Hibat Allah Abu'l-Barakat al-Baghdaadi

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Hibat Allah Abu'l-Barakat al-Baghdaadi (c. 1080-1165) was a Muslim philosopher, physicist and scientist of Jewish-Arab descent from Baghdad, Iraq. His Hebrew name was Nathanel. He wrote a critique of Aristotelian philosophy entitled al-Mu'tabar. His thought influenced another Jewish philosopher, 'Izz ad-Dawla Ibn Kammuna. It is known that Abu-l-Barakat had converted to Islam later in his life.

According to A.C. Crombie, al-Baghdaadi was a follower of Avicenna, who

proposed an explanation of the acceleration of falling bodies by the accumulation of successive increments of power with successive increments of velocity.^[1]

According to Shlomo Pines, al-Baghdaadi's theory of motion was also

the oldest negation of Aristotle's fundamental dynamic law [namely, that a constant force produces a uniform motion], [and is thus an] anticipation in a vague fashion of the fundamental law of classical mechanics [namely, that a force applied continuously produces acceleration].^[2]

Al-Baghdaadi's theory of motion was vaguely foreshadowing Newton's second law of motion, by distinguishing between velocity and acceleration and for showing that force is proportional to acceleration rather than velocity.

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