Quaestiones Quaedam Philosophicae - Additional Information

Additional Information

This octavo notebook, currently in the Cambridge University Library, was Newton's basic notebook in which he set down in 1661 his readings in the required curriculum in Cambridge and his later readings in mechanical philosophy. He entered notes from both ends. The initial notes, in Greek, were on Aristotle's logic at one end and his ethics, at the other. Newton also made notes on the required book Regulae Philosophicae by Daniel Stahl which laid out Aristotelean philosophy in the form of dialogues, with objections and refutations in the style of modern day FAQs. Later he added notes on Rhetorices contractae by Gerard Vossius.

The first signs of Newton's own developing interests are in his notes on Physiologiae peripateticae, by the 17th century philosopher Johannes Magirus. His notes on the exposition of Aristotelean cosmology shows the first signs of independent thought, in that Newton departed from the order of presentation in the book by collecting together the periods of the celestial spheres. He was impressed enough by the argument that light is non-corporeal (otherwise the sun would be exhausted) to make note of it. He continued with a reading on the phenomenon of the rainbow. But following this he drew a line across the page, below which appears his first notes on the new natural philosophy of his day— a compendium of limits on the radii of stars as determined by Galileo and Auzout. At the other end of the book, he interrupted his notes on Aristotle with two pages of notes on Descartes' metaphysics.

Following this, the central approximately hundred pages of this notebook is entitled Questiones quadem Philosophcae, and a later motto over the title Amicus Plato amicus Aristotle magis amica veritas (Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my best friend is truth).