[October 2000 journal entry]
Newton’s methodological proposal, as I understand it, was to consider natural explanations for events before appealing to supernatural explanations. I do not recall that Newton put his proposal in terms of paradigms or worldviews. The significance of doing so has to do with assumptions about those events that are not sufficiently accounted for by the initial step one takes in trying to explain any event. A person using a pre-modern/pre-scientific paradigm expects events to be explained ‘from above’, with the assumption that confounding events could be so explained but are at present beyond human understanding (e.g., “God works in a mysterious way” or “We’ll understand it all by and by”). The reverse, it seems to me, is also the case. A modern/scientific paradigm forms around a sufficient and growing number of ‘from below’ explanations of events. Confidence in this paradigm leads one to assume that confounding events will in the future be explained ‘from below’. I am not sure Newton realized (or dared to acknowledge, if he realized) that his proposal called for, in addition to a methodological shift, also and more profoundly a paradigm shift.
Newton’s methodological proposal, as I understand it, was to consider natural explanations for events before appealing to supernatural explanations. I do not recall that Newton put his proposal in terms of paradigms or worldviews. The significance of doing so has to do with assumptions about those events that are not sufficiently accounted for by the initial step one takes in trying to explain any event. A person using a pre-modern/pre-scientific paradigm expects events to be explained ‘from above’, with the assumption that confounding events could be so explained but are at present beyond human understanding (e.g., “God works in a mysterious way” or “We’ll understand it all by and by”). The reverse, it seems to me, is also the case. A modern/scientific paradigm forms around a sufficient and growing number of ‘from below’ explanations of events. Confidence in this paradigm leads one to assume that confounding events will in the future be explained ‘from below’. I am not sure Newton realized (or dared to acknowledge, if he realized) that his proposal called for, in addition to a methodological shift, also and more profoundly a paradigm shift.