Was there really a property proposed called levity? I thought that that was only... | Hacker News

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emmelaich on Aug 22, 2020 | parent | context | favorite | on: College Notebook of Isaac Newton

Was there really a property proposed called levity?

I thought that that was only mentioned in parodies of Newton.

e.g. https://www.sciencephoto.com/media/363707/view/caricature-of...

stan_rogers on Aug 22, 2020 [–]

Yes, and it goes back at least as far as Aristotle (although he would have used a rather Greeker word). Levity would have been a property of fire and air in Aristotelian physics, where gravity was a property of earth and water.

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