Reseñas
Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements por Hugh Aldersey-Williams
It is the cultural significance that is the focus of this survey by Hugh Aldersey Williams. His discussion follows a rather meandering path through the elements not in their natural order but grouped by social uses. In sections called Power, Fire, Craft, Beauty, and Earth, he highlights some elements in each group showing how they were discovered, how they have been used, and the meanings with which they have been imbued throughout time. He also chronicles his own interests in the elements, and the ways in which he tried to collect and work with various elements throughout his life.
The forays into chemistry by Aldersey Williams are very basic - you don’t have to understand physics or even chemistry to enjoy his exploration of the elements. Some parts of the book are more interesting than others - for example I thought the whole anecdote about the gold sculpture of the supermodel Kate Moss was drawn out and of marginal interest. But I appreciated the way he integrated the uses of elements by artists and writers into his book. In any event, most of his stories were not only more interesting but full of fascinating factoids.
Evaluation: Overall, I found this survey of elements accessible and entertaining, not only learning a thing or two but renewing my interest in atomic science. I listened to the audiobook narrated by Antony Ferguson, and I have to say the British pronunciations were as fun and interesting to me as the content of the material. For example, who knew the British say gaseous with a long a, or that in Britain, Ulysses is pronounced with the accent on the first syllable: “YOU-liss-ees," instead of as the U.S., where it is pronounced with the accent on the second syllable: “You-LISS-ees."
It's interesting to see how there was a kind of window of opportunity for science in Northern Europe in the middle of the seventeenth century: the English were setting up the Royal Society, Colbert was trying to harness the power of science to the advancement of his bureaucratic state in France, and there was a lot of openness to cross-border co-operation. There was money for big experiments, and a general relaxation of religious control of ideas. It didn't last long, of course; by the mid-1680s the French had shut the door to Protestants and the English (under Dutch rule) had reverted to their usual opposition to any ideas from the other side of the Channel. But it was long enough for the leading European scientists to consolidate their own private networks and adapt to the new ways of working with rapid publication of new discoveries, replication of results and constructive discussion. It's astonishing, with hindsight, how someone like Christiaan could move around so freely between three countries that were at war with each other — in one or other combination — for quite a big chunk of his life.
As well as talking abut the general situation of seventeenth century Holland, France and Britain, Aldersey-Williams also takes care to put Christiaan in the context of his over-achieving family, especially his father the courtier, diplomat, composer, architect and poet Constantijn (1596-1687) and his brother the lens-grinder, diplomat and secretary to William III, Constantijn (1628-1697).
(The Huygens family included at least four generations of notable Christiaans and Constantijns, all of whom seem to have had major achievements in more than one field, so it soon gets confusing.)
The book is said to be aimed at "general readers", but you would need to know a certain amount about physics (at least high-school level) to get anything much out of it. It's well backed up with references and a generous bibliography.
The 17th century was a golden age of the natural sciences and laid the foundations for what we would call today the scientific method and the true sciences. It is during this time that we start to see full-time career scientists appear, along with growing specialisation in a chosen field. The roll call of scientific names in this period is awe-inspiring: Boyle, Hooke, Newton, Cassini, Fermat, Leibniz, Mersenne, Pascal, Leeuwenhoek and more.
Huygens was born into a life of privilege and success and was expected in his turn to be successful and make his mark. A key contributor to the Dutch Golden Age he and his family were intimately involved in many aspects of the political, military and commercial expansion and turmoil of this period.
As a scientist Huygens has an impressive list of achievements: inventor of the pendulum clock mechanism, discoverer of the rings of Saturn and the moon Titan, developer of a wave theory of light and many more across the fields of astronomy, optics, mathematics and mechanics. During his lifetime he was the acknowledged preeminent scientist in Europe and his opinion was constantly sought about whether a particular idea or theory was worth pursuing. Huygens’ approval of ones work was a mark that you had made it.
