Newton During a Pandemic Four Hundred Years Ago
During a pandemic called Black Death, Isaac
Newton had to work from home, too. He used the time wisely.
In London, a quarter of the population would die
of plague from 1665 to 1666. It was one of the last major outbreaks in the 400
years that the Black Death ravaged Europe.
Isaac Newton was in his early 20s when the Great
Plague of London hit. He wasn’t a “Sir” yet, didn’t have that big formal wig.
He was just another college student at Trinity College, Cambridge.
It would be another 200 years before scientists
discovered the bacteria that causes plague, but even without knowing exactly
why, folks back then still practiced some of the same things we do today to
avoid illness spreading -- Social Distancing.
In 1665, Cambridge sent students home to continue
their studies. For Newton, without his professors to guide him, he apparently thrived.
The year-plus he spent away was later referred to as his “year of wonders.”
First, he continued to work on mathematical
problems he had begun at Cambridge; the papers he wrote on this became early
calculus.
Next, he acquired a few prisms and experimented
with them in his bedroom, even going so far as to bore a hole in his shutters
so only a small beam could come through. From this sprung his theories on
optics.
And right outside his window at his home, there
was an apple tree. The story of how Newton sat under the tree, was bonked on
the head by an apple and suddenly understood theories of gravity and motion, is
largely fictitious.
Newton returned to Cambridge in 1667, theories in
hand. Within six months, he was made a fellow; two years later, a professor.
So if you’re working or studying from home over
the next few weeks, perhaps remember the example Newton set. Having time to
muse and experiment in unstructured comfort proved life-changing for him — and
no one remembers whether he made it out of his pyjamas before noon.
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