Landmarks in science : Hippocrates to Carson

306 Pages·1982·7.428 MB·English

by  Downs, Robert Bingham

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Landmarks in Science

LANDMARKS IN SCIENCE
Hippocrates to Carson
ROBERTB. DOWNS
LIBRARIES UNLIMITED, INC.
Littleton, Colorado
1982
Copyright ® 1982 Libraries Unlimited, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior written permission of the publisher.
LIBRARIES UNLIMITED, INC.
P.O. Box 263
Littleton, Colorado 80160
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Main entry under title:
Landmarks in science.
Bibliography: p. 291
Includes index.
1. Science-History. 2. Scientists—Biography.
I. Downs, Robert Bingham, 1903-
Q125.L29 500 82-154
ISBN 0-87287-295-5 AACR2
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments 11
Introduction........ 13
1 GREAT PHYSICIAN................................................................................ 21
Hippocrates. Aphorisms
2 FATHER OF NATURAL HISTORY...................................................... 25
Aristotle. History of Animals
3 FIRST SCIENTIFIC BOTANIST............................................................ 30
Theophrastus. On the History of Plants and On the Causes of Plants
4 MASTER MATHEMATICIAN.............................................................. 34
Euclid. Elements of Geometry
5 MECHANICAL WIZARD...................................................................... 38
Archimedes. On the Sphere and the Cylinder
6 POET OF SCIENCE.................................................................................. 41
Lucretius. On the Nature of Things
7 FIRST MEDICAL HISTORIAN.............................................................. 45
Celsus. De Medicina
8 THE GREAT COMPILER........................................................................ 48
Pliny the Elder. Natural History
9 FIRST HERBALIST.................................................................................. 52
Dioscorides. Materia Medica
IO BEGINNING OF SCIENTIFIC CARTOGRAPHY............................... 55
Ptolemaeus. Geography
11 DICTATOR OF MEDIEVAL MEDICINE............................................. 58
Galen. On the Natural Faculties
5
6 / Table of Contents
12 PRINCE OF PHYSICIANS........................................................................... 62
Avicenna. Canon of Medicine
13 ADMIRABLE DOCTOR............................................................................... 64
Roger Bacon. Opus Majus
14 UNIVERSAL GENIUS....................................................................................67
Leonardo da Vinci. Notebooks
15 SUN-CENTERED UNIVERSE..................................................................... 71
Copernicus. Concerning the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres
16 FATHER OF MINERALOGY......................................................................75
Agricola. De Re Metallica
17 COMPLETE SKEPTIC..................................................................................78
Paracelsus. Selected Writings
18 GREAT HERBALIST.....................................................................................82
Leonhard Fuchs. Important Commentaries Concerning the History
of Plants
19 FOUNDER OF MODERN ANATOMY........................................................84
Andreas Vesalius. On the Structure of the Human Body
20 START OF MODERN ZOOLOGY................................................................88
Conrad Gesner. Historia Animalium
21 CLASSIC OF EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCE.............................................. 90
William Gilbert. On the Loadstone, Magnetic Bodies, and on the
Great Magnet the Earth
22 ASTRONOMICAL OBSERVER SUPREME..............................................93
Tycho Brahe. Studies in the New Astronomy
23 PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE........................................................................97
Francis Bacon. Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning
24 EXPLORER OF OUTER SPACE................................................................ 101
Galileo. Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World
25 LAWMAKER FOR THE UNIVERSE........................................................ 105
Johannes Kepler. The New Astronomy and Harmony of the World
26 BIRTH OF EXPERIMENTAL MEDICINE.............................................. 109
William Harvey. Anatomical Exercise on the Motion of the Heart
and Blood in Animals
27 BEGINNING OF MODERN SCIENTIFIC METHOD.............................117
Rene Descartes. A Discourse on Method
Table of Contents / 7
28 FIRST MODERN CHEMIST......................................................................120
Robert Boyle. The Sceptical Chymist
29 TAXONOMIC PIONEER............................................................................123
John Ray. Historia Plantarum
30 FOUNDER OF MICROSCOPIC ANATOMY.......................................... 126
Marcello Malpighi. Ana tome Plantarum
31 PENDULUM AND LIGHT..........................................................................129
Christian Huygens. Pendulum Clocks and Treatise on Light
32 FIRST MICROBE HUNTER........................................................................132
Anton van Leeuwenhoek. Letters to the Royal Society of England
33 OBSERVER OF THE INVISIBLE..............................................................136
Robert Hooke. Micrographia
34 PLANT ANATOMIST..................................................................................139
Nehemiah Grew. The Anatomy of Plants Begun
35 SYSTEM OF THE WORLD..........................................................................142
Isaac Newton. Principia Mathematica
36 PLANT PHYSIOLOGIST............................................................................150
Stephen Hales. Vegetable Staticks
37 ELECTRICAL WIZARD..............................................................................153
Benjamin Franklin. Experiments and Observations on Electricity
38 FATHER OF SYSTEMATIC BIOLOGY....................................................158
Carolus Linnaeus. System of Nature
39 SPIRIT OF ENLIGHTENMENT................................................................161
Denis Diderot. Encyclopedie
40 PIONEER OF MODERN GEOLOGY........................................................164
James Hutton. Theory of the Earth
41 ANALYZER OF WATER............................................................................167
Henry Cavendish. Experiments on Air
42 ARCHITECT OF MODERN CHEMISTRY.............................................. 170
Antoine Laurent Lavoisier. Elementary Treatise of Chemistry
43 INVERTEBRATE ZOOLOGIST................................................................173
Jean Lamarck. Natural History of Invertebrate Animals
8 / Table of Contents
44 DISCOVERER OF VACCINATION.......................................................... 176
Edward Jenner. An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the
Variolae Vaccinae
45 MATHEMATICAL ASTRONOMER........................................................ 179
Pierre Laplace. Celestial Mechanics
46 COMPARATIVE ANATOMIST................................................................ 181
Georges Cuvier. The Animal Kingdom
47 BIRTH OF THE ATOMIC THEORY........................................................ 184
John Dalton. A New System of Chemical Philosophy
48 FATHER OF ENGLISH GEOLOGY.......................................................... 187
William Smith. Geological Atlas of England and Wales
49 UNIVERSAL MAN........................................................................................189
Alexander von Humboldt. Cosmos
50 SEAMAN’S BIBLE........................................................................................192
Nathaniel Bowditch. The New American Practical Navigator
51 ORNITHOLOGIST SUPREME..................................................................196
John James Audubon. The Birds of America
52 CASE OF THE WOUNDED STOMACH..................................................201
William Beaumont. Experiments and Observations on the
Gastric Juice and the Physiology of Digestion
53 BIRTH OF PHOTOGRAPHY....................................................................208
Louis Daguerre. History and Description of the Process of
Daguerreotype
54 ELECTRICAL PIONEER............................................................................210
Michael Faraday. Experimental Researches in Electricity
55 INTERPRETER AND SYNTHESIZER....................................................213
Charles Lyell. Principles of Geology
56 PATHS OF THE SEA....................................................................................215
Matthew Fontaine Maury. The Physical Geography of the Sea
57 CASE OF THE WANDERING BOULDERS............................................221
Jean Louis Agassiz. Studies on Glaciers
58 SURVIVAL THROUGH NATURAL SELECTION................................ 224
Charles Darwin. On the Origin of Species
59 PROFESSIONAL HOMICIDE....................................................................227
Oliver Wendell Holmes. The Contagiousness of Puerperal Eever
Table of Contents / 9
60 FIRST GREAT AMERICAN BOTANIST..................................................234
Asa Gray. Elements of Botany
61 INDESTRUCTIBLE ENERGY................................................................... 238
Hermann von Helmholtz. On the Conservation of Force
62 EXPLORER OF UNSEEN WORLDS........................................................241
Louis Pasteur. Treatise on the Fermentation Known as Lactic
63 RIDDLE OF HEREDITY............................................................................. 244
Gregor Mendel. Experiments in Plant Hybridization
64 FOUNDER OF ANTISEPTIC SURGERY................................................247
Joseph Lister. On the Antiseptic Principle in the Practice of Surgery
65 GREATEST AMERICAN SCIENTIST......................................................250
Josiah Willard Gibbs. On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances
66 FOUNDER OF AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGY..........................................252
William James. The Principles of Psychology
67 BACILLUS HUNTER................................................................................. 257
Robert Koch. The Etiology of Tuberculosis
68 DOYEN OF EXPERIMENTAL PHYSIOLOGISTS......................... . . .260
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov. Conditioned Reflexes
69 FOUNDER OF MODERN PSYCHIATRY................................................263
Sigmund Freud. Civilization and Its Discontents
70 MOST CIVILIZED ENGLISHMAN..........................................................267
Havelock Ellis. Studies in the Psychology o f Sex
71 DISCOVERERS OF RADIUM....................................................................270
Marie and Pierre Curie. Researches on Radioactive Substances
72 HARBINGER OF THE ATOMIC AGE......................................................273
Albert Einstein. Relativity, the Special and General Theory
73 THE PROPER STUDY OF MAN................................................................276
Alfred Kinsey. Sexual Behavior in the Human Male
74 UPSETTING THE BALANCE OF NATURE..........................................282
Rachel Carson. Silent Spring
Sources of Quotations 289
Bibliographical Notes 291
301
Index ...........................