Newton's theorem of revolving orbits does not go to infinity. However, this conclusion holds only when two bodies are present (the two-body problem); the motion of three bodies or more acting under their mutual gravitation (the "n"-body problem) remained unsolved for centuries after Newton, although solutions to a few special cases were discovered. Newton proposed that the orbits of planets about the Sun are largely elliptical because the Sun's gravitation is dominant; to first approximation, the presence of the other planets can be ignored. By analogy, the elliptical orbit of the Moon about the Earth was dominated by the Earth's gravity; to first approximation, the
Kepler's laws of planetary motion Moon and Earth the acceleration of the Moon becomes So in this approximation the Moon moves around the Earth according to Kepler's laws. In the three-body case the accelerations are These accelerations are not those of Kepler orbits, and the three-body problem is complicated. But Keplerian approximation is the basis for perturbation calculations. See Lunar theory. Kepler used his two first laws to compute the position of a planet as a function of time. His method involves the solution of a transcendental equation called Kepler's equation. The procedure for calculating the heliocentric polar coordinates ("r","θ") of a planet as a