

The Loneliest Genius - pmcpinto
http://nautil.us/issue/19/illusions/the-loneliest-genius

======
Dn_Ab
There are some doubting the veracity of the article, and while it is onesided
in how it paints Newton, the main conclusion, how Newton's childhood might
have contributed to his penchant for isolation is a solid one.

Newton was in his time known as vindictive, secretive, paranoid, sensitive
(especially to criticism, he would have made many enemies here on HN) and
fairly querulous. Throughout his life he had few friends, wasted no time on
idling and had no time for art or music. He was puritanical and deeply
religious. In his early notebooks he recorded sins such as: _Squirting water
on Thy day ' and 'Making pies on Sunday night'_

He was also prone to rages, as recorded in that same notebook:

 _' Striking many'; 'Punching my sister'; 'Wishing death and hoping it to
some'._

In [1] it is stated: _Given the rage that Newton had shown throughout his life
when criticised, it is not surprising that he flew into an irrational temper
directed against Leibniz_ and that _Newton 's assistant Whiston had seen his
rage at first hand. He wrote:- 'Newton was of the most fearful, cautious and
suspicious temper that I ever knew.'_

However, while these aspects of Newton's personality have recently been the
topics of focus in various articles and books, what is often omitted is that
Newton was only so vindictive if he felt slighted. Granted, this was not hard
to do, but there were other aspects to his character[2]:

 _> He has usually been found to have been an unsmiling and humourless,
puritanical man with a countenance that was ‘ordinarily melancholy and
thoughtfull’, but which, as Henry More FRS (1614–87) described during a
discussion about biblical prophecy, could sometimes become ‘mighty lightsome
and chearfull, and in a maner transported.’20_

 _> He always kept Close to his Studyes, very rarely went a visiting, & had as
few Visitors, ...excepting 2 or 3 Persons… in whose Company he took much
Delight and Pleasure at an Evening...I never knew him take any Recreation or
Pastime, either in Riding out to take ye Air, Walking, bowling, or any other
Exercise whatever, Thinking all Hours lost, yt was not spent in his Studyes_

Newton grew up with what seems to be have been a rather disturbed childhood.
Isolated, with indication of having been distant to his mother (at least early
on) and mistreated by his stepfather; when coupled with how far ahead he was
when compared to his peers†, seems to have resulted in an emotionally stunted,
insecure and sensitive individual. Taken together with his obsession with
righteousness, it is not hard to see how he might have been difficult to get
along with, in turn feeding back to poor social ability and bolstering his
inclinations towards being alone.

Newton seemed to have suffered from depression and poor self image throughout
his life, exacerbated no doubt, to paranoid delusions later on by consumption
of heavy metals as mercury, arsenic and lead.

Certainly Newton was not an easy person to deal with; his brilliance, lack of
interests and religiosity coupled with insecurity and pensive nature made for
a difficult combination to not somehow run afoul of. He was likely not one to
suffer fools lightly and was probably very good at holding a grudge. There are
signs that he would have been pedantic and insufferable, the servants at his
home certainly had no kind words to lay on him. Yet in the context of his
early abandonment, the antagonism of his household against his bookishness,
the hostility of his stepfather and the isolated childhood from having grown
up with a mind so blazingly sharp, it is difficult to fault him for ending up
as one so prone to churlishness. But despite a tendency towards a dour
disposition, _Stukeley wrote of him in his Memoir:

"according to my own observation, tho'. Sr. Isaac was of a very serious, &
compos'd frame of mind yet I have often seen him laugh, & that upon moderate
occasions. he had in his disposition, a natural pleasantness of temper, & much
good nature, very distant from moroseness, attended neither with gayety nor
levity. he usd a good many [shrewd] sayings, bordering on joke, & wit. in
company he behavd very agreably; courteous, affable, he was easily made to
smile, if not to laugh."_

† _Stukeley later wrote: one reason why Sr. Isaac did not play much with his
schoolfellows, was, that generally, they were not very affectionate toward
him. he was commonly too cunning for them in every thing. they were sensible,
that he had more ingenuity than they_

[1] [http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Newton.html](http://www-
history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Newton.html)

[2]
[http://rsnr.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/62/3/289.full](http://rsnr.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/62/3/289.full)

[http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/prism.php?id=40](http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/prism.php?id=40)

------
return0
Did Newton himself ever complain about loneliness? I 've never heard anything
of the sort, yet this writer assumes it.

