30 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
Unweaving the Rainbow Makes it More Beautiful
Newton's unweaving of the rainbow led on to spectroscopy, which has
proved the key to much of what we know today about the cosmos. And
the heart of any poet worthy of the title Romantic could not fail to leap
up if he beheld the universe of Einstein, Hubble and Hawking. We read
its nature through Fraunhofer lines - 'Barcodes in the Stars' - and their
shifts along the spectrum. The image of barcodes carries us on to the
very different, but equally intriguing, realms of sound ('Barcodes on the
... 1 
notes
notes24 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
Darwin and the Origins of Life
There is a curious parallelism between Darwin's twenty-year delay in publishing his theory of evolution and Newton's {102} twenty-year delay in publishing the Principia. And Newton's refusal to publish his cosmological speculations finds a parallel in Darwin's silence concerning the problem of the origin of life.
If we are to understand in general terms the place of life in the universe, we must also understand life's origin. Darwin explicitly excluded the origin of life from the scope of ... 1 notes
notes13 OCT 2013 by ideonexus
The Importance of Mathematics in Seafaring
Before there was an accurate seafaring clock, the sailor seeking his bearings
had to be a trained mathematician. The accepted way to find longitude
at sea was by precise observations of the moon, which required refined
instruments and subtle calculations. An error as small as 5' in observing the
moon meant an error of 2V2. degrees of longitude, which on the ocean could
be as much as 150 miles—enough to wreck a ship on treacherous shoals.
Fatal miscalculation might come from a crude instrume...
1 Sailors had to be mathematicians in order to keep their bearings on the ocean.
18 JAN 2013 by ideonexus
Newton Was "Last of the Magicians"
Newton provides an example of how the idea of "science" had not yet fully emerged as something separate from religion in early Enlightenment thinking. In fact, during the seventeenth century, the word "scientist" was not commonly used to describe experimenters at all; they were called natural philosophers"^^ in an extension of the Puritan idea of the study of the Book of Nature. Science had also not fully emerged as a separate concept, but was sometimes thought of as a method or style of stud... 1 notes
notesThere was a great deal of belief in magic in Newton's writings.
06 AUG 2012 by ideonexus
Knowledge Increases
The progress of the sciences secures the progress of the art of instruction, which again accelerates in its turn that of the sciences; and this reciprocal influence, the action of which is incessantly increased, must be ranked in the number of the most prolific and powerful causes of the improvement of the human race. At present, a young man, upon finishing his studies and quitting our schools, may know more of the principles of mathematics than Newton acquired by profound study, or discovere...
1 By standing on the shoulders of giants, the college-graduate can know more than Newton learned in a lifetime through all his hard work and discovery.
22 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Attention Makes the Genius
Attention makes the genius; all learning, fancy, and science depend on it. Newton traced back his discoveries to its unwearied employment. It builds bridges, opens new worlds, and heals diseases; without it Taste is useless, and the beauties of literature are unobserved; as the rarest flowers bloom in vain, if the eye be not fixed upon the bed. Everything else depends on being able to pay attention.
08 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
There is No Scientific Basis for Prejudice
Break the chains of your prejudices and take up the torch of experience, and you will honour nature in the way she deserves, instead of drawing derogatory conclusions from the ignorance in which she has left you. Simply open your eyes and ignore what you cannot understand, and you will see that a labourer whose mind and knowledge extend no further than the edges of his furrow is no different essentially from the greatest genius, as would have been proved by dissecting the brains of Descartes ...Folksonomies: prejudice
Folksonomies: prejudice
The brains of laborers and geniuses are anatomically identical.
08 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Science Depends on Revolutions Large and Small
Scientific development depends in part on a process of non-incremental or revolutionary change. Some revolutions are large, like those associated with the names of Copernicus, Newton, or Darwin, but most are much smaller, like the discovery of oxygen or the planet Uranus. The usual prelude to changes of this sort is, I believed, the awareness of anomaly, of an occurrence or set of occurrences that does not fit existing ways of ordering phenomena. The changes that result therefore require 'put... 1 notes
notesSmall ones, like the discovery of oxygen and Uranus, that requires thinking in a way to uncover anomalies.
05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Our Purpose is to Expand the Realm of the Known
The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions. And even a cursory glance at the history of the biological sciences during the last quarter of a century is sufficient to justify the assertion, that the most potent instrument for the extension of the realm of natural knowled... 1 notes
notesJust a little bit in each generation.
05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Science is Strange
Because a fact seems strange to you, you conclude that it is not one. ... All science, however, commences by being strange. Science is successive. It goes from one wonder to another. It mounts by a ladder. The science of to-day would seem extravagant to the science of a former time. Ptolemy would believe Newton mad. 1 notes
notesWorking from wonder to wonder.
