Quantum Wildness and the Newtonian Myth of a Natural Order
The persistence of wildness in civility, and the refusal to submit to natural facts
Isaac Newton’s method of explaining natural changes unified all phenomena under so-called laws of nature, from the motions of things on Earth to the orbits of other planets. These laws were presumed to be decrees by God who was sovereign over the universe.
In this context, it’s worth recalling that Newton (1642–1727) lived at the height of absolute monarchy in Europe. In the feudal period, the king delegated his power over the kingdom to lords, who swore fealty to the king just as the peasants were obliged to work on the land-owner’s land. The invention of the printing press in around 1436 marked the start of a period of modernization that would soon support the nobles’ fantasy of absolute control.
Britannica defines “absolutism” as “the political doctrine and practice of unlimited centralized authority and absolute sovereignty, as vested especially in a monarch or dictator. The essence of an absolutist system is that the ruling power is not subject to regularized challenge or check by any other agency, be it judicial, legislative, religious, economic, or electoral.”