Try to picture the genius of Newton in the dark ages in which he lived. He
found patterns and understood the world in astonishing ways. I think it was
genuinely impossible for him to find a soulmate other than himself, even among
his educated peers. He found patterns and understood the world in a profoundly
different way than others. Should we not assume he was happy with discovering
the unimaginable? Is that even comparable to the petty joy of socializing?

~~~
dharmach
>Should we not assume he was happy with discovering the unimaginable?

He had nervous breakdowns, one of the causes: chronic psychological depression

~~~
return0
His nervous breakdowns were attributed to ingestion of chemical substances (he
was experimenting with alchemy)
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Later_life_of_Isaac_Newton#1693](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Later_life_of_Isaac_Newton#1693)

------
edw519
_If his retreat into the realm of the mind was a boon for science, however, it
came at a great cost to the man, and seems to have been connected to the
loneliness and pain of his childhood._

I wonder if OP is confusing cause and effect. Did his choice of solitude cause
him to suffer socially or did his decision to not waste time with others on
minutiae enable him to focus on what he thought was more important? I prefer
to choose the latter (for Newton and myself).

~~~
eunoia
Do you really think time spent being social is wasted?

No judgement, just curiosity.

~~~
Verdex
Here's something to consider.

Being lonely by myself hurts. Being lonely in a group of people hurts more.
Learning about algebraic topology doesn't hurt.

I think it's a bad idea for people to be by themselves, but I can more than
empathize with the "I would rather not" sentiment in this thread.

~~~
researcher88
If I feel lonely and isolated, I am less inclined to be creative. If I am
healthy and socially active, I feel more motivated to work harder and create.

I have wasted so much while being alone and while being very social. It's a
vicious thing but all I can do is improve my habits and seek out balance.

------
GotAnyMegadeth
Sorry for the off topic.

> like convincing cats to gather for a game of Scrabble

If you get any board game out in a house with cats, it will be minutes until
they are all gathered, trying to sit on the board. Perhaps they should have
said "like convincing cats to not sit on a game of Scrabble".

------
arethuza
What about Newtons later career where he made the unlikely transformation from
scientific genius to stupendous badass?

 _" Counterfeiting was high treason, punishable by the felon's being hanged,
drawn and quartered. Despite this, convicting even the most flagrant criminals
could be extremely difficult. However, Newton proved to be equal to the task.
Disguised as a habitué of bars and taverns, he gathered much of that evidence
himself. For all the barriers placed to prosecution, and separating the
branches of government, English law still had ancient and formidable customs
of authority. Newton had himself made a justice of the peace in all the home
counties"_

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton#Later_life](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton#Later_life)

For an heavily fictionalized, but hugely entertaining, account of the times, I
can _strongly_ recommend the Baroque Cycle - much stupendous badassery.

------
sanxiyn
"When Sir Isaac Newton died in 1727, he left behind no will and an enormous
stack of papers. His surviving correspondences, notes, and manuscripts contain
an estimated 10 million words, enough to fill up roughly 150 novel-length
books."

[http://www.wired.com/2014/05/newton-papers-q-
and-a/](http://www.wired.com/2014/05/newton-papers-q-and-a/)

Those words are being transcribed and published. You can read what is
published so far here:

[http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/prism.php?id=1](http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/prism.php?id=1)

------
djtriptych
Warning - this is an excerpt. The full article appears to require a
subscription.

