pencil, lke this is Sy64 PRYNMAN'S LOST LECTURE Bach tack isa a point called foeus ofthe elipse. The sting makes ‘ine from one focus to a point on the ellipse and back to the other focus. The total length of the string stays the same asthe pene goes around the curve, Here's a slighly more proper geometric diagram: Hore P” and F are the two foc, and P may be any point onthe curve. “The distance from F” to P and back to Fis the same, no matter where P is on the curve Here is small poit worth remembering: Ifthe string is made a litle shorter and the ticks stay where they are, we get another ellipse, inside this one; and if the string is made longer while the tacks stay where they are, we ge an ellipse that es outside this one. It follows that any point inthe plane—say, q-—such thatthe distance from F” to q 10 Fis fess than the distance from F” to P to F (in other word, any point that cean be reached by a shorter sting) lies inside our orginal elise ‘Likewise, any point Q such that FQ + QF (another way of saying the distance from F” to Q plus the distance from Qo F) is large than F*P “PF (the length of the original string lies outside our ellipse. Here's «picture illustrating the idea Feynman's Prof of the Law of Hipes 65 A ltde later inthe discussion, Feynman uses this idea, but he doesn't Drove it as we have just done, Instead he asks the students to work it ‘out for themselves, ‘An ellipse has snother special propery. If «lightbulb were turned on at F, and if the inner surface of the ellipse reflected light like a misror, then all he rflectd light rays would come back together at F", the other focus, like this And vice versa: all the light rays starting atone focus will be focused ‘oa point atthe oter focus. Feynman cites this as the second elementary property of the ellipse, and then he sets out to prove that these two Properties are really equivalent, (His srategy hete is wo lead us to a ‘more arcane property of ellpses—one that will prove indispensable later on.) Picture any point P onthe ellipse, At that point (as at any point) on the ellipse (or any other curve), there isa single, unique stnight line that just touches the curve without penetrating iLike this