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Comment by potamic | Hacker News Reader

This is some remarkable intuition. Electromagnetism wasn't even developed as a theory. To observe such varied phenomena like how nerves communicate or what comprises matter or the behaviour of light and postulate they might all have something in common and something to do with the attraction/repulsion seen when objects are rubbed together, is incredible. Was the idea very unique for its time or did scientists at the time hold similar ideas? Do you think it was just a lucky guess in the end that the world didn't turn out to be more complex or was there some reason behind this craziness?

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It's tricky in hindsight. He also guessed stuff wrong, and how the biology eventually turned out is not exactly how he imagied. You project a modern understanding on that text but you don't really understand the significance of the phrasing he uses, such as spirit etc. It's a loose match, perhaps better than Democritus and the atom, but still needs hindsight bias.

People had similar theories, like Descartes imagined nerve tubes carrying fluid to act and kind of hydraulic actuation, as well as ancient Greek pneuma theory of vital spirit. Gilbert's work on magnetism and electricity was known, Hooke's work on vibrations. It's impressive of course but not out of this world unimaginable magic. He plugged his favorite modern theory to biology, replacing the fluid stuff with electric stuff. Tons of people did that kind of thing before and after, sometimes it works, sometimes it leads to nowhere.

The classic “genius effect” where someone is a genius or very good at something and goes do something else and is off base but people will still thing there’s value there.

People just didn’t have the tools to understand this subject at that time.

Nikola Tesla fits this all to well. He was a genius in an very narrow subject and rejected the ideas of his peers in his field. He didn't believe electricity was made of subatomic electrons and it all came from an either. He was even trying to use the Earth as a wireless energy transmitter when it is a grounding source.

Too many people believe that a person really good in context A will be good in context B to Z. Or the Shaolin Monk Fallacy, just because you can do push ups with two fingers and swing a staff does not mean you are instantly good with a pool cue or tennis racket.

Perhaps not instantly good, but there's obviously major skill transfer between domains. In physical domains this is easy to see and understand with countless demonstrations of professional athletes who decide to swap sports and reach a professional level in the new sport with relative ease. And I think the exact same is true in mental domains.

World class expertise in some mental field is not achieved solely by knowledge within that field, but by a distinct ability to process and apply information in a novel way. And that skill is highly transferrable to other fields. Of course you still need to then accumulate information in said other field, which is why it's not instantaneous, but if a world class individual in one field puts their energy towards mastery of another field, I certainly would not bet against their success!

I’m not sure it’s really about skill transfer outside of very related areas. You need to be genetically lucky to hit the very top of a physical or mental field and the odds you have similar gifts in a field with slightly different demands is far higher than average.

Similarly having the drive to actually dedicate yourself to some narrow area could be considered a skill but I think it’s more a personality trait.

By "skill" I'm referring to something far more fundamental, perhaps trait would have been a better word. For instance sports are largely about athleticism, hand eye coordination, strength, and so on. And these all are largely transferrable. Similarly in mental domains I'm referring more about the ability to accumulate and process information while also using it as a tool think more outside the box, than as an ends in and of itself.

Are you saying that a rifle shooter could easily pivot to darts or pool, and a swimmer could just as easily move to baseball? Or a body builder could take on a rock climber because they are in the domain of "Sports"?

All sports have different muscle memory training and thought processes.

"Or the Shaolin Monk Fallacy, just because you can do push ups with two fingers and swing a staff does not mean you are instantly good with a pool cue or tennis racket."

It doesn't even mean you are good at fighting :-)

Agreed, it’s astonishing intuition. It’s hard to call it a lucky guess when it is the last paragraph of Newton’s magnum opus. But very hard to explain.

Choosing my words carefully, I think it was a kind of deep and deliberate magic. Of the sort Newton ascribed to Pythagoras as the esoteric discoverer of the inverse square law of gravitation. (see “Newton and the pipes of pan”). Hooke also had a sort of musical, oscillatory, spiraling conception of mental phenomena. So it was in the Zeitgeist.

In any case, it is striking and amazing— and resonant in this age of vibes.

And since I know the word “magic” is triggering, here’s a magical book by one of the founding members of the Royal Society: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_Magick

“Newton and the pipes of pan” (1966) McGuire & Rattansi

https://www.enotes.com/topics/theology/criticism/criticism/j...

People like Newton, in earlier eras, would be called prophets. And Newton wasn't do far from the religious aspect himself. He was considered crazy in his time, disliked by most. He was an adherent of the occult, in fact he discovered gravity while specifically looking for ways to move objects from afar. Oh, he found it. Today he is revered, and rightly so, but at the time he was hated though he was respected.

I don't think prophet is the right word. Prophets didn't develop physics or engineering but warned the tribe of God's impending punishment unless they obey better or similar historic predictions of how God will use floods or draughts or enemy tribes to challenge you etc.

Newton had insight far beyond the teachings of his day, and struggled to present them to the people.

I'm quibbling with the term "prophet", I'm not disparaging the amount or beyondness of Newton's insight. Prophets are generally not known for the "beyond"-ness of their "insights".

Actually, that is exactly what a prophet is. A person endowed with perception not afforded to most other people.

He's probably also the first quant (headed the british federal bank) and infamously lost a ton of money in a shipping bubble.

> He was considered crazy in his time, disliked by most.

Where did you get that from? As far as I know he was widely respected as a genius in his time and had great professional and social success (including receiving a knighthood of course).

Where is it written that he was considered crazy and disliked?

Newton had many fueds and enemies, and was repeatedly not a pleasant person. Hook and Liebniz come quickly to mind.

You should read about his experiments and beliefs in the occult.

I'm of the opinion that the story of the apple falling on his head, started as a jab.

All those guys had “beliefs in the occult”

There are some insights, but I think you only feel they are remarkable because you have a much more concrete understanding of how things work and you filled the holes in these vague words with your knowledge.

An ancient Greek philosopher said the matter is made of smallest particles. It doesn't mean he found the concept of atoms as we know.

Scholars back then had good intution:

"Did we know the mechanical affections of the particles of rhubarb, hemlock, opium, and a man, as a watchmaker does those of a watch ... we should be able to tell beforehand that rhubarb will purge, hemlock kill, and Opium make a man sleep; as well as a watchmaker can" -- John Locke

The world was very pious then. To have written that paragraph a century earlier may have resulted in ostracizm. To have written it like that was enough given the limited backing that ould be given. It was enough to influence those around and after Newton, it was, in that sense, remarkable.

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