"I had no need of that hypothesis."
— Atheism

January 1, 1970

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Atheism
Original Language: English

Sources

There is no contemporary source for this version of Laplace's interaction with Napoleon. It is not mentioned in the only eye-witness account of the event (see Daniel Johnson, 2007), and Hervé Faye was told by François Arago that Laplace had sought his help in a failed attempt to get the story removed from an unauthorized biography (Faye, Sur l'origine du monde, Paris, 1884, pp. 109–111). Scholars believe the hypothesis Laplace was referring to was Newton's notion that God had to intervene period