That he is not routinely mentioned alongside Leibniz and Newton is a puzzle (Huygens was just about the only intellect that Newton acknowledged was equal or even superior to his own). Alderney-Williams gives a convincing explanation that this was at least partly due to Huygens focus on commercially exploitable research; he worked hard at developing a sea-going accurate clock that could be used to measure longitude, for example, and spent much time building and maintaining water features for rich and powerful men.
This is a very readable and interesting work. The Huygens family were remarkable for their involvement in so many key events in Dutch and European history and in their network of key contacts across the Continent. We glimpse the everyday lives of these people. Written for the general reader the detail of the science is played down (for me, I could have stood a little more on this).
Periodic Tales is an odd little piece. As much picaresque as Dead Souls or Don Quixote, Hugh Aldersey-Williams wanders pell-mell and everywhither amongst forty or so of the known elements, pointing out their unusual properties, uses, or histories.
Some editions of Periodic Tales are subtitled A Cultural History of the Elements, whereas others – mine included – opt for The Curious Lives of the Elements. It's not much of a change, sure, but the subtleties in subtitles do seem to reflect the two opposing sides of the book. Hugh Aldersey-Williams has a master's degree in science but is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Ostensibly, then, he's in the perfect position to write about the elements from both a scientific viewpoint and a more arts-oriented side. In practice he seems far happier with the former than the latter.
The sections on scientists' ever more refined attempts to break down compounds into purer and purer substances, on Mendeleev's sagacious formulation of the periodic table, and on the zany japes those kooks at Las Alamos got up to are all fun to read and thoroughly interesting. But when the subject turns to, say, the cultural value of gold and that slightly disturbing statue of Kate Moss at the British Museum, the tone becomes more forced. Sometimes it's as if the author isn't quite sure why he's writing about the deep culturohistorical significance of collections of atoms unified by their having the same number of protons in their nucleus. Worse, sometimes he seems to have decided that the best way to discuss the elements' role in the arts is to set off on a flight of romantic prose. Anyone who has read Jules Verne's [b:The Castle in Transylvania|7937245|The Castle in Transylvania|Jules Verne|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320559907s/7937245.jpg|1533080] will know what happens when an author more suited to solid science writing tries their hand at impersonating Shelley.
As with many modern non-fiction works, Periodic Tales has tried to take a slightly different approach to its subject matter, and explained in its introduction that this is because there already exist many marvellous books about the elements. This one might not have been marvellous, but it was a nice appetiser until I find one that is.
Periodic Tales is an odd little piece. As much picaresque as Dead Souls or Don Quixote, Hugh Aldersey-Williams wanders pell-mell and everywhither amongst forty or so of the known elements, pointing out their unusual properties, uses, or histories.
Some editions of Periodic Tales are subtitled A Cultural History of the Elements, whereas others – mine included – opt for The Curious Lives of the Elements. It's not much of a change, sure, but the subtleties in subtitles do seem to reflect the two opposing sides of the book. Hugh Aldersey-Williams has a master's degree in science but is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Ostensibly, then, he's in the perfect position to write about the elements from both a scientific viewpoint and a more arts-oriented side. In practice he seems far happier with the former than the latter.
The sections on scientists' ever more refined attempts to break down compounds into purer and purer substances, on Mendeleev's sagacious formulation of the periodic table, and on the zany japes those kooks at Las Alamos got up to are all fun to read and thoroughly interesting. But when the subject turns to, say, the cultural value of gold and that slightly disturbing statue of Kate Moss at the British Museum, the tone becomes more forced. Sometimes it's as if the author isn't quite sure why he's writing about the deep culturohistorical significance of collections of atoms unified by their having the same number of protons in their nucleus. Worse, sometimes he seems to have decided that the best way to discuss the elements' role in the arts is to set off on a flight of romantic prose. Anyone who has read Jules Verne's [b:The Castle in Transylvania|7937245|The Castle in Transylvania|Jules Verne|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320559907s/7937245.jpg|1533080] will know what happens when an author more suited to solid science writing tries their hand at impersonating Shelley.
