Whewell’s Gazette
Your weekly digest of all the best of
Internet history of science, technology and medicine
Editor in Chief: The Ghost of William Whewell
Year 2, Volume #10
Monday 21 September 2015
EDITORIAL:
Another seven days have slipped by and once again it’s time for Whewell’s Gazette the weekly #histSTM links list bringing its eager readers the best from the last seven days of the histories of science, technology and medicine swept up from the distance corners of cyberspace for their perusal and delectation.
The history of science theatre event of the year is without any doubt Nicole Kidman making a rare appearance on the London stage as Rosalind Franklin in “Photograph 51”. Unfortunately the play, which is not new, perpetuates a major history of science myth in its very title. The myth says that Maurice Wilkins showed Franklin’s x-ray crystallography photograph 51 of DNA to James Watson without her permission and he was able to solve the structure of DNA upon seeing it.
As Matthew Cobb has clearly shown in his new book Life’s Great Secret nearly everything in this story is false. Photograph 51 was not made by Franklin but by Raymond Gosling who had been Wilkins’ doctoral student, was then transferred to Franklin and then back to Wilkins’ as Franklin decided to leave the King’s College laboratory. At the time Wilkins showed the photo to Watson he was Gosling’s doctoral supervisor and so was perfectly entitled to do so, although whether he was wise to do so is another question. More important despite the claims he made in his book, The Double Helix, Watson would not have been able to determine the structure of DNA from this photo.
More interestingly it was Crick who actually derived the structure of DNA using, amongst other things, data from Franklin’s work that she herself had made public in a lecture that Crick attended.
It is interesting to see how the critics reacted to this new historical information. In her review in the Telegraph Kate Mulcahy claims that “The debate rages on” whilst at the same time linking to Cobb’s earlier Guardian article laying out the true facts; in my opinion more than somewhat disingenuous. In his excellent review in the Guardian, Stephen Curry points out that “the real story is…more complex” (with reference to the use of Photograph 51) whilst linking in a footnote to the Cobb article with the comment. Matthew Cobb’s recent article gives an efficient summary of the facts of the matter”.
Whatever it would appear from the review that the piece is well worth going to see.
Noël Coward Theatre: Photograph 51 Till 21 November 2015
Nicole Kidman as Rosalind Franklin Photograph: Johan Persson/Johan Persson
Source: The Guardian
The New York Times: In ‘Photograph 51’, Nicole Kidman Is a Steely DNA Scientist
The Telegraph: Rosalind Franklin should be a feminist icon – we women in science need her more than ever
The Guardian: Photograph 51: how do you bring science to the stage?
New Scientist: Photograph 51: Inside the race to understand DNA
Quotes of the week:
“Genius and science have burst the limits of space, and few observations, explained by just reasoning, have unveiled the mechanism of the universe. Would it not also be glorious for men to burst the limits of time, and, by a few observations, to ascertain the history of this world, and the series of events which preceded the birth of the human race?” – Georges Cuvier h/t @hist_astro
“Every book is the wreck of a perfect idea.” – Iris Murdoch h/t @askpang
“In the UK we call them lifts but in the US they call them elevators, because we’re raised differently”. – Moose Allain (@MooseAllain)
“Does anyone know what the smallest number is that can’t be described in a single tweet?” – Guy Longworth (@GuyLongworth)
Ding dong dell
Pussy’s in the well
Who put her in?
Schrödinger, Erwin
What is her state?
Indeterminate – Matthew Hankins (@mc_hankins)
He was very careful during bondage sessions. He always used a safe word that contained upper and lower case letters and at least one number. – @50Nerds of Grey
[History] does not use induction or deduction, it does not demonstrate, it narrates. —Collingwood discussing Croce. h/t @gabridli
Birthday of the Week:
John Goodricke born 17 September 1764
Yovisto: John Goodricke and the Variable Star Persei
teleskopos: Sights and sounds: darkness and silence
Alexander von Humboldt born 14 September 1769
Portrait of Alexander von Humboldt by Friedrich Georg Weitsch, 1806
Source: Wikimedia Commons
New Scientist: The Invention of Nature finds science’s lost hero
National Geographic: Why Is the Man Who Predicted Climate Change Forgotten?
PHYSICS, ASTRONOMY & SPACE SCIENCE:
Inside the Science Museum: Russia’s 19th century cosmic pioneers
Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 14 – Charles François de Cisternay du Fay
Charles François de Cisternay du Fay
Source: Wikimedia Commons
arXiv: 100 Years of General Relativity (pdf)
Scientific American: Guest Blog: Paris: City of lights and cosmic rays
AIP: Murray Gell-Mann
New Science Theory: William Gilbert On The Magnet (Full text English New Translation)
Forbes: New Evidence The Nazis Didn’t Come close to the Bomb
Starts with a Bang: Maxwell’s Unification Revolution
World Digital Library: Explanation of the Telescope
journals.cambridge.org: Connecting Heaven and Man: The role of astronomy in ancient Chinese society and culture
The Timaru Herald: Big telescope with an even bigger history to be restored in Fairlie
The historic Brashear telescope will be the centrepiece of the new Astronomy Centre built by Earth and Sky near the shore of Lake Tekapo.
