Isaac Newton
Issac Newton's "The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy," published in 1687, reflects the Renaissance-era shift in scientific inquiry towards the pursuit of knowledge through mathematics rather than philosophy or theology.
Since the ancients esteemed the science of mechanics of greatest importance in the investigation of natural things, and the moderns, rejecting substantial forms and occult qualities, have endeavoured to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics as far as it relates to natural philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold respect; as rational, which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and practical. To practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished from geometry that what is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; what is less so, is called mechanical. However, the errors are not in the art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an imperfect mechanic; and if any could work with perfect accuracy he would be the most perfect mechanic of all.
Issac Newton, The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, 1687
Question 1
Describe one perspective about the nature of mathematics described in the excerpt.
Question 2
Identify one way that Issac Newton's approach to understanding the natural world differed from thinkers living before the Scientific Revolution.
Question 3
Explain one way Issac Newton influenced the evolution of scientific thinking in the late 17th century.
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