As with many modern non-fiction works, Periodic Tales has tried to take a slightly different approach to its subject matter, and explained in its introduction that this is because there already exist many marvellous books about the elements. This one might not have been marvellous, but it was a nice appetiser until I find one that is.
The book is split into three sections, The Whole, The Parts and The future.
The first section looks at the the history of anatomy, from the grim ways that early medical studies were undertaken on cadavers that were acquired from executions or other dubious means. There are lots of gross things in this part, I won't enlighten you completely, but it was a grim and sordid task. He also gets to meet his first dead body.
In the second section he goes on to look at separate significant body parts, from the head to the feet, and lots of the bits in-between internal and external. There are lots of facts and anecdotes in all the separate chapters, and he does describe his first dissection of a pigs eye.
The final section is on the future of the human body, and the enhancements that are now available from replacement limbs to medical advances that keep people alive.
He writes in an engaging style, and assumes that if you have picked this up then you will not be a doctor or biologist. The facts are presented clearly, and he does participate in events from watching dissections to sketching nudes for the chapter on skin. Well worth a read if you have managed to avoid biology since school!
I had been interested lately in revisiting my learning in chemistry. I found this popular account of the origins of elements, and some of the cultural significance. The author became interested in chemistry in childhood, and began to collect as many elements of the periodic table as he could. The chapters are each organized around a different element, and include subjects that range from artwork in Spain using mercury, to the role of phosphorous in the firestorm in Hamburg. Many of the "rare earth" elements were first isolated from ores from the Swedish mine at Ytterby, hence ytterbium, and holmium, named for nearby Stockholm. I rate this book as a favorite
Quello di cui questo libro ha da dire è ben riassunto dal sottotitolo: liberamente traducibile in “Due statistici spiegano di che cosa preoccuparsi (e di che cosa invece no) nel XXI secolo.” Ancora di più ci aiuta la sinossi resa disponibile da Amazon:
What exactly are your chances of being struck by a meteorite?
Think you’re having less sex than the French?
How high will sea levels actually rise?
We live in an increasingly uncertain world. There’s so much to worry about it is often hard to know what to really panic about. But stay calm! For Panicology is the perfect answer to the conundrums and questions that bedevil modern life. Putting a lit match to the lies, headlines and statistical twaddle that seeks to frighten us, it explores 40 reasons for worry: from binge-drinking to Frankenstein foods, bird flu to alien abductions – and explores what, if any, effect they will have on your life.
Why worry in ignorance when you can be a happy, informed sceptic?
I due scrivono molto bene (sono inglesi, non americani, e questo aggiunge in humour senza togliere nulla alla chiarezza), ma il libro è a volte un po’ superficiale. Non mi piace per nulla (lo trovo troppo puerile) la piccola trovata di dare un punteggio da 1 a 5 ai diversi aspetti del panico (rappresentato da una gallina in fuga), del rischio (i dadi) e di quanto in nostro potere (un pugno chiuso).
Per me, anche per motivi professionali, la parte più interessante è l’Introduzione, dove gli autori spiegano chiaramente la loro filosofia e che cosa li ha spinti a scrivere il libro: il panico è una pulsione forte e irrazionale, che non soltanto ci fa stare male, ma è anche una pessimo consigliere nelle scelte da fare. Soltanto il senso critico e l’informazione quantitativa attendibile ci possono aiutare: in questo, i temi di Aldersley-Williams (l’autore di Periodic Tales, che sto leggendo) e Briscoe (ex Statistics Editor del Financial Times e attualmente vice-presidente di Timetric) sono affini a quelli trattati da Dan Gardner in Risk, che ho recensito di recente.
Il loro spirito è ben riassunto (sempre nell’Introduzione) da una citazione tratta da Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds di Charles Mackay Il libro è nel pubblico dominio e lo trovate qui):
Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.
