29 DEC 2016 by ideonexus
How Science Fiction Got Its Start with Frakenstein
It’s not completely fanciful to say that science fiction began with three things: a dead frog, a volcano, and a teenage bride.
The dead frog was one that an Italian physician named Luigi Galvani was experimenting with in the 1780s, when he found that a mild electric shock could cause the frog’s leg to twitch. It was just an induced muscle reflex, but it suggested that there might be a connection between electricity and life.
The volcano was Mount Tambora in Indonesia, which exploded in ...28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Newton, Adam, and the Apple
When Newton saw an apple fall, he found
In that slight startle from his contemplation—
'Tis said (for I'll not answer above ground
For any sage's creed or calculation)—
A mode of proving that the earth turn'd round
In a most natural whirl, called 'gravitation';
And this is the sole mortal who could grapple,
Since Adam, with a fall, or with an apple. A poem by Lord Byron.
28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
What opposite discoveries we have seen!
What opposite discoveries we have seen!
(Signs of true genius, and of empty pockets.)
One makes new noses, one a guillotine,
One breaks your bones, one sets them in their sockets;
But vaccination certainly has been
A kind antithesis to Congreve's rockets, ... Folksonomies: poetry
Folksonomies: poetry
From science, bombs and immunizations, guillotines and life-saving surgery. A poem by Lord Byron.
28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
The Age of New Inventions
This is the patent-age of new inventions
For killing bodies, and for saving souls,
All propagated with the best intentions;
Sir Humphrey Davy's lantern, by which coals
Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions,
Tombuctoo travels, voyages to the Poles,
Are ways to benefit mankind, as true,
Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo.Lord Byron marvels at the scientific wonders of his age.