Source: The Timaru Herald
In the Dark: A Botanic Garden of Planets
guff: Einstein’s Amazing Scientific Contemporaries That Changed the World
EXPLORATION and CARTOGRAPHY:
BuzzFeed News: The Wreck of HMS Erebus: How a Landmark Discovery Triggered a Fight for Canada’s History
Scientific Data: Roads and cities of 18th century France
PBA Galleries: The Warren Heckrotte Collection of Rare Cartography
Miguel Costansó’s Carta Reducida Del Oceano Asiatico, Ó Mar Del Sur – See more at: http://www.pbagalleries.com/content/2015/09/14/the-warren-heckrotte-collection-of-rare-cartography/#sthash.KgAcxIEl.dpuf
globes.consciencebibliotek.be: Erfgoed Antwerpen, Blaeu Globes
MEDICINE & HEALTH:
Dr Alun Withey: Medicine in a Vacuum – Practitioners in Early Modern Wales
Yovisto: William Budd and the Infectious Diseases
storify: Things I’m going to miss teaching my medical students
Embryo Project: Margaret Higgins Sanger (1879–1966)
Margaret Sanger in 1922
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Center for the History of Medicine: Barbara Barlow
Morbid Anatomy Museum: Anatomical Atlases Digitized
19th Century-Disability Cultures and Contexts: Talking Gloves
Thomas Morris: The supernumerary leg
Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 17 – Guillaume-Benjamin-Amand Duchenne du Boulogne
Thomas Morris: Give that man a medal
Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow: Glasgow Surgical Instrument Makers
Newman’s cytoscope for examination of the bladder by John Trotter Ltd.
Thomas Morris: Nutmeg is the best spice for students
The Harvard Crimson: Harvard Field Hospital Unit Active in England
Academia: Typhoid Fever and Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, 1891
Remedia: Gossip, News and Manners: the Barber-Surgeon in 16th Century Italy
Thomas Morris: The mystery of the poisonous cheese
The Medicine Chest: Mapping histories of medicine
TECHNOLOGY:
Conciatore: The Discovery of Glass
English Heritage: 5 Clocks Which Tell the Story of Time
The Grandfather Clock at Mount Grace Priory
Source: English Heritage
Capitalism’s Cradle: How many industrial Revolutions?
Teyler’s Museum: Dompelbatterij
99% Invisible: Episode 180: Reefer Madness
Yovisto: Happy Birthday Linux
Tux the penguin, mascot of Linux
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Contributor: Decoding Alan’s apple
Leaping Robot: Frank Malina’s Cosmos
Still image of Malina’s Vortex and 3 Molecules (1965)
Source: Leaping Robot
EARTH & LIFE SCIENCES:
Why Evolution is True: The duck-faced lacewing, its baby and an ancient Egyptian inscription
York Daily Record: Dover Intelligent Design trial: 10 years later
3 Quarks Daily: The Scopes “Monkey Trial”, Part 1: Issues, Fact, and Fiction
Scopes in 1925
Source: Wikimedia Commons
3 Quarks Daily: The Scopes “Monkey Trial”, Part 2: Evidence, Confrontation, Resolution, Consequences
AMNH: Digitizing Darwin’s Work
Hakai Magazine: The Great Quake and the Great Drowning
Embryo Project: Wilhelm Roux (1850–1924)
Google Cultural Institute: Historic Moments: Beauty from Nature: Art of the Scott Sisters
Notches: Revisiting Loves Golden Age
Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience: Mechanical Neuroscience: Emil du Bois-Reymond’s Innovations in Theory and Practice
The Guardian: Revealed: how Indigenous Australian storytelling accurately records sea level rises 7,000 years ago
Indigenous rock art in Kakadu national park in the Northern Territory. Researchers say stories about sea level rises in Australia date back though more than 7,000 years of continuous oral tradition. Photograph: Helen Davidson for the Guardian
Jacob Darwin Hamblin: The Atom does not wait for favors from nature
The Raw Story: The ‘missing link’ in evolution is a myth that comes from medieval theology not modern science
Public Domain Review: Dr Mitchill and the Mathematical Tetrodon
PNAS.org: Strong upslope shifts in Chimborazo’s vegetation over two centuries since Humboldt (pdf)
Notches: Out in the Open: Rural Life, Respectability, and the Nudist Park
NCSE: Huxley’s Paley, Part 3
News Works: How Old Faithful earned its name
Until Darwin: The “American School”: A brief timeline of the Monogenist/polygenist Debate
Geschichte der Geologie: Von den Untiefen der Meere zu den Gipfeln der Welt
University of Cambridge: Research: The Magna Carta of scientific maps
Sigmund & Jocelyn: Fine Art: Birdman 1: George Edwards
Artist George Edwards
Source: Sigmund & Jocