Eureka! – a book review

Eureka!: The Birth of Science by Andrew Gregory

I recently read Eureka!: The Birth of Science by Andrew Gregory. The book deals with a topic that has long fascinated me – the birth of science. In a previous post I argued that this took place in the 12th century, the age of cathedrals. Gregory takes the view that it happened with the ancient Greeks, and sees Aristotle and Archimedes as among science’s pioneers. He gives a brief defence of this thesis, and provides a quick summary of Greek scientific thought.

Aristotle and Archimedes

I found this book rather short for the subject (177 pages, including bibliography), was disappointed at the lack of endnotes, and found some annoying errors (the Greeks did not consider the universe small, for example – Archimedes took it to be 2 light-years across). But the big unanswered question is: what went wrong? Gregory includes a list of key people at the back of the book, and if you turn that list into a bar chart, you can see that Greek science basically fell off a cliff around 200 BC.

In a brief two-page section towards the end, Gregory suggests that Christianity was somehow responsible for the decline of Greek science, but that simply makes no sense. Was it instead Roman conquest, beginning around 280 BC? Was it the growing separation of aristocratic philosophy from plebeian technology? Was it the replacement of original science by encyclopaedic systematisation (such as that of Pliny)? It would have been nice to have those questions answered.

Goodreads gives this book 3.4 stars; I was rather less enthusiastic.

Eureka!: The Birth of Science by Andrew Gregory: 2 stars


Measuring the Earth this (Southern) Christmas

In around 240 BC, Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the Earth. The diagram above (from NOAA) shows how he did it. This Christmas, people in the Southern Hemisphere can repeat his work!

Eratosthenes knew that, at the summer solstice, the sun would be directly overhead at Syene (on the Tropic of Cancer) and would shine vertically down a well there. He also knew the distance to Syene.

On 21 December, the sun will be directly overhead on the Tropic of Capricorn at local noon. This table show the time of local noon on 21 December 2017, and the distance to the Tropic of Capricorn, for some Southern Hemisphere cities:

City Local Noon Distance to Tropic (km)
Adelaide 13:14 1270
Auckland 13:19 1490
Brisbane 11:46 450
Buenos Aires 12:52 1240
Darwin 12:45 1220
Hobart 13:09 2160
Johannesburg 12:06 310
Melbourne 13:18 1590
Perth 12:15 940
Santiago 13:41 1110
Sydney 12:53 1160

At exactly local noon, Eratosthenes measured the length (s) of the shadow of a tall column in his home town of Alexandria. He knew the height (h) of the column. He could then calculate the angle between the column and the sun’s rays using (in modern terms) the formula θ = arctan(s / h).

You can repeat Eratosthenes’ calculation by measuring the length of the shadow of a vertical stick (or anything else you know the height of), and using the arctan button on a calculator. Alternatively, the table below show the angles for various shadow lengths of a 1-metre stick. You could also attach a protractor to the top of the stick, run a thread from the to of the stick to the end of the shadow, and measure the angle directly.

The angle (θ) between the stick and the sun’s rays will also be the angle at the centre of the Earth (see the diagram at top). You can then calculate the circumference of the Earth using the distance to the Tropic of Capricorn and the fact that a full circle is 360° (the circumference of the Earth will be d × 360 / θ, where d is the distance to the Tropic of Capricorn).

Height (h) Shadow (s) Angle (θ)
1 0.02
1 0.03
1 0.05
1 0.07
1 0.09
1 0.11
1 0.12
1 0.14
1 0.16
1 0.18 10°
1 0.19 11°
1 0.21 12°
1 0.23 13°
1 0.25 14°
1 0.27 15°
1 0.29 16°
1 0.31 17°
1 0.32 18°
1 0.34 19°
1 0.36 20°
1 0.38 21°
1 0.4 22°
1 0.42 23°
1 0.45 24°
1 0.47 25°
1 0.49 26°
1 0.51 27°
1 0.53 28°
1 0.55 29°
1 0.58 30°
1 0.6 31°
1 0.62 32°
1 0.65 33°
1 0.67 34°
1 0.7 35°
1 0.73 36°
1 0.75 37°
1 0.78 38°
1 0.81 39°
1 0.84 40°
1 0.87 41°
1 0.9 42°
1 0.93 43°
1 0.97 44°
1 1 45°

On having multiple hypotheses which all fit the data

For every fact there is an infinity of hypotheses.” – from Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

‘I will read the inventory… First item: A very considerable hoard of precious stones, nearly all diamonds, and all of them loose, without any setting whatever… Second item: Heaps and heaps of loose snuff, not kept in a horn, or even a pouch, but lying in heaps… Third item: Here and there about the house curious little heaps of minute pieces of metal, some like steel springs and some in the form of microscopic wheels… Fourth item: The wax candles, which have to be stuck in bottle necks because there is nothing else to stick them in… By no stretch of fancy can the human mind connect together snuff and diamonds and wax and loose clockwork.’

‘I think I see the connection,’ said the priest. ‘This Glengyle was mad against the French Revolution. He was an enthusiast for the ancien regime, and was trying to re-enact literally the family life of the last Bourbons. He had snuff because it was the eighteenth century luxury; wax candles, because they were the eighteenth century lighting; the mechanical bits of iron represent the locksmith hobby of Louis XVI; the diamonds are for the Diamond Necklace of Marie Antoinette.’

