CULTURE

Keynes acquired Newton's private papers and was shocked at what he found. @michael_nielsen reads the key passage in the essay Keynes published afterwards:

"Newton was not the first of the age of reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last great mind which looked out on… pic.twitter.com/ACoanqEckb

— Dwarkesh Patel (@dwarkesh_sp) 8 avril 2026

Keynes acquired Newton's private papers and was shocked at what he found. @michael_nielsen reads the key passage in the essay Keynes published afterwards: "Newton was not the first of the age of reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last great mind which looked out on the visible and intellectual world with the same eyes as those who began to build our intellectual inheritance rather less than 10,000 years ago." And as Michael jokes, what are these great scientists actually doing? Writing down squiggles on a page based on observations and these mysterious cosmic connections, then using it to accomplish miracles. Launching rockets, creating atomic bombs. "That's exactly what magicians do." Keynes was shocked to find that Newton's alchemy and theology used the same methods as his physics: "There was extreme method in his madness. All his unpublished works on esoteric and theological matters are marked by careful learning, accurate method and extreme sobriety of statement. They are just as sane as the Principia, if their whole matter and purpose were not magical. They were nearly all composed during the same twenty-five years of his mathematical studies."

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