Inventions That Changed the World
by Robert Dolezal and Of Readers Digest Editors
The world at the turn of the twentieth century was in the throes of "Marconi-mania"-brought on by an incredible invention that no one could quite explain, and by a dapper and eccentric figure (who would one day win the newly minted Nobel Prize) at the centre of it all. At a time when the telephone, telegraph, and electricity made the whole world wonder just what science would think of next, the startling answer had come in 1896 in the form of two mysterious wooden boxes containing a device Marco...
In recent years philosophers of science have urged that many scientific theories are extremely useful and successful despite being internally inconsistent. Via an investigation of eight alleged 'inconsistent theories' in the history of science, Peter Vickers urges that this view is at best overly simplistic. Most of these cases can only be described as examples of 'inconsistent science' if we employ reconstructions of science which depart from the real (history of) science to an unacceptable deg...
An Eleventh-century Manual of Arabo-Byzantine Astronomy (Corpus des astronomes byzantins, #3)
by Alan Jones
The Quest for Aqua Vitae (SpringerBriefs in History of Chemistry) (SpringerBriefs in Molecular Science)
by Seth C. Rasmussen
Ethyl alcohol, or ethanol, is one of the most ubiquitous chemical compounds in the history of the chemical sciences. The generation of alcohol via fermentation is also one of the oldest forms of chemical technology, with the production of fermented beverages such as mead, beer and wine predating the smelting of metals. By the 12th century, the ability to isolate alcohol from wine had moved this chemical species from a simple component of alcoholic beverages to both a new medicine and a powerful...
The Works in Logic by Bosniac Authors in Arabic (Islamic Philosophy, Theology and Science. Texts and Studies, #77)
by Amir Ljubovic
The book offers and explains the hypothesis that the end of the 13th century does not denote the "final stage" and the "stage of decay" of Arabic logic as the "Aristotelian logic" continues its life and development in the following period in Bosnia and Herzegovina either as a subject within the educational system, or as general propaedeutics for each scientific thought where it had skilled interpreters. The book proves that the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina used almost the same way to...
The figure of Dai Zhen (1724–1777) looms large in modern Chinese intellectual history. Dai was a mathematical astronomer and influential polymath who, along with like-minded scholars, sought to balance understandings of science, technology, and history within the framework of classical Chinese writings. Exploring ideas in fields as broad-ranging as astronomy, geography, governance, phonology, and etymology, Dai grappled with Western ideas and philosophies, including Jesuit conceptions of cosmolo...
The contentious history of the idea of the black hole-the most fascinating and bizarre celestial object in the heavens For more than half a century, physicists and astronomers engaged in heated dispute over the possibility of black holes in the universe. The weirdly alien notion of a space-time abyss from which nothing escapes-not even light-seemed to confound all logic. This engrossing book tells the story of the fierce black hole debates and the contributions of Einstein and Hawking and othe...
"An essential perspective for those seeking a serious introduction to early geological science and a fundamental point of departure for future research.... No other book has this scope and conceptual focus."—Kenneth L. Taylor, University of OklahomaIn the years between 1665 and 1750, geology was a new kind of science, combining physical law with historical process. Rhoda Rappaport explains its novelty and provides a transnational account of the development of geological thinking. She begins with...
The Rise of Scientific Europe, 1500-1800
Deals with the growth of science throughout Europe, from 1500 to 1800. The book assumes no prior knowledge of the history of science, covering instead such topics as scientific societies, science education and communication. It includes the Copernican and Newtonian revolutions. This book is designed to be of interest to Open Universty undergraduates specializing in arts and science or as a background book for teachers of science or students of history.
Ancient science is a subject that commands extensive general interest. This is the first non-technical survey of the interface between ancient and modern science. It is aimed at crossover student sales in classics, the history of ideas and the history and philosophy of science. Modern science and its technology are the children of the seventeenth-century. But the bold investigative experimentation and scientific systems of thought that this era spawned were in turn thoroughly influenced by Greek...
The Historical Development of the Calculus (Springer Study Edition)
by C. H. Edwards
The calculus has served for three centuries as the principal quantitative language of Western science. In the course of its genesis and evolution some of the most fundamental problems of mathematics were first con- fronted and, through the persistent labors of successive generations, finally resolved. Therefore, the historical development of the calculus holds a special interest for anyone who appreciates the value of a historical perspective in teaching, learning, and enjoying mathematics and i...
These essays offer scholars, teachers, and students a new basis for discussing attitudes toward, and technological expertise concerning, water in antiquity through the early Modern period, and they examine historical water use and ideology both diachronically and cross regionally. Topics include gender roles and water usage; attitudes, practices, and innovations in baths and bathing; water and the formation of identity and policy; ancient and medieval water sources and resources; and religious a...
Humanity can make short work of the oceans' creatures. In 1741, hungry explorers discovered herds of Steller's sea cow in the Bering Strait, and in less than thirty years, the amiable beast had been harpooned into extinction. It's a classic story, but a key fact is often omitted. Bering Islannd was the last redoubt of a species that had been decimated by hunting and habitat loss years before the explorers set sail.As Callum M. Roberts reveals in THE UNNATURAL HISTORY OF THE SEA, the oceans' b...