This is the biography of one of the most original and widely significant, yet largely forgotten, British scientists. Frederick Soddy was one of the first generation of English atomic scientists, working with Rutherford on the initial discoveries about atomic disintegration, and received the Nobel Prize in 1921 for his research on isotopes. Soddy's worry about the responsibility of science and scientists to society began with his fear that the atomic energy he and Rutherford had discovered could be disastrous if suitable political controls were not enforced, and led to his abandoning...