Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
Sources

Opticks: or, a Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light

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Opticks is Isaac Newton's own treatise on light, first published in 1704, cited here from the Gutenberg edition of the historical English text, and Book One, Part Two, is where Newton lays out his division of the visible spectrum into seven named colours along with his explicit analogy between those seven colour intervals and the seven intervals of the musical octave. As Newton's own primary presentation of an idea that shaped centuries of subsequent color theory, it is the correct source for what he actually argued and how he framed the color music analogy himself, tiered here the same way the atlas tiers other historical primary sources such as Pliny, Dioscorides and Agrippa. Its limit is that it presents seventeenth century natural philosophy in its own terms, so a claim about modern optics or color science needs a current scientific source rather than Newton's own historical text.

Facts
Assessment
Reliability Tier
1
Isaac Newton's Opticks, whose Book One, Part Two carries his primary division of the visible spectrum into seven named colours and his explicit analogy with the seven intervals of the musical octave.
Notes
Book I, Part II carries the division of the spectrum into seven named colours and the explicit analogy with the seven intervals of the musical octave. Tiered as the corpus tiers Pliny, Dioscorides, Theophrastus and Agrippa.
Citation
Author
Isaac Newton
Publisher
Sam. Smith and Benj. Walford, London
Publication Year
1704
URL
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33504
Source Type
primary-text
Claims Backed By This Source (44 claims)

This source backs 44 claims across the atlas. As facts: 18 well-attested, 14 scholarly debate. As cited relationships: 2 holds. Plus 10 entities citing it as a general reference with no single fact or relationship attached.

Disposition By Topic

  • Colors, 34 claims: 9 well-attested, 14 scholarly debate, 2 holds, 9 general references.
  • Sources, 8 claims: 8 well-attested.
  • Historical Figures, 2 claims: 1 well-attested, 1 general references.
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