Kategoria BISAC: Science >> History

Heat and energy form the backbone of modern physics, but the ideas are not intuitive for most students beginning their study of physics. Instructors spend much valuable time in the classroom and lab explaining such concepts as entropy, thermodynamics, and the conservation of energy. But, as educators know, such ideas can become clearer if students learn how the scientists who developed these concepts came to their discoveries through experimentation and observation. This volume in the "Greenwood Guide to Great Ideas in Science" series provides a historical perspective to heat and...

All students of physics need to understand the basic concepts of electricity and magnetism. E&M is central to the study of physics, and central to understanding the developments of the last two hundred years of not just science, but technology and society in general. But the core of electricity and magnetism can be difficult to understand - many of the ideas are counterintuitive and difficult to appreciate. This volume in the Greenwood Guides to Great Ideas in Science series traces the central concepts of electricity and magnetism from the ancient past to the present day, enabling students...

Science and Islam provides a detailed account of the relationship between Islam and science from the emergence of the Islamic scientific tradition in the eighth century to the present time. This relationship has gone through three distinct phases. The first phase began with the emergence of science in the Islamic civilization in the eighth century and ended with the rise of modern science in the West; the second period is characterized by the arrival of modern science in the Muslim world, most of which at that time was under colonial occupation; and the third period, which began...

Despite the popular view of medieval Europe as a Dark Age of intellectual stagnation, scientific and technological achievement thrived during this time. As any vacationer to Europe knows, churches and castles remain lasting testaments to the ingenuity of that period in history. Through carefully chosen examples which are presented in easily accessible thematic chapters, "Science and Technology in Medieval European Life" demonstrates how these two aspects of human achievement, far from being ivory-tower enterprises, impacted the daily life of people in medieval Europe. These topics will...

These historical narratives of scientific behavior reveal the often irrational way scientists arrive at and assess their theories. There are stories of Einstein s stubbornness leading him to reject a correct interpretation of an experiment and miss an important deduction from his own theory, and Newton missing the important deduction from one of his most celebrated discoveries. This enlightening book clearly demonstrates that the greatest minds throughout history arrived at their famous scientific theories in very unorganized ways and they often did not fully grasp the significance and...

Einstein s Struggles with Quantum Theory: A Re-Appraisal, presents an account of all aspects of Einstein s encounter with quantum theory. Until recently it was accepted that, after important early work, Einstein was simply unable to follow Niels Bohr s approach to quantum theory, and that Einstein s own views, centered on realism, were of no interest. This book follows modern scholarship arguing that Einstein s arguments were well constructed, in the Einstein-Bohr debate his position was legitimate, and his pragmatic approach to realism stimulated John Bell and encouraged the emergence of...

David Harland opens with a review of the robotic probes, namely the Rangers which returned television before crashing into the Moon, the Surveyors which 'soft landed' in order to investigate the nature of the surface, and the Lunar Orbiters which mapped prospective Apollo landing sites. He then outlines the historic landing by Apollo 11 in terms of what was discovered, and how over the next several missions the program was progressively geared up to enable the final three missions each to spend three days on comprehensive geological investigations. He concludes with a review of the robotic...