Hypotheses fingo: interpretación, anticipación e investigación de la naturaleza en los Principia Mathematica de Newton

Authors

  • Andrew Mayne-Nicholls Merino Universidad de Chile

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22370/sst.2025.10.4902

Keywords:

Hypoyhesis, Anticipation, Interpretation, Naturalists, Mathematicians

Abstract

This paper will attempt to a) understand Newton’s method of Discovery in the context of (i) the dispute between the two prevailing traditions in the Royal Society - the naturalist tradition and the mathematician tradition - and (ii) the influence of Francis Bacon’s proposal aEstudiante de Licenciatura en Filosofía, Universidad de Chile on the naturalist current; and then b) to statement hypotheses non fingo, examining what Newton means by hypothesis and to what extent this statement is consistent with the rest of the proposal in the Principia; and, finally, c) to propose a fourth interpretation - in addition to those already presented by Andrew Janiak - according to which Newton could be understood as a moderate Baconian.

Author Biography

Andrew Mayne-Nicholls Merino, Universidad de Chile

Estudiante de Licenciatura en Filosofía, Universidad de Chile

References

Bacon, F. (2000). Novum Organon. Cambridge University Press.

Ducheyne, S. (2006). The General Scholium: Some Notes on Newton’s Published and Unpublished Endeavours. Lias: Sources and Documents Relating to the Early Modern History of Ideas, 33(3), pp. 223-274.

Feingold, M. (2001). Mathematicians and Naturalists: Sir Isaac Newton and the Royal Society. En Buchwald y Cohen (Eds.), Isaac Newton’s Natural Philosophy (pp. 77-102). The MIT Press.

Janiak, A. (Ed.). (2004). Newton: Philosophical Writings. Cambridge University Press.

Janiak, A. (2008). Newton as Philosopher. Cambridge University Press.

Jalobeanu, D. (2016). “The Marriage Of Physics With Mathematics”: Francis Bacon on Measurement, Mathematics, and the Construction of a Mathematical Physics. In G. Gorham, B. Hill, E. Slowik, & C.

K. Waters (Eds.), The Language of Nature: Reassessing the Mathematization of Natural Philosophy in the Seventeenth Century (pp. 51-80). University of Minnesota Press. https://doi.org/10.5749/j.ctt1d390rg.5

Manzo, S. (2012). Francis Bacon’s Natural History and Civil History: A Comparative Survey. Early Science and Medicine, 17(1/2) pp. 32-61. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41723181

Newton, I. (1999). The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. (Cohen et al., Trans.). University of California Press.

Torretti, R. (1998). Filosofía de la Naturaleza. Editorial Universitaria.

Published

2025-04-17

How to Cite

Mayne-Nicholls Merino, A. (2025). Hypotheses fingo: interpretación, anticipación e investigación de la naturaleza en los Principia Mathematica de Newton. Serie Selección De Textos , 10, 129–148. https://doi.org/10.22370/sst.2025.10.4902