Submitted by e-dogg (not verified) on Sun, 03/02/2008 - 18:39.
A quote from that same book:
Ultimate explanations, Newton said, should be left out of science. This is the context in which he uttered his famous expression hypotheses non fingo--"I feign no hypotheses."
A translation of the passage containing that expression:
I have not as yet been able to discover the reason for these properties of gravity from phenomena, and I do not feign hypotheses. For whatever is not deduced from the phenomena must be called a hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, or based on occult qualities, or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy particular propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards rendered general by induction.
So, of course Newton clearly held Christian beliefs. However, it seems just as clear that he would agree with the exclusion of supernatural causes from formal science.
Hypotheses non fingo
A quote from that same book:
Ultimate explanations, Newton said, should be left out of science. This is the context in which he uttered his famous expression hypotheses non fingo--"I feign no hypotheses."
A translation of the passage containing that expression:
I have not as yet been able to discover the reason for these properties of gravity from phenomena, and I do not feign hypotheses. For whatever is not deduced from the phenomena must be called a hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, or based on occult qualities, or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy particular propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards rendered general by induction.
So, of course Newton clearly held Christian beliefs. However, it seems just as clear that he would agree with the exclusion of supernatural causes from formal science.