Dear Oriel,

I am pleased at least that I was not kidding you as to Faraday's
insight. ;-) Now as to Newton, in the light of your words

>I am not to have a quote mining war on account of Newton

I would only mention, it is so easy to reason about past, not so easy
to look ahead. The problem is not in the trifles of which you are
trying to re-draw Newton's portrait like an opportunist who steeled
Kepler's ideas and took "flight on the back of a common astronomical
crow". Newton had some other task - to join separate results, and at
his level of knowledge he has accomplished this task successfully.
Descartes who tried to formulate mechanical laws, neither Leibnitz
with his great achievements in differential calculus, nor Kepler who
has established the laws of planetary orbital motion and whom you are
so much defending derived the gravity law in the Newton's form - in
the form of equal gravitational and inertial masses. None of them has
formulated in mathematically rigorous form the laws of mechanics which
even now work fine in all areas of science and engineering. If
speaking, what Newton used to achieve his aim, we have to mention that
he took the idea of infinitesimals from his teacher. The first law of
mechanics - the law of inertia - he took from Galileo, the law of
equal action and counteraction - from Descartes who took it from
Aristotle, and so on. Not this is the point. The point is, he gave us
the FIRST mathematical formulation of laws for mechanics and
gravitation on whose basis we can calculate and analyse. And in limits
which Newton outlined the experimental check of these laws is
impeccable. We have to understand it before accusing someone in
somewhat. ;-) And it would be much better if you roll up your sleeves
and develop our knowledge of nature. Believe me, this is much more
difficult than to accuse others that they do  not love the nature. ;-)
Then you will understand, for example, that if in one part of his
theory one denied the aether, introducing convenient postulates, as
Einstein did, and in the second part introduced the aether, he should
not wonder, why finally these parts appear irrelevant.

And concerning Newton's attitude to the idea of aether, I already
explained you and cited Newton. The problem of aether impeding bodies'
motion actually existed and was partly lifted only after the wave
nature of light and unified nature of EM field and light were
established - in 19th, not in 17th century. In Descartes' vortex
theory this difficulty took its place in full size. It even now is not
fully lifted, it only is shifted deeper to the phenomenology. It can
be solved only after we will have solved the structure of particles.
Quarks, gravitons, meson fields will hardly help, as well as string
theory, fractals etc. They have been built on fantasies, not on
observed and checked phenomena. They are not the way. The way is where
the conception passes from hypothesis to the name of theory only after
multiple check from different sides and the main, when it is closed -
when the results obtained in different ways are fully consistent with
each other and with experiments.

On this way we may not choose from a broad scope of revelations only
some convenient, shutting our eyes to inconvenient revelations of an
effect, as the supporters of photon theory do. To be true, the
hypothesis has to corroborate ALL possible experimental results. One
experiment with which this hypothesis does not match can kill it. With
it, if the conception on the whole has been built without bias, the
negative experiment will only better outline its limits of
applicability and open the way to clear our understanding up. Just
this occurs with Newton's conception in passing to sub-light
velocities. But if the postulates were selected for the author's
convenience, just as in GR, SR, QM, QED, photon theory and so on, one
inconsistent experiment can destroy the whole building of existing
conception. This is what we all see now, under great displeasure and
highly aggressive behaviour of supporters of above conceptions and of
people who like to "think the physics out".

And we may not think any authority in the science as an infallible
god, as you are trying to represent and to accuse Newton. I told you
already, we have to consider Newton's results in the context of data
available at his time. His result is what is important. And the result
is, his mechanical laws impeccably work at small velocities. There are
still only vain attempts to re-phrase the Newton's law of gravity, as
I already told you. And I would like to emphasise, namely Newton's law
was the prototype of Coulomb's law, and we can say, this was the start
point in the search of unified field theory. It would not be good of
us to accuse Newton of what the descendants have fantasised excessive,
or made not well, or distorted. He made his part well, and this part
became a stage of new understanding of physical laws and of philosophy
as well. ;-) And it is a natural thing that any theory is then
improved or added. If you see, how can you improve it - do it, not
revile the author. If you understood the meaning of mass as the
measure of inertia, or if you have revealed the nature of
gravitational interaction - again, it is not worthy to accuse Newton.
Show us your results with the same proof as it is done in classical
physics. If your meaning contradicts Newton laws, prove it
experimentally. If in one part it corresponds and in another does not,
show that you are right, too. Have you any problem? ;-)

It is so easy to relive everyone and everything.. . This is not the
way to the truth. Truth does not like mud, mean tricks, labels. Truly
loving the laws of nature, you would know it, not only trade the
slogans and labels. This is the monopoly of supporters of Relativity
and photon theory. This is just why the truth is out of their
interest. ;-)

The same, it is their manner - to answer about astronomical history of
the Earth to the thesis substantiating the succession of Faraday and
Maxwell insights, to speak of Foucault pendulum in respond to the
citation from Faraday about finite speed of propagation of magnetic
interaction. ;-) Or to leave unanswered inconvenient citations from
Maxwell about aether and from Einstein - about the problems that he
has put into the underpinning of GR. As a scientists truly loving the
nature and standing for separation of conceptions, you surely
understand it well. And not only understand, but follow this principle
in your actions and discussions. Do not you agree with me? ;-)

Sergey