History of science Books

The classic case for why government must support science - with a new essay by physicist and former congressman Rush Holt on what democracy needs from science today Science, the Endless Frontier is recognised as the landmark argument for the...

New perspectives on the iconic physicist's scientific and philosophical formationAt the end of World War II, Albert Einstein was invited to write his intellectual autobiography for the Library of Living Philosophers. The resulting book was his uniquely...

The fascinating untold story of how the ancients imagined robots and other forms of artificial life-and even invented real automated machines The first robot to walk the earth was a bronze giant called Talos. This wondrous machine was created not by MIT...

The astonishing new story of human originsWas Darwin wrong when he traced our origins to Africa? The Real Planet of the Apes makes the explosive claim that it was in Europe, not Africa, where apes evolved the most important hallmarks of our human lineage...

The Greco-Roman mathematician Claudius Ptolemy is one of the most significant figures in the history of science. He is remembered today for his astronomy, but his philosophy is almost entirely lost to history. This groundbreaking book is the first to...

Why the social character of scientific knowledge makes it trustworthy Do doctors really know what they are talking about when they tell us vaccines are safe? Should we take climate experts at their word when they warn us about the perils of global...

More than fifty years after his death, Albert Einstein's vital engagement with the world continues to inspire others, spurring conversations, projects, and research, in the sciences as well as the humanities. Einstein for the 21st Century shows us why he...

Physics Today, Notable Books of 2020 A finely drawn portrait of Einstein's sixteen months in Prague In the spring of 1911, Albert Einstein moved with his wife and two sons to Prague, the capital of Bohemia, where he accepted a post as a...

This book presents reverse mathematics to a general mathematical audience for the first time. Reverse mathematics is a new field that answers some old questions. In the two thousand years that mathematicians have been deriving theorems from axioms, it...

In 1969, Princeton physicist Gerard O'Neill began looking outward to space colonies as the new frontier for humanity's expansion. A decade later, Eric Drexler, an MIT-trained engineer, turned his attention to the molecular world as the place where...

Until a few decades ago, the ocean depths were almost as mysterious and inaccessible as outer space. Oceans cover two-thirds of the earth's surface with an average depth of more than two miles--yet humans had never ventured more than a few hundred feet...

A comprehensive history of the biological sciences from antiquity to the modern era. This book presents a global history of the biological sciences from ancient times to today, providing needed perspective on the development of biological thought while...

How scientists through the ages have conducted thought experiments using imaginary entities - demons - to test the laws of nature and push the frontiers of what is possible.Science may be known for banishing the demons of superstition from the modern...

A book that finally demystifies Newton's experiments in alchemyWhen Isaac Newton's alchemical papers surfaced at a Sotheby's auction in 1936, the quantity and seeming incoherence of the manuscripts were shocking. No longer the exemplar of Enlightenment...

An insider account of how researchers unraveled the mystery of the thawing ArcticIn the 1990s, researchers in the Arctic noticed that floating summer sea ice had begun receding. This was accompanied by shifts in ocean circulation and unexpected changes...

A gripping history of the polar continent, from the great discoveries of the nineteenth century to modern scientific breakthroughs.]Antarctica, the ice kingdom hosting the South Pole, looms large in the human imagination. The secrets of this vast frozen...

A fundamentally new approach to the history of science and technologyThis book presents a new way of thinking about the history of science and technology, one that offers a grand narrative of human history in which knowledge serves as a critical factor...

Einstein's Jury is the dramatic story of how astronomers in Germany, England, and America competed to test Einstein's developing theory of relativity. Weaving a rich narrative based on extensive archival research, Jeffrey Crelinsten shows how these early...

A treasure trove of illuminating and entertaining quotations from the legendary naturalist Here is Charles Darwin in his own words--the naturalist, traveler, scientific thinker, and controversial author of On the Origin of Species, the book that shook...

In this sweeping and richly illustrated history, S. Frederick Starr tells the fascinating but largely unknown story of Central Asia's medieval enlightenment through the eventful lives and astonishing accomplishments of its greatest minds--remarkable...

How genes are not the only basis of heredity-and what this means for evolution, human life, and diseaseFor much of the twentieth century it was assumed that genes alone mediate the transmission of biological information across generations and provide the...

A cosmic perspective on carbon its importance in the universe and our lives.When we think of carbon, we might first think of a simple element near the top of the periodic table: symbol C, atomic number 6. Alternatively, we might think of something more...

What can fashionable ideas, blind faith, or pure fantasy possibly have to do with the scientific quest to understand the universe? Surely, theoretical physicists are immune to mere trends, dogmatic beliefs, or flights of fancy? In fact, acclaimed...

This groundbreaking book by the acclaimed Dorothy Roberts examines how the myth of biological concept of race-revived by purportedly cutting-edge science, race-specific drugs, genetic testing, and DNA databases-continues to undermine a just society and...

How are illnesses diagnosed? What is cancer? Why are some pandemics so deadly? This book explores big questions like these, explaining the breakthroughs and discoveries that have shaped our modern-day understanding of medicine and helped us protect and...