Both the other men were staring at him with round eyes. ‘What a perfectly extraordinary notion!” cried Flambeau. “Do you really think that is the truth?’

‘I am perfectly sure it isn’t,’ answered Father Brown, ‘only you said that nobody could connect snuff and diamonds and clockwork and candles. I give you that connection off-hand. The real truth, I am very sure, lies deeper.’

He paused a moment and listened to the wailing of the wind in the turrets. Then he said, ‘The late Earl of Glengyle was a thief. He lived a second and darker life as a desperate housebreaker. He did not have any candlesticks because he only used these candles cut short in the little lantern he carried. The snuff he employed as the fiercest French criminals have used pepper: to fling it suddenly in dense masses in the face of a captor or pursuer. But the final proof is in the curious coincidence of the diamonds and the small steel wheels. Surely that makes everything plain to you? Diamonds and small steel wheels are the only two instruments with which you can cut out a pane of glass.’

The bough of a broken pine tree lashed heavily in the blast against the windowpane behind them, as if in parody of a burglar, but they did not turn round. Their eyes were fastened on Father Brown. ‘Diamonds and small wheels,’ repeated Craven ruminating. ‘Is that all that makes you think it the true explanation?’

‘I don’t think it the true explanation,’ replied the priest placidly; ‘but you said that nobody could connect the four things. The true tale, of course, is something much more humdrum. Glengyle had found, or thought he had found, precious stones on his estate. Somebody had bamboozled him with those loose brilliants, saying they were found in the castle caverns. The little wheels are some diamond-cutting affair. He had to do the thing very roughly and in a small way, with the help of a few shepherds or rude fellows on these hills. Snuff is the one great luxury of such Scotch shepherds; it’s the one thing with which you can bribe them. They didn’t have candlesticks because they didn’t want them; they held the candles in their hands when they explored the caves.’

‘Is that all?’ asked Flambeau after a long pause. ‘Have we got to the dull truth at last?’ ‘Oh, no,’ said Father Brown.

As the wind died in the most distant pine woods with a long hoot as of mockery Father Brown, with an utterly impassive face, went on: ‘I only suggested that because you said one could not plausibly connect snuff with clockwork or candles with bright stones. Ten false philosophies will fit the universe; ten false theories will fit Glengyle Castle. But we want the real explanation of the castle and the universe.” – from G. K. Chesterton, “The Honour of Israel Gow

A History of Science in 12 Books

Here are twelve influential books covering the history of science and mathematics. All of them have changed the world in some way:

1: Euclid’s Elements (c. 300 BC). Possibly the most influential mathematics book ever written, and used as a textbook for more than 2,000 years.

2: De rerum natura by Lucretius (c. 50 BC). An Epicurean, atomistic view of the universe, expressed as a lengthy poem.

3: The Vienna Dioscurides (c. 510 AD). Based on earlier Greek works, this illustrated guide to botany continued to have an influence for centuries after it was written.

4: De humani corporis fabrica by Andreas Vesalius (1543). The first modern anatomy book.

5: Galileo’s Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (1632). The brilliant sales pitch for the idea that the Earth goes around the Sun.

6: Audubon’s The Birds of America (1827–1838). A classic work of ornithology.

7: Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859). The book which started the evolutionary ball rolling.

8: Beilstein’s Handbook of Organic Chemistry (1881). Still (revised, in digital form) the definitive reference work in organic chemistry.

9: Relativity: The Special and the General Theory by Albert Einstein (1916). An explanation of relativity by the man himself.

10: Éléments de mathématique by “Nicolas Bourbaki” (1935 onwards). A reworking of mathematics which gave us words like “injective.”

11: Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs by Niklaus Wirth (1976). One of the early influential books on structured programming.

12: Introduction to VLSI Systems by Carver Mead and Lynn Conway (1980). The book which revolutionised silicon chip design.

That’s four books of biology, four of other science, two of mathematics, and two of modern IT. I welcome any suggestions for other books I should have included.

The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science: a book review

The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science by John Henry

I recently read the 3rd (2008) edition of John Henry’s The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science – an excellent, though very brief, survey (it is 114 pages, not including the glossary and index).

Henry tends to see considerable continuity between the “natural magic” of medieval thought and the emerging scientific viewpoint, which was based on experiment and mathematical analysis. Personally, I think that he overstates the case a little. It is interesting that he never mentions Giordano Bruno, who was one of those who held on to the older magical view (then again, Bruno was not a scientist).

Replica of a van Leeuwenhoek microscope (photo: Jeroen Rouwkema)

Henry also puts emphasis on the emerging use of scientific instruments, such as the microscope and the telescope.

Galileo’s sketches of the moon, published in his Sidereus Nuncius of 1610

I was a little disappointed in the discussion of Galileo, which did not seem quite correct, but the main flaw in this book is its brevity. I’m giving it three stars.

* * *
The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science by John Henry: 3 stars

Marching for Science #7

Interesting summary of the Science March from STAT:


March for Science, Washington, DC (photo: Becker1999)