The Weird Case of Wolfgang Pauli: Hardcore Positivist and “Mystic”

Religious/“spiritual” commentators, New Age “scientists”, and self-described “anti-materialists” often cite the case of Wolfgang Pauli and his (what they call) “mystical” views. They also note that Pauli admired — and was inspired by — the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Yet Pauli was a physicist —indeed, a great physicist. So it’s not much of a surprise that virtually none of his writings on mystical matters were published in his lifetime — certainly not as academic papers or books. However, various books on Pauli’s mysticism and his relationship with Jung were published long after his death in 1958.

(i) Introduction
(ii) False Authority: Name-Dropping Various “Great Scientists”
(iii) Gerald R. Baron on Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung
(iv) Part Two: Wolfgang Pauli’s Positivism

To put it at its most extreme: a person may be a serial killer and still be a great scientist. Similarly, a person may (i.e., in his private life) believe in pixies, white/black supremacy, or alien lizards and still be a great scientist.

Indeed, there’s a long list of great scientists and mathematicians who held very peculiar views outside their scientific and mathematical work. [See ‘The ‘Maddest’ Scientists In History’, which doesn’t…