EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ADAM HART-DAVIS
Profiling the pioneering scientists and their signature achievements, from antiquity to modern times
5 stars out of 5 stars
The first American Edition of SCIENCE appeared in 2009. The version I have was dated 2011. The Editor-in-Chief, Adam Hart-Davis, also served as Editor-in-Chief of ENGINEERS, another DK book. ENGINEERS first appeared in 2013. There was another edition in 2015.
The formats of the two books are similar. Whereas ENGINEERS profiles the great engineering feats and the engineers who built them, SCIENCE focused on humankind’s expansion of scientific knowledge in all fields and the scientists who enabled these advances, from antiquity to modern times.
There is not always a clear distinction between scientists and engineers, but a good guide is the quote by the pioneer aerodynamicist Theodore Von Karman, who said that “Scientists aim to understand what is; engineers aim to design and create what has never been “. While most can be classified in one category or another, there were a few who straddled both. Examples were Benjamin Franklin, H. Hertz, G. Marconi. They are included in both books.
The story of the progress of science is organized, following historical timelines, into five periods: The Dawn of Science (Prehistory to 1500), Renaissance and Enlightenment (1500-1700); The Industrial Revolution (1700-1800); The Atomic Age (1890-1970); and The Information Age (1970 Onward). Under each period, all fields of science are covered, with descriptive subheadings ranging from topics in astronomy, botany to mathematics and medicine. There are double page biographies of 19 major characters, and around 100 features on other great pioneers. Examples of the former are Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin; examples of the latter are Edmund Halley and Joseph Henry. It is, however, rather puzzling why Niels Bohr, a towering figure in the development of quantum theory, was neither among the 19 nor among the 100 selected.
There is a reference section and a Who’s who section at the end of the book. The reference section provides quick access to facts and figures on the major fields of science covered, which include Measurement, Astronomy and Space, Earth Science, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, and Mathematics.
Of the 19 major characters, I was ignorant of four: Abu Ali Alhazen, Joseph Black, Dorothy Hodgkin and James Lovelock.
- Thanks to SCIENCE, I now know that Alhazen is known as the father of the science of optics. He was also one of the earliest experimental scientists. His many achievements in science are commemorated by a crater on the Moon, an asteroid, and by his portrait on Iraqi banknotes.
- Joseph Black was the father of quantitative chemistry. Among his discoveries was “latent heat”, capsulized in the sentence “A very great quantity of heat is necessary to the production of vapor”. He died on December 6, 1799, while at dinner with his family. He set his bowl gently down upon his knees and died, without spilling a drop.
- Dorothy Hodgkin was a pioneer in the technique of X-ray crystallography. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1964 “for her determinations by X-ray techniques of the structures of important biochemical substances”. She was the first British woman to receive the Nobel Prize.
- James Lovelock is best known as the founder of Gaia theory (also known as Earth System Science), which describes the entire earth, made of both living and nonliving parts, as a single system. He was instrumental in the discovery of the ozone hole in the atmosphere. As of this writing, he is 102 years old, living in England.
Among the 100 “other great pioneers” featured was Lyman Spitzer and Brian Green. I studied Spitzer’s book “Physics of Fully Ionized Gas” in graduate school. I did not know that he was the first to recognize the potential of space astronomy. In 1965, NASA asked him to help plan the Hubble Space Telescope. He was instrumental in lobbying Congress for funding the project and helped it become a reality.
Brian Green was one of the leading string theorists. He wrote the popular science book “The Elegant Universe” which I read many years ago. He was on television a lot and I always enjoyed watching him popularizing various aspects of physics.
The book certainly rises up to the claim of its subtitle “The Definitive Visual Guide”. It is in fact much more than a visual guide. It provides a panoramic view of the vast canvas that is Science. The scientific spirit is captured in the quote by Marie Curie at the back cover of the book: “Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.”
The source of the following illustrations are from Wikipedia.
The idea that these four elements—Earth, Water, Air, and Fire—made up all matter was the cornerstone of philosophy, science, and medicine for two-thousand years.
Link of review in Amazon.com
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