The Curious World of Science: Simon Flynn ****

Simon Flynn, whose career has transitioned from book publisher to science teacher, is surely ideally placed to put together what feels (surely intentionally) a little like a science book equivalent of one of those Victorian cabinets of curiosities.

This chunky volume consists of a set of short, illustrated articles covering a very wide range of science and maths topics. One moment we're reading about the classic Monty Hall problem, then perusing Darwin's infamous list of pros and cons for getting married. Some of the historical detail is delightful - I was really interested, for instance, in the time when Leicester Square was home of scientific entertainment - first Lever's museum of 'Natural and other Curiosities' and then the amazing Royal Panopticon of Science and Art which featured a 100 foot fountain in its foyer - it looks incredible and it's so sad it soon disappeared.

This book is a supercharged version of Flynn's 2012 The Science Magpie - while probably not worth getting if you already have the original, the added visuals really increase the 'curiosities' impact of the book, with one proviso: the graphic designer was given too much leeway. Some articles - the one on Frankenstein and the reanimating power of electricity, for example - are in small white font on a black background. I found this a real struggle to read, particularly when there was italic text.

As I mentioned in my original review, not every article can thrill, and although it's interesting to see things like a translation of Galileo's confession or a period American newspaper report of a visit to Albert Einstein in Germany, it doesn't necessarily make exciting reading. But then you turn the page and something engaging burst into sight. Flynn makes quite a lot of use of science-based poetry, which I suspect will be an approach some readers love and others find tedious. Generally, the science content is solid, though it was a little odd to find an article on earthquake magnitudes using the Richter scale, pretty much abandoned by scientists ages ago - it's a bit like the book quoting energy in foot-poundals.

Overall, this is a book you can either dip into, in loo book style, or peruse as lightweight reading - ideal for a holiday title. There's nothing too challenging - but you will find material here that's surprising, fascinating and fun.

Hardback:

Kindle:
Using these links earns us commission at no cost to you
Review by Brian Clegg - See all of Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly digest for free here

Comments

The Antigravity Enigma - Andrew May ****

Antigravity - the ability to overcome the pull of gravity - has been a fantasy for thousands of years and subject to more scientific (if impractical) fictional representation since H. G. Wells came up with cavorite in The First Men in the Moon . But is it plausible scientifically? Andrew May does a good job of pulling together three ways of looking at our love affair with antigravity (and the related concept of cancelling inertia) - in science fiction, in physics and in pseudoscience and crankery. As May points out, science fiction is an important starting point as the concept was deployed there well before we had a good enough understanding of gravity to make any sensible scientific stabs at the idea (even though, for instance, Michael Faraday did unsuccessfully experiment with a possible interaction between gravity and electromagnetism). We then get onto the science itself, noting the potential impact on any ideas of antigravity that come from the move from a Newtonian view of a...

The World as We Know It - Peter Dear ***

History professor Peter Dear gives us a detailed and reasoned coverage of the development of science as a concept from its origins as natural philosophy, covering the years from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. inclusive If that sounds a little dry, frankly, it is. But if you don't mind a very academic approach, it is certainly interesting. Obviously a major theme running through is the move from largely gentleman natural philosophers (with both implications of that word 'gentleman') to professional academic scientists. What started with clubs for relatively well off men with an interest, when universities did not stray far beyond what was included in mathematics (astronomy, for instance), would become a very different beast. The main scientific subjects that Dear covers are physics and biology - we get, for instance, a lot on the gradual move away from a purely mechanical views of physics - the reason Newton's 'action at a distance' gravity caused such ...

It's On You - Nick Chater and George Loewenstein *****

Going on the cover you might think this was a political polemic - and admittedly there's an element of that - but the reason it's so good is quite different. It shows how behavioural economics and social psychology have led us astray by putting the focus way too much on individuals. A particular target is the concept of nudges which (as described in Brainjacking ) have been hugely over-rated. But overall the key problem ties to another psychological concept: framing. Huge kudos to both Nick Chater and George Loewenstein - a behavioural scientist and an economics and psychology professor - for having the guts to take on the flaws in their own earlier work and that of colleagues, because they make clear just how limited and potentially dangerous is the belief that individuals changing their behaviour can solve large-scale problems. The main thesis of the book is that there are two ways to approach the major problems we face - an 'i-frame' where we focus on the individual ...

Search This Blog