The Father of Physics

Readers who happen to be Facebook users may want to sign up for science and math quizzes in their feeds.  The question at left is rare, in that it has no right answer.

Someone suggested Isaac Newton, which is reasonable.

I would say that physics started with the ancient (pre-Socratic) Greek philosophers. About 460 BCE, Democritus formed the atomic theory of the universe, which is exactly where we are today, i.e., looking for the building blocks of the universe.

Even earlier, Thales believed that it is Water that is the “arche,” meaning it is the matter of everything.  This, of course, turned out not to be true, but it could be argued that it was a statement that pertained to physics.

Of course, this is from a western point of view; I have no clue what, for example, the ancient Chinese were up to.