The Prism and the Pendulum: The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments in Science - Brossura

Crease, Robert

Brossura

ISBN 10: 0812970624 ISBN 13: 9780812970623

Casa editrice: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004

Riassunto

A philosopher and historian creates a thought-provoking odyssey through two millennia of scientific accomplishment, capturing ten key experiments that changed the world forever, from Eratosthenes's first measurement of Earth's circumference, to Foucault's pendulum, to Galileo's study of the speed of falling bodies, to the realm of quantum mechanics. Reprint. 10,000 first printing.

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Recensione:

“Science and scientists are so often seen as cold and emotionless, but they are passionately drawn to beauty and truth, no less intensely than artists or poets. One can open this book anywhere and get a sense of this special passion—each chapter has its own special feel and delectations, and all of them bring out that beauty, for scientists, is no less important than truth, and that one can be ravished by an experiment no less than by a work of art.”
—Oliver Sacks

“In an era in which the public perceives science as a string of ethereal ideas conjured up by cute men in tweed jackets sitting in overstuffed leather chairs in the faculty lounge, The Prism and the Pendulum creates a refreshing portrait of beauty in science: of men with rough hands polishing inclined planes, peering into wells, climbing towers, or sitting in the dark looking for the one spark in eight thousand that would ignite the nuclear age. In this readable, narrative-driven book, we meet scientists wresting the truth from nature by confronting her on a physical, visceral level. Robert Crease, with this volume, destroys and corrects the ‘damn good stories’ commonly used to teach science, and places himself among our most important science historians and philosophers.”
—Dick Teresi, author of Lost Discoveries, coauthor of The God Particle, cofounder of Omni
From the Hardcover edition.

L'autore:

Robert P. Crease is a professor in the Department of Philosophy at Stony Brook University in New York, and historian at Brookhaven National Laboratory. He writes a monthly column, “Critical Point,” for Physics World magazine. His books include Making Physics: A Biography of Brookhaven National Laboratory; The Play of Nature: Experimentation as Performance; The Second Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Twentieth-Century Physics (with Charles C. Mann); and—with Robert Serber—Peace & War: Reminiscences of a Life on the Frontiers of Science. Crease’s translations include American Philosophy of Technology: The Empirical Turn. He lectures widely, and his articles and reviews have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Smithsonian, and elsewhere. He lives in New York City.
From the Hardcover edition.

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Random House Trade Paperbacks
• Data di pubblicazione: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0812970624
• ISBN 13: 9780812970623
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 272