Tournament of Genius
(1) Sir Isaac Newton vs. (16) Gottfried Leibniz
by Tournament of Genius - March 17, 2009 - 5:00 AM

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(1) Sir Isaac Newton

It may be a myth that Newton discovered the law of gravity when an apple bonked him on the noggin, but it’s tough to argue with the guy’s genius credentials. By parsing out the composition of white light, he made himself the father of optics. By enumerating his three laws of motion, he became the father of modern physics. By discovering calculus, he became the bane of college freshmen for centuries to come. If that’s not enough, he also had a really terrific wig collection.

(16) Gottfried Leibniz

Newton may be hogging all of the credit for calculus, but Leibniz came up with the field independently and actually wrote out the notation we still use today. Leibniz wasn’t just a mathematician, though. He was a political adviser to the Duke of Hanover. He tinkered with improving lamps, clocks, submarines, and other gadgets. His work as a mining engineer gets him credit for being one of the first geologists. By showing equal dexterity as a logician and a metaphysical thinker, Leibniz was also one of the preeminent philosophers of his day. In other words: Isaac Who?

The Breakdown

The Battle for Calculus! Leibniz probably deserved a higher seed, but we couldn’t help making these two old rivals square off to see who the real king of the integral is. There was no love lost between these two geniuses, either; Leibniz spent the last years of his life in a bitter feud with Newton over whether or not he’d simply bogarted Newton’s ideas.

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[See the whole bracket here.]

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Comments (9)

  1. Both of them are great scientists. Newton with his theories of gravity & light & Leibniz with his calculus & philosophical stand for God.

    posted by Karl on 3-17-2009 at 5:11 am

  2. Newton (in my opinion) had a much bigger impact on science than Leibniz. But Newton’s infatuation with alchemy, magic, and his fanatical religious fervor always left a bitter taste in my mouth. So I voted Gottfried as the more “pure” scientist.

    posted by Caleb on 3-17-2009 at 5:34 am

  3. I voted Leibniz, since I am more a philosopher than a scientist. Just so we know, Leibniz was a believer as well, and wrote about the Big Guy plenty.

    posted by Zach on 3-17-2009 at 10:23 am

  4. There is no option to vote… it just shows the results.

    posted by Sarah in CA on 3-17-2009 at 10:41 am

  5. Newton’s going to sweep the tournament. He’s the greatest genius who ever lived, no question. Basically, he single-handedly invented physics.

    posted by Marcus Brute on 3-17-2009 at 12:45 pm

  6. I know this is all in fun, but it’s hard to legitimize any bracket that has Leibniz as the 16 and the RZA as the 13. You guys are phoning this in.

    posted by Dave on 3-17-2009 at 2:02 pm

  7. I have to say I’m with Leibniz here. Newton was really good at ruining the lives of other scientists he thought were threats, like Leibniz. Also, I’m much happier doing caluculas with Leibniz’s notation and not Newton’s.

    posted by Me on 3-17-2009 at 2:13 pm

  8. If you read the Leibniz-Clarke exchange, it becomes clear that Leibniz’s universe was at least consistent while Newton seems to embody contradiction in every way. Yet it was Newton who took great joy late in life for breaking Leibniz and ruining him so in a sense Newton won. Had Newton not written the royal society’s conclusion himself finding Leibniz to be a fraud, perhaps Leibniz would have been appointed to a high position in England instead of dying like a theif. Newton wins the dirty scoundrel award any day.

    posted by Gary geck on 6-30-2010 at 12:44 am

  9. There is no question that Newton discovered/invented Calculus before Leibniz, by nearly 10 years. And it appears that Leibniz very well could have become aware of Newton’s yet-unpublished work on the Calculus prior to developing his own version. We do know that when Leibniz actually published his work on Calculus, he was aware that Newton had also been working on the same topic, but gave no mention of Newton.

    Basically, it appears that Leibniz WAS at least somewhat dishonest and dishonorable with respect to Newton. Which would at least somewhat justify Newton’s anger towards him.

    In any case, Newton’s contributions to optics, physics, and mathematics outstrip anything Leibniz contributed. And Newton preceded Leibniz by nearly 10 years in developing Calculus. So, Newton.

    posted by Douglas J. Bender on 12-4-2011 at 11:31 pm

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