One biographer (Michael White _Isaac Newton: The Last Sorcerer_
Reading MA: Addison-Wesley, 1997, pages 187-8) says "[in a letter
to Hooke, Newton] went on to write a sentence that has been
quoted so often yet has been largely misunderstood for over three
centuries: 'What Descartes did was a good step. You have added
much several ways...If I have seen further it is by standing on
ye shoulders of Giants'. In that last sentence Newton revealed
the truly spiteful, uncompromising and razor-sharp viciousness of
his character, for Hooke...was so stooped and physically deformed
that he had the appearance of a dwarf. The phrase 'standing on ye
shoulders of Giants' was a perfectly double-edged comment,
designed deliberately to mislead. On the surface, it appears a
compliment - Hooke is called a giant - but Newton meant quite the
reverse."
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I don't know if it qualifies as a "dispute", but there is a
question as to who originated the class-of-all-classes-not-
members-of-themselves paradox. Russell stated the paradox in his
1902 letter to Frege "...there is no class (as a totality) of
those classes which, each taken as a totality, do not belong to
themselves. From this I conclude that under certain
circumstances a definable collection [Menge] does not form a
totality." In _My Mental Development_ (page 13) Russell claims
to have originated this paradox in June, 1901.
However, Zermelo in a 1908 paper stated (footnote 9)
"I had, however, discovered this antinomy myself, independently
of Russell, and had communicated it prior to 1903 to Professor
Hilbert among others."
Both quotes (in English translation) are from Jean van Heijenoort
_Form Frege to Godel, A source Book in Mathematical Logic, 1879-
1931_ Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1967. Russell is
on page 125 and Zermelo on page 191.
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Greetings from moonlit New Jersey (I have to work midnight shift
tonight)
James A. Landau
Federal Aviation Administration Technical Center (ACT-350/BCI)
Atlantic City Airport NJ 08405 USA