The Last Word

[Pariah]

In addition to Boyle, you could include Traité élémentaire de chimie (Elementary Treatise of Chemistry) by Antoine Lavoisier, published in 1789. It's widely considered the first modern chemistry textbook. In some ways, it is to chemistry what Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica is to physics.

[L. Marcus]

Chemistry before him was just a lotta hot air.

[Pariah]

What you did there, I see it.

[Pariah]

Pulling a zero on a question I promised would be on the final is a sign of inattention.

 

On last year's final exam, I included a question from the previous exam that we went over in excruciating detail. All I did was to change the name of the compound, which had no relevance whatsoever to solving the problem.

 

The two most common scores on that problem were 5/5 and 0/5.

[L. Marcus]

Silly teachers, study are for other people.

[tkdguy]

That's what my students seem to believe.

[Bazza]

In addition to Boyle, you could include Traité élémentaire de chimie (Elementary Treatise of Chemistry) by Antoine Lavoisier, published in 1789. It's widely considered the first modern chemistry textbook. In some ways, it is to chemistry what Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica is to physics.

 

Cheers, will add it to the list.  

[Bazza]

 

Answer:

 

 

[Bazza]

Socrates, the original FAQ.

[Cancer]

Actually, Bazza, I am vaguely amused that what you're doing with your book collection is trying to redo the natural science sections of the various Great Books series.

[Bazza]

Actually, Bazza, I am vaguely amused that what you're doing with your book collection is trying to redo the natural science sections of the various Great Books series.

 

Cheers. I forgot about that as a resource. Good idea! 

 

(and now that you mention it, it amuses me too. Hopefully my sojourn through natural science history is useful to you an Pariah, as you both teach this stuff). 

[L. Marcus]

Mmm, Time Team ...

[Cancer]

The history stuff is most interesting in that it lays out the transition between what was generally believed at the time to the more modern view. Even that latter may not be what we now think of as "modern", of course, which is part of the issue, sometimes, in trying to just dive in and read those books cold. Most of the books in physics in the era Bazza's playing with, for instance, frame most of mathematics in terms of geometry, drawing upon Euclid, Archimedes, etc. At first, one would scratch one's head wondering why they do that terribly roundabout geometric argument when calculus gets to the relevant result much more cleanly and directly. Then you remember that calculus was just emerging at the end of that era, while the geometry was canonical curriculum. (And I will point out that people who don't have calculus and take this as evidence it isn't needed ... are weak enough in mathematics that they can't follow the geometry either, thereby invalidating their own argument.)

 

I have spent much more time with the era of the late 1800's and early 1900's, when astrophysics as we now think of it was just getting started. Lord Rutherford made a snide comment once to the effect that all science is either physics or stamp collecting, and I suspect that he had the astronomy of circa 1900 specifically in mind when he made the comparison to stamp collecting. Astronomy then was in an era of mass data collection after the invention of dry-plate photography and the drastic improvement in the ability to measure stellar motions and positions to unprecedented accuracy ... if one had an adequate baseline in time, which was barely true in the first decade of the 20th Century ... and in the first great spectroscopic surveys, since the human eye is really really bad at spectroscopic observations at low light levels. Secchi by himself was able to distinguish four different types of stellar spectra using his eyeball and a prism spectrometer, but it took a more permanent medium (and one with a longer integration time!) to gather enough spectral information to see the breadth of phenomena what were present in stars and nebulae. Astronomy almost by definition is a data-starved discipline, and great advances come immediately after new dimensions in observational data become possible.

[Bazza]

The history stuff is most interesting in that it lays out the transition between what was generally believed at the time to the more modern view. Even that latter may not be what we now think of as "modern", of course, which is part of the issue, sometimes, in trying to just dive in and read those books cold. Most of the books in physics in the era Bazza's playing with, for instance, frame most of mathematics in terms of geometry, drawing upon Euclid, Archimedes, etc. At first, one would scratch one's head wondering why they do that terribly roundabout geometric argument when calculus gets to the relevant result much more cleanly and directly. Then you remember that calculus was just emerging at the end of that era, while the geometry was canonical curriculum. (And I will point out that people who don't have calculus and take this as evidence it isn't needed ... are weak enough in mathematics that they can't follow the geometry either, thereby invalidating their own argument.)

 

 

Yep. They had to made do with the mathematical tools they had with them. And in its own way fascinating how they had to draw upon Euclid, Archimedes. I supposed we could call it a trope; Archimedes worked with infinitesimals that he was close to developing calculus. 

 

(I'm coming at it from the angle that one would be familiar with the Greek/Roman/Latin perspective of maths, science, astronomy, philosophy, humanities, liberal arts etc and now wanting to "upgrade" the maths & science part to a modern perspective. I'm also discounting the modern philosophy, because, well i don't like it, however the modern natural science is still very much worthwhile. That i can talk to you all is proof of that.)

[Cancer]

Back home after a road trip. Still very short on sleep, but at least I've had a good long shower this morning.

[L. Marcus]

Showers are good, and even better if the nozzle-handle hasn't fallen off. Gotta fix that, one of these days.

[Bazza]

*chuckle @ LM*

[L. Marcus]

... I'm thinking duct tape.

[tkdguy]

Ah, a fan of the Red Green Show.

[L. Marcus]

Never seen that one. Only Canadian show I know I've seen is Kids In The Hall.

 

No, I was thinking more about a mate back in basic training -- he had some pretty bizarre dreams on the theme of duct tape. And of course there's the Myth Busters' duct tape cannon.

[Bazza]

Duct tape dreams? that sounds a very serious obsession. 

[L. Marcus]

He was a peculiar person.

[Bazza]

Sounds like it. 

[L. Marcus]

Mind you, we were all Air Force conscript technical NCOs. Peculiar seemed part of the job spec.

[Bazza]

Yep. You wouldn't like to be scared of heights, being in the Air Force.