green numbers give full details | back to texts | unexpand this idea
17009 | I won't object if someone shows that gravity consistently arises from the action of matter |
Full Idea: If someone explains gravity along with all its laws by the action of some subtle matter, and shows that the motion of the planets and comets will not be disturbed by this matter, I shall be far from objecting. | |||
From: Isaac Newton (Letters to Leibniz 1 [1693], 1693.10.16) | |||
A reaction: Important if you think that Newton is the hero of the descriptive regularity theory of laws. Newton probably thought laws came from God, but he wouldn't object to Leibniz's view, that God planted the laws within the matter. |