***
Qualche citazione. Il riferimento è come di consueto alle posizioni sul Kindle:
Numbers are the “fact” generator in today’s society and the currency in any debate about risk. But they are not all of equal quality – some are manipulated by governments while others are produced by people with a vested interest. Often, proper figures don’t exist – they are opinion surveys or come from administrative systems that do not give us data on the definition we want, leading to poor policy and weaker assessment.Yet those who wish to make a point on television or in the newspapers do it using numbers. Sound-bite statistics, sometimes invented and often inaccurate, seize the imagination even if they crumble under close inspection. [106]
The only alternative is to retreat into anecdote and hopelessly selective assumptions. [115]
Temporary migration, based on a permit system, might be appealing to a skeptical public and might be acceptable for some categories of low-skilled workers, but such newcomers are likely to be less adaptable and integrate more slowly. Ongoing, regular labor needs are unlikely to be met most satisfactorily by recycling temporary workers. [1327]
It will then become clearer that globalization is about massive waves of income redistribution: from workers to consumers, as they can shop around ever more widely for cheaper goods;from expensive labor to cheap labor, as employment expands rapidly in developing countries; and from energy users toward energy producers, as the demand for energy soars in developing countries. [1522]
[…] the key labor market divide going forward will not be between high-skilled and low-skilled workers, but between services that can be delivered electronically from off-shore and those that cannot be. [1532]
“It is a profound privilege to die from stress-related diseases,” says a professor from Stanford University. The point he makes, of course, is that in developed countries we have never had it so good, and that worrying about stress is itself a sign of how charmed our lives are. As a society we have wealth, job choice, and travel opportunities unimaginable only a generation ago, and in our free time we can gamble, drink, surf the Internet, and watch television on super-sized plasma screens to our heart’s content. We have legal safeguards against many of society’s ills, and the hard toil and infectious diseases that filled the Victorian graveyards with youthful corpses have all but gone.And yet it seems we are as nuserable as sin and bogged down with stress. [1596]
A study by Britain’s Health and Safety Executive, the government body responsible for health and safety regulation, suggested that about half a million workers suffered from work-related stress in the latest year, the largest category after backache. [1622]
Do we mean overwork, acute boredom, or something more medical, such as depression or anxiety? [1656: a proposito della troppo vaga definizione di stress]
The National Weather Service puts the average U.S. death toll due to lightning at seventy-three people a year; the global figure must be over a thousand. [1717]
Ideally, we should focus on conserving habitat – then the species that live there will be saved automatically. But being the sentimental souls we are, we prefer to cherish glamorous species of rare orchid or the iconic panda. Fortunately, this is almost as good. If the Chinese succeed in saving the panda – despite the country’s galloping industrialization, conservation efforts are doing well, and recent fieldwork has shown there are more pandas than were thought – it will be because they saved enough of its habitat, and with it hundreds of other species without really trying. [2415]
Arthur C. Clarke famously wrote that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. So why is the magic now black? [2557]
[…] agriculture always has a detrimental effect on the natural ecology-that, in a sense, is its purpose. [2602]
It is impossible to prove a negative, however, and so doubts persist […] [2765]
[…] official agencies are increasingly taking into account not only scientific evidence but also the vagaries of public opinion, evidence-based or not. [2769]
Just as it sounded. Pretty good summary and explanations about many if not all the elements and their place in history.
1 
JBD1 | 2 reseñas más. | Sep 23, 2017 |
JBD1 | 2 reseñas más. | Sep 23, 2017 | In that the present book did help, by providing not so much physiological as cultural facts. It also showed me ways of demonstrating the operating of the body through activities I had not thought of previously.
An enjoyable read, but don't expect too much physiology. It concentrates very successfully on the culture of the body, of its perception as a cultural phenomenon and adds ideas and fresh viewpoints. Recommended.
1 BridgitDavis | 25 reseñas más. | Apr 18, 2016 |
BridgitDavis | 25 reseñas más. | Apr 18, 2016 | Este sitio utiliza cookies para ofrecer nuestros servicios, mejorar el rendimiento, análisis y (si no estás registrado) publicidad. Al usar LibraryThing reconoces que has leído y comprendido nuestros términos de servicio y política de privacidad. El uso del sitio y de los servicios está sujeto a estas políticas y términos.