The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors by John Gribbin (PDF)

Description

A wonderfully readable account of scientific development over the past five hundred years, focusing on the lives and achievements of individual scientists, by the bestselling author of In Search of Schrödinger’s CatIn this ambitious new book, John Gribbin tells the stories of the people who have made science, and of the times in which they lived and worked. He begins with Copernicus, during the Renaissance, when science replaced mysticism as a means of explaining the workings of the world, and he continues through the centuries, creating an unbroken genealogy of not only the greatest but also the more obscure names of Western science, a dot-to-dot line linking amateur to genius, and accidental discovery to brilliant deduction.By focusing on the scientists themselves, Gribbin has written an anecdotal narrative enlivened with stories of personal drama, success and failure. A bestselling science writer with an international reputation, Gribbin is among the few authors who could even attempt a work of this magnitude. Praised as “a sequence of witty, information-packed tales” and “a terrific read” by The Times upon its recent British publication, The Scientists breathes new life into such venerable icons as Galileo, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Linus Pauling, as well as lesser lights whose stories have been undeservedly neglected. Filled with pioneers, visionaries, eccentrics and madmen, this is the history of science as it has never been told before.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐John Gribbin has written a marvelous book that describes how men and women discovered the mechanics of the world they live in. This is the story of science and scientists, beginning in the Renaissance up to the present day. He tells us about men like Galileo and Newton and Darwin—what drew them to the study of science, how they learned, explored, argued with each other, and built upon each other’s discoveries. He covers all the branches of science, including astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology and geology, and how these sciences built upon each other to come to a rounded sense of the physical world and how it works.Just two caveats. Like many scientists, Gribbin can be obsessive about data. He tells us not just the year but the month and day when his subjects were born—as if that made a difference. One wonders: Will he mention the hour of birth too? Then one reads, “Robert Hooke was born on the stroke of noon on 18 July 1635 . . .” Who cares? Obsessions with minutiae such as this can obscure the larger narrative. Second, Gribbin is so invested in empirical science that he regards all that came before as mysticism and superstition. However there are other ways of knowing. Art, poetry, philosophy–and yes, religion–are not false for being non-empirical. They can be legitimate ways of coming to the truth, and valuable correctives in an age when science is king.

⭐This was great book that attempts to show that science is a process involving a multitude of people with varying personalities. Since it focused on the scientists themselves, I often supplemented my reading with technical details from other sources.

⭐If you’re trying to learn about the history of science and how we went from explaining the world through religion to the ridiculously advanced world we live in today… look no further. The author does a fantastic job explaining every major discovery that lead to our advanced world. Through physics, chemistry, biology, geology…. the book touches on everything scientific. For how long it is, I never got bored of its content. Highly recommend. One of my favorite books

⭐I actually read a copy of this book borrowed from town library. It was so fascinating, that I bought it to have a copy in my Kindle. It’s a history of physics discovering, and at the end of the book, it explains with clarity how the universe came into being.

⭐If you expect this book to illuminate the lives of natural philosophers and scientists; to detail their idiosyncracies, oddities, obsessions, and personalities; to explore the politics and prevailing social and religious winds of their day — then this book will be a joy for you to read, and you will delight in its pages.If you expect this book to describe the thinking of these intellectual forefathers and -mothers of ours; to sort through their theories and how they arrived at them; to paint a big picture of the history of science that enables you to see the overarching themes and trends — then this book, sadly, will be a disappointment.There is no doubt that Gribbin has written a tale that is grand in scope, expansive in nature, and overall exciting, enthralling and even downright juicy (who would have thought that the lives of natural philosophers and scientists were filled with such scandal and self-indulgence?). However, one should approach this book with the knowledge that it is more about quirks than quarks, more about natural passions than natural laws, and more about the history of scientific personalities than the history of scientific thought.

⭐Everything arrived on time and as advertised

⭐I enjoyed this book tremendously. It is an incredibly comprehensive overview of the progress of scientific thought from the ancient Greeks to present day (approximately 2000). Gribbin has organized the book basically chronologically, but he also organizes his chapters along themes such as astronomy or life sciences. Generally, he treats mathematical advancements as outside the scope of the book unless they have a bearing on the ability to analyze and lead to scientific understandings. He makes a strong case for how science has been built incrementally, from step to step (although some steps are larger). This book is enthralling and interesting because Gribbin does such a nice job in describing the scientists as people with all of their foibles and eccentricities, and he is good to point out funny coincidences and ironies. This book was so good and has so much interesting detail that I plan to read it again.

⭐I very much enjoy reading about the history of science. The short biographies given about each of the scientists in this history make this book even more of an interesting read. As someone trained in science however, I would have occasionally enjoyed a few more scientific details, for example the control experiments performed to rule out alternative explanations. I also strongly disagree with the authors perspective at the end of the book regarding our current understanding of the natural world. The author implies that essentially all of the major discoveries in science have been made, i.e. our theoretical understanding is complete and it is now just a matter of filling in the details. If I am not mistaken, physicists prior to Einstein had a similar belief. In my opinion, we have yet to make similar conceptual breakthroughs that will be necessary to explain both the origin of life and the origin of the universe itself. However, regardless of these criticisms I still highly recommend this book.

⭐Simply fantastic. Utterly readable. Buy it.

⭐Amazing book. Fun and educational.

⭐It is a very good book. The author does a very good job of portraying the events in the lives of the scientists. It piques the reader’s interest, throughout. No complaints with the contents of the book , hovever, the page quality is poor, so is quality of the cover.

⭐Quite good & readable; I haven’t finished reading it though…., 600+ pages,mind it. Gribbin’s a excellent writer. He knows how to keep U hooked to his books.He not only covered the history & the science, the personal & related aspects in each chapter makes the book quite absorbing.Hence 5 star rating.

⭐Amazing book…..must read….! Wonderful….happy for this book…

Keywords

Free Download The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors in PDF format
The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors PDF Free Download
Download The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors 2019 PDF Free
The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors 2019 PDF Free Download
Download The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors PDF
Free Download Ebook The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors