Meet astronomers, engineers, experimenters and inventors – the trail-blazing thinkers who shaped our world.
Inside you will find: -An informative timeline of the history of science -The lives and discoveries of Galileo, Ptolemy, Brunel, Watt, Newton, Boyle and many more -Expert writers on the world’s greatest scientific advances -Insights into over 2000 years of scientific ideas and inventions, people and personalities.
WELCOME
History of science • From early humans to the 21st century, Patricia Fara traces history’s major milestones in science and technology
TECHNOLOGY IN THE ANCIENT WORLD • From crop harvesters to automated statues and even proto-computers, the Greeks and Romans loved a gadget. Laurence Totelin traces the technological advances, from the practical to the pointless, made two millennia ago
Technology in Greek and Roman agriculture
INVENTION OR ADAPTATION? WHAT THE ROMANS REALLY DID FOR US • The Romans get the credit for a lot of inventions, but do they deserve it? Jem Duducu investigates how Roman innovation was open a case of adaptation, rather than originality…
1750 Gowin Knight revolutionises the navigational compass
A HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN 10½ OBJECTS • From the early calculator that helped merchants do complex sums in seconds to the x-ray that unlocked the secrets of DNA, Patricia Fara introduces objects that have transformed our understanding of the world (and universe) over the past 500 years
10 GLOBAL MILESTONES IN THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY • From Babylonian mathematics to Inuit climate science, James Poskett picks ten of the most remarkable stories from the global history of science and technology
“The history of science can prevent us from making the mistakes of the past” • Nobel Prize winner Steven Weinberg talks to Matt Elton about his book exploring thousands of years of scientific discovery
AN EXPERIMENTAL SOCIETY • Over 350 years on from the Royal Society’s birth, Patricia Fara reveals how its founder members’ conviction that experiments should take priority over theories transformed the study of science for good
Five founder members of the Royal Society • Remarkable thinkers dedicated to “promoting Physico-Mathematicall Experimental Learning”
1706 Francis Hauksbee produces electric light
12 GIANT LEAPS FOR MANKIND • In a feature first published in BBC History Magazine in 2009, 12 historians nominate the moments that they consider to be among humanity’s greatest leaps forward
THE FATHER OF MODERN GEOGRAPHY • From Columbus’s expeditions to the Google Earth app, our understanding of the Earth owes a huge debt to one extraordinary scholar. Jerry Brotton introduces the second-century geographer Ptolemy
1781 William Herschel sees a new planet
A BRIEF HISTORY OF ASTRONOMY • Heather Couper explains how our understanding of space has developed over the past 5,000 years
A RAIL REVOLUTION • The age of the railways brought unimaginable changes to Britain, Dan Snow tells Rob Attar, and helped to build – but ultimately undermined – the empire
RAILWAY MILESTONES
MOON SHAKER • Over 400 years on from the first lunar observations by telescope, Christopher Lewis considers how Galileo Galilei changed our view of the Moon and the heavens
Galileo: a man of many parts
Heroes of Invention • The industrial revolution brought insecurity and squalor to many, but, as Christine MacLeod explains, many of the great inventors and industrialists of the 19th century – particularly those in steam power – were lionised and honoured in their lifetimes
Local heroes: celebrating six innovators • Statues and celebrations were de rigueur in the hometowns of the great industrial trailblazers
ADA LOVELACE A VISIONARY OF...