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The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors
John Gribbin · back to the book
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorPrime Obsession: Bernhard Riemann and the Greatest Unsolved Problem in Mathematics
John Derbyshire · 435 pages
The Music of the Primes: Searching to Solve the Greatest Mystery in Mathematics
Marcus du Sautoy · 351 pages
Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science
David Lindley · 272 pages
The more precisely the position is determined, the less precisely the momentum is known in this instant, and vice versa.--Werner HeisenbergThat God would choose to play dice with the world is something I cannot believe.--Albert EinsteinNothing exists until it is measured.--Neils BohrThe remarkable story of a startling scientific idea that ignited a battle among the greatest minds of the twentieth
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Bill Bryson · 560 pages
A Short History of Nearly Everything by American author Bill Bryson is a popular science book that explains some areas of science, using easily accessible language that appeals more so to the general public than many other books dedicated to the subject. It was one of the bestselling popular science books of 2005 in the United Kingdom, selling over 300,000 copies. A Short History deviates from
Making the Monster: The Science Behind Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (Bloomsbury Sigma)
Kathryn Harkup · 305 pages
The Day the Universe Changed: How Galileo's Telescope Changed the Truth
James Burke · 353 pages
The Ascent of Man
Jacob Bronowski · 448 pages
Traces the development of science and the discoveries that have made man unique among animal species.
Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements
Hugh Aldersey-Williams · 430 pages
"In the spirit of A SHORT HISTORY OF NEARLY EVERYTHING, an energetic and wide-ranging book of discovery and discoverers, of exploitation and celebration, and of superstition and science, all in search of the ways the chemical elements are woven into our culture, history, and language"--
A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos
Dava Sobel · 273 pages
The bestselling author of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter tells the story of Nicolaus Copernicus, and the revolution he inspired, in an utterly original and groundbreaking new book. By 1514, the reclusive cleric Nicolaus Copernicus had written and hand-copied an initial outline of his heliocentric theory—in which he defied common sense and received wisdom to place the sun, not the earth, at the c
The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements
Sam Kean · 391 pages
The infectious tales and astounding details in The Disappearing Spoon follow carbon, neon, silicon, and gold as they play out their parts in human history, finance, mythology, war, the arts, poison, and the lives of the (frequently) mad scientists who discovered them. --from publisher description
Coming of Age in the Milky Way
Timothy Ferris · 495 pages
From the second-century celestial models of Ptolemy to modern-day research institutes and quantum theory, this classic book offers a breathtaking tour of astronomy and the brilliant, eccentric personalities who have shaped it. From the first time mankind had an inkling of the vast space that surrounds us, those who study the universe have had to struggle against political and religious preconcepti
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer
Siddhartha Mukherjee · 571 pages
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer is a book written by Siddhartha Mukherjee, an Indian-born American physician and oncologist. Published on 16 November 2010 by Scribner, it won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot · 381 pages
The Demon Under the Microscope: From Battlefield Hospitals to Nazi Labs, One Doctor's Heroic Search for the World's First Miracle Drug
Thomas Hager · 340 pages
The Nazis discovered it. The Allies won the war with it. It conquered diseases, changed laws, and single-handedly launched the era of antibiotics. It was sulfa, the first synthetic antibiotic. Science writer Hager chronicles the history of the drug that shaped modern medicine. Sulfa saved millions of lives--among them those of Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt Jr.--but even more, it
Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History
Bill Schutt · 350 pages
"Eating one's own kind is completely natural behavior in thousands of species, including humans. Throughout history we have engaged in cannibalism for reasons relating to famine, burial rites, and medicinal remedies. Cannibalism has been used as a form of terrorism but also as the ultimate expression of filial piety. With unexpected wit and a wealth of knowledge, Bill Schutt, a research associate
Science Matters: Achieving Scientific Literacy
Robert M. Hazen, James S. Trefil · 294 pages
Knowledge of the basic ideas and principles of science is fundamental to cultural literacy. But most books on science are often too obscure or too specialized to do the general reader much good.Science Matters is a rare exception-a science book for the general reader that is informative enough to be a popular textbook for introductory courses in high school and college, and yet well-written enough
The Making of the Atomic Bomb
Richard Rhodes · 886 pages
Here for the first time, in rich, human, political, and scientific detail, is the complete story of how the bomb was developed, from the turn-of-the-century discovery of the vast energy locked inside the atom to the dropping of the first bombs on Japan. Few great discoveries have evolved so swiftly -- or have been so misunderstood. From the theoretical discussions of nuclear energy to the brig
Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History
Penny Le Couteur, Jay Burreson · 384 pages
Napoleon's Buttons is the fascinating account of seventeen groups of molecules that have greatly influenced the course of history. These molecules provided the impetus for early exploration, and made possible the voyages of discovery that ensued. The molecules resulted in grand feats of engineering and spurred advances in medicine and law; they determined what we now eat, drink, and wear. A change
Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History
Stephen Jay Gould · 350 pages
Darwin's Ghosts: The Secret History of Evolution
Rebecca Stott · 396 pages
Christmas, 1859. Just one month after the publication of On the Origin of Species, Darwin received a letter that deeply unsettled him. He had expected criticism. Letters were arriving every day like swarms, some expressing praise, most outrage and accusations of heresy. But the letter from the Reverend Powell was different.
Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus
Bill Wasik, Monica Murphy · 288 pages
Charts the history, science, and cultural mythology of rabies, documenting how before its vaccine the disease caused fatal brain infections and sparked the creations of monsters, including werewolves, vampires and zombies.
How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World
Steven Johnson · 293 pages
"From the New York Times-bestselling author of Where Good Ideas Come From and Everything Bad Is Good for You, a new look at the power and legacy of great ideas. In this illustrated volume, Steven Johnson explores the history of innovation over centuries, tracing facets of modern life (refrigeration, clocks, and eyeglass lenses, to name a few) from their creation by hobbyists, amateurs, and entrepr
Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder
Richard Dawkins · 352 pages
Did Newton "unweave the rainbow" by reducing it to its prismatic colors, as Keats contended? Did he, in other words, diminish beauty? Far from it, says Dawkins - Newton's unweaving is the key to much of modern astronomy and to the breathtaking poetry of modern cosmology. Mysteries don't lose their poetry because they are solved; the solution is often more beautiful than the puzzle, uncovering deep