Newton died they think in part from poisoning by inhaling metal vapour from experiments he did in chemistry. He did not invent calculus, but improved its use and its notation. Elements of calculus were used by previous mathematicians, and also used in parallel by Leibniz, who did much more in the development of that branch of analysis than Newton. There are those who feel that Leibniz's approach was superior to Newton's. The equations of motion can be derived from Algebra as well, although a people feel that his use of differentials is very handy.
Newton's contributions to science were very basic and profound in that he, like Einstein, proposed a complete or very nearly complete physical system that models the nature of observed phenomona and developed the mathematical tools that describe it fairly exactly. He anticipated the investigation of the very nature of matter and energy and the way in which they may relate, but the world would have to wait for more investigation into electro-magnetism and energy and the mathematics of these areas to advance science more.
Some scientists I believe who have perhaps not received the recognition that they deserve in more modern times, who did similar and in some way equally profound work , are Dalton, Gauss, Fourier, DeBroglie, Mosley, Thompson (Kelvin), Dirac, Maxwell, Faraday, Gibbs, Lorentz, Rutherford, Pauling and Bohr. Of these, I think Fourier, Maxwell and Gibbs may come closest to the basic, and all embracing synthesis that Newton achieved.
We are running out of Giants. They are lost it appears in the political world of University funding.
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