~~~
ProAm
Giant paywall. I was bummed, great article so far.

~~~
melling
Me too. Fortunately the solution was trivial. I bought a subscription.

------
doctorfoo
It reads like a character assassination. A very negative interpretation for no
particular reason, and a highly incredulous and begrudging perspective of the
extreme introverted or loner character.

A truly _awful_ article.

------
q2
I feel skeptical to read about history of anything or anyone. People are
complex entities. We have rational and emotional/irrational habits/reactions
...etc. Generally, historians look at the documents left or recorded and
construct some picture. But I feel, no one or no entity records every emotion,
every reaction, every action they do or involve ...etc. So there will always
gaps/holes and there will always be unknown unknowns. Sometimes, we feel, we
reached conclusions and may be awards are given and after few years, some new
leads open up and it may change whatever we know till then making us feel like
fools to trust in the beginning. Then there are many, who won't record
anything, no trace at all. We are around 7 billion people now approximately
and how much we record daily about ourselves for _others i.e. future
historians_? I feel recording for future historians is overhead. Writing diary
for yourself is different thing altogether.

So in conclusion, please do not conclude whatever you read as final w.r.t
history even though it may be detailed or how well it may be written. There
are always unknown unknowns.

Take whatever useful in your life and leave the rest may be the optimal
approach towards history, if really required. Otherwise, in general scenario
i.e. for daily life, just ignore history.

------
arvinjoar
Is it just me or is it Newton season? Aeon Magazine recently ran an article on
magical thinking that mentioned Newton, and I swear I've seen him mentioned in
other articles recently as well.

~~~
NickPollard
Actually, it is - literally. As the article mentioned, Newton was born on 25th
December, so he often comes up in Christmas-related discussion and so this
time of year is a good time to mention him.

[https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=newtonmas](https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=newtonmas)

------
martinhath
Some of the paragraphs, ie. the first and second, are really good. Some
others, aren't.

>Physicist Richard Feynman voiced the feelings of many a self-absorbed
scientist when he wrote a book titled, What Do You Care What Other People
Think?

Did he? I finished the book a few days ago, and there aren't really anything
self-absorbed about it.

>Newton never wrote a memoir, but if he had, he probably would have called it
I Hope I Really Pissed You Off, or maybe, Don’t Bother Me, You Ass.

What does this even mean? From the article itself, it sounds like Newton
didn't want to socialize, not that he wanted to piss people off.

>He had come into the world on December 25, 1642, like one of those Christmas
gifts you hadn’t put on your list.

I.. what? Surely, for a parent to get his/her child is a present indeed. (I
might misread this, but gifts I don't put on my list are gifts I do not
want!).

>They certainly weren’t close—in all the writings and scribbles Isaac left
behind there is not a single affectionate recollection of her.

The fact that there aren't anything doesn't mean they weren't close (one can
be close without expressing it in writing!).

>The lonely but intensely creative life he led as a boy was preparation for
the creative but tortured and isolated life he would lead for most—though
happily not all—of his adult life.

The author seems to assume that everyone have to be surrounded by people to
not have a 'tortured life'. I can't really say I agree.

>But Newton was not cut out to be a farmer, proving that you can be a genius
at calculating the orbits of the planets, and a total klutz when it comes to
growing alfalfa. What’s more, he didn’t care.

It sounds indeed like he didn't care, not that he simply sucked at it (though
he might did suck).

All in all, I'm not sure I liked the article in its entirety. Somehow, the
author thinks (or knows, but without backing it up) that Newton was a bitter,
arrogant misanthropy, because of a bad childhood.

~~~
zarriak
I think the writer meant that the gift is one that you didn't ask for, but
realize that it is a great thing. Nobody asked for Newtonian Physics, but he
delivered it and greatly improved our understanding of our world.

~~~
skaplun
This doesnt really matter :) but.. They wrote that he was born early, his
early birth coincided with christmas hence unexpected gift At least thats how
i read it

