M&D-related: Newton, alchemy, economics

[pynchonoid]

Public release date: 11-Sep-2006

Contact: Jane Sanders
jsanders at gatech.edu
404-894-2214
Georgia Institute of Technology Research News

Unpublished papers reveal lesser-known, but
significant research of Sir Issac Newton

Georgia Tech Professor Kenneth Knoespel has studied
the unpublished manuscripts of Sir Issac Newton and
found connections between his work in alchemy and his
concept of value in economics.


Known primarily for his foundational work in math and
physics, Sir Issac Newton actually spent more time on
research in alchemy, as well as its interrelationships
with science, history and religion, and its
implications for economics.

Alchemy, as Newton practiced it in the 17th and 18th
centuries, was research into the nature of chemical
substances and processes – primarily the transmutation
of materials from one type of matter to another.
Newton and others conducted experiments, but also
incorporated philosophical thought in their attempts
to uncover the mysteries of the physical universe.

"Newton's extensive work on universal history (which
presents human history as a coherent unit governed by
certain immutable principles) provides an essential
setting for linking his work on alchemy and his work
heading England's mint in the 1690s," said Georgia
Institute of Technology Professor Kenneth Knoespel,
who chairs the School of Literature, Communication and
Culture. "It is not at all farfetched to think of
history as a kind of alchemical process that looks to
the creation of value and wealth."

Knoespel will present an invited talk titled "Newton's
alchemical work and the creation of economic value" at
9 a.m. Pacific time Sept. 11 at the American Chemical
Society's 232nd national meeting in San Francisco. The
talk is part of a session dedicated to scholarship
based on the unpublished manuscripts of Newton, most
of which are housed at the University of Cambridge and
in the Edelstein Center at Hebrew University in
Jerusalem. For the past 15 years, Knoespel has studied
both collections -- some portions of which weren't
available to scholars until the 1970s.

By integrating the study of these manuscripts,
Knoespel determined that Newton's alchemical practice
"functions as a translation code for a new language of
economics in which an investigation of
material-spiritual value becomes transformed into a
systematic structure of social value understood
through economics."

Newton began to translate his notions of value in
alchemy to an economic setting when he was appointed
to head England's mint – several years after the 1687
publication of "The Principia," in which Newton
described universal gravitation and the three laws of
motion, laying the groundwork for classical mechanics.

"Newton moves from an academic research position to a
position of considerable visibility within the state,"
Knoespel noted. "He became the symbol of the stability
of the British economy at this time. It is hardly an
exaggeration to think of such a move as involving a
shift from private research to the broad application
of policy formed by decades of private research."

Newton took the new job very seriously, undertaking
new research on the history of money and combining it
with his work in mathematics, alchemy and metallurgy.
He improved the edging of coins, much like U.S. coins
are formed today, to prevent people from clipping the
edges. Newton also assayed the coins of Europe to
determine the amount of gold and silver they contained
to help establish England's economic basis.

As the economic system of capitalism began to be
institutionalized in Europe in the decades following
Newton, many "thought that capital, or value, within
capitalism was being mystified in the same way that
gold is within its alchemical transformation,"
Knoespel said.

Furthermore, Knoespel asserted, "I believe that Newton
thought by improving the English economic system, he
was going to contribute to the ongoing transformation
of England into God's kingdom on Earth. A Newtonian
approach to matter carries with it a Messianic force
that finally grounds itself in natural philosophy that
includes an interpretation of human and natural
history.

"Newton never makes economic value the sole force that
determines history. Instead, the practice of economics
is at least twofold, involving both the practice of a
monetary system and a conceptual framework that sees
within an economic system, the workings of God in
time," he added.

Connecting the published work of Newton the
mathematician and the physicist with the unpublished
work of Newton the alchemist, historian and religious
philosopher provides broader insight into his legacy,
Knoespel said.

"The history of science has often separated Newton the
complex mathematician from the Newton of the
Newtonians," he explained. "The purists say: 'Newton
is a mathematician and a physicist. Don't mix him up
with religion or alchemy because you'll turn him into
Harry Potter.'"

But it is this purist belief that for 200 years
suppressed Newton's unpublished work in alchemy until
the mid-20th century, Knoespel said. "I'm certainly
not interested in making Newton into an occult
figure," he added. "Newton was profoundly interested
in the relationship between physics and religion. That
he was, but that doesn't turn him into a magician."

###



__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com