Spencer Heath Archive

Item 1912

Pencil notes inserted in John Archibald Wheeler, “A Septet of Sibyls: Aids in the Search for Truth,” reprinted from American Scientist, Vol.44, No.4, October 1956.

Wheeler’s Seven Sibyls (Working Premises — Axioms)

1. The Unknown is Knowable

Yes, but not absolutely. We and our capacities are finite.

(2)  Advance by Trial & Error

Yes, but none except by instinct and intuition without benefit of rationality.

(3)  Measurement and Theory are Inseparable

Yes, because Theory must be rational, must employ ratios.

(4)  Analogy Gives Insight

Yes, it separates the distinctive from the correspondent.

(5)  New Truth Connects with Old Truth

Yes, as in (4). Analogy finds the distinctive new in connection with the correspondent old.

(6)  Complementarity Guards against Contradiction

Yes, different aspects of the same thing are complementary in it, not contradictory.

(7)  Great Consequences Spring from Lowly Sources

Yes, the complex and great are always integrations of the simple and small.