How to memorize what you read: Newton's method

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

The great scientist was sitting in the library with books for a reason. Some habits allowed him to memorize what he read immediately and for a long time.

Sir Isaac Newton is famous for his meeting with a falling apple in 1666.

Of course, this was a turning point in his work. But do not forget that both before and after Newton reflected on many ideas. More than 20 years passed from the moment when Newton watched the apple, and until the publication of his book "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy".

To understand how Newton made mind-blowing discoveries, you need to study his habits before and after the apple fell. Thanks to the Royal Society of London, it became known about one of Newton's most important habits - how he read. For example, he folded the corners of important pages.

Society's library manager Rupert Baker jokingly called Newton a repeat offender in the area of book page damage.

In total, the collection of the society contains four books from the scientist's personal library.

• The work of the English astronomer Samuel Foster, Miscellanies, or Mathematical Lucubrations, 1659.
• A treatise on numismatics from 1700.
• Collection of works on alchemy 1610.
• Works on the occult and magic of Agrippa Nettesheim "On Secret Philosophy" 1533.

Only the first is directly related to Newton's work on the study of gravity, so this book quartet is beautiful in itself. As you can see, Newton was a versatile person. Like Van Gogh and Einstein, he could find a connecting thread between seemingly irrelevant things and make a discovery.

In addition, Newton had a whole system by which he folded the corners of the pages. To study it, Baker turned to The Isaac Newton Library, published in 1978 by John Harrison. Here's what the researchers found.

Newton folded pages according to a certain method

Typically, pages are folded by folding the corner up or down. Newton went further. Each corner bent by the scientist points to a specific word, phrase or sentence in the book.

Newton took notes right in the book

Moreover, the notes were huge. They cannot even be called notes: these are arguments that could flood all the free space on the page.

Newton did a great job of compiling the descriptions of the book

In addition to his notes, Newton compiled indices and pointers. They looked the same as they look now in scientific publications, and were alphabetical and thematic. After each position, the page numbers on which the word occurs are listed. Imagine how wonderful such lists look next to the habit of folding pages.

Newton was not afraid to spoil books

Do not forget about this principle. Books are property, sometimes valuable. The Newtonian attitude shows that he perceived books as a working tool that should be used with maximum convenience and, if necessary, broken.

However, this is not a reason to spoil your own and, moreover, other people's books. But do you think that some of Newton's methods are worth adopting?