The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments (Abridged)

by George Johnson Narrated by Dion Graham

Overview

From the acclaimed New York Times science writer George Johnson, an irresistible book on the ten most fascinating experiments in the history of science-moments when a curious soul posed a particularly eloquent question to nature and received a crisp, unambiguous reply.

Johnson takes us to those times when the world seemed filled with mysterious forces, when scientists were dazzled by light, by electricity, and by the beating of the hearts they laid bare on the dissecting table.

We see Galileo singing to mark time as he measures the pull of gravity, and Newton carefully inserting a needle behind his eye to learn how light causes vibrations in the retina. William Harvey ties a tourniquet around his arm and watches his arteries throb above and his veins bulge below, proving that blood circulates. Luigi Galvani sparks electrical currents in dissected frog legs, wondering at the twitching muscle fibers, and Ivan Pavlov makes his now-famous dogs salivate at ascending chord progressions.

For all of them, diligence was rewarded. In an instant, confusion was swept aside and something new about nature leaped into view. In bringing us these stories, Johnson restores some of the romance to science, reminding us of the existential excitement of a single soul staring down the unknown.

Editorial Reviews

JUNE 2009 - AudioFile

Rather than tackling the most IMPORTANT experiments throughout history, Johnson takes a more engaging approach (to the layman, anyway). He examines the 10 most BEAUTIFUL experiments—the ones that contained in them an elegance of inquiry and a grace of execution. From the works of Galileo to Newton to Pavlov, these experiments not only were well-earned products of years of research, but also tended to undo hitherto accepted views of the world and how it worked. Dion Graham's narration takes on much of Johnson's wry cleverness. He sounds as if he's having as much fun narrating the experimenters' personal anecdotes as Johnson had writing them. Moreover, when those anecdotes start to ramble, Graham's enthusiastic narration becomes the cohesive thread through the elegant (but sometimes dense and wandering) text. A.H.A. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine

JUNE 2009 - AudioFile

Rather than tackling the most IMPORTANT experiments throughout history, Johnson takes a more engaging approach (to the layman, anyway). He examines the 10 most BEAUTIFUL experiments—the ones that contained in them an elegance of inquiry and a grace of execution. From the works of Galileo to Newton to Pavlov, these experiments not only were well-earned products of years of research, but also tended to undo hitherto accepted views of the world and how it worked. Dion Graham's narration takes on much of Johnson's wry cleverness. He sounds as if he's having as much fun narrating the experimenters' personal anecdotes as Johnson had writing them. Moreover, when those anecdotes start to ramble, Graham's enthusiastic narration becomes the cohesive thread through the elegant (but sometimes dense and wandering) text. A.H.A. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169325836
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	04/08/2008
Edition description:	Abridged

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