Vortex

(vorteks.) [L., from ver to, I turn around.] A whirlpool, formed by the water running rapidly round; there is a cavity in the middle, into which floating bodies are drawn. The word is also applied to a whirlwind. In the philosophy of Des cartes a V. means a collection of material particles, forming a fluid or ether, and having a rapid rotatory motion round an axis. He endeavored, by means of this hypothesis, to explain the motions of the heavenly bodies; but it is inapplicable to those which, like the comets, traverse the heavens in all directions. His object was to show that the universe might a ume, and preserve its present form, on mechanical principles. [s. 945]