Examining the Newtonian Worldview

In The Quantum Enigma, Rosenblum and Kuttner address the impact of the “Newtonian worldview” on our ability to understand and explain the phenomena of the physical world. Science has been able to greatly advance our knowledge of the natural world over the last several centuries largely due to this worldview. In this paper, five tenets of the Newtonian worldview will be summarized; two of these points—those found to be the most and least defensible—will be discussed in greater detail. As a final point, a discussion will be laid out regarding which of the five precepts, if rejected by modern physics, would be the most disturbing to give up.

The first concept to be addressed is determinism. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, determinism is “the idea that every event is necessitated by antecedent events and conditions together with the laws of nature.” Essentially, it is the philosophy that all events are determined by a fixed set of causes, so that the future is as rigid as the past. Some religious forms of determinism assert that events are decided by the will of a deity. For our purposes, however, we will consider the scientific form of determinism that is based on basic causality. Consider, for example, throwing a die. We might see this as a way to determine a random result (between 1 and 6). But, thrown from a certain height and with a certain velocity, the die will land on a certain edge or corner and roll a certain number of times before it slows down and stops. Because the die is bound by the laws of physics, the outcome of the roll is determined as we roll it, although we may be unable to calculate all the factors involved and predict the outcome.

The second tenet of the Newtonian worldview i...

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...it would mean something different to each individual. It would be utterly futile to attempt to describe an objective reality which is nonexistent.

Works Cited

Blackburn, Simon. Truth: a Guide. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2005. 188. Print.

Hoefer, Carl. "Causal Determinism." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University, 23 Jan. 2003. Web. 1 Mar. 2011.

Libet, B., C. A. Gleason, E. W. Wright, and D. K. Pearl. "Time of Conscious Intention to Act in Relation to Onset of Cerebral Activity (readiness-potential)." Brain 106.3 (1983): 623-42. Print.

Libet, B. "Unconscious Cerebral Initiative and the Role of Conscious Will in Voluntary Action." Behavioral and Brain Sciences 8 (1985): 529-66. Print.

Rosenblum, Bruce, and Fred Kuttner. "Chapter 4: Our Newtonian Worldview." Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008. 23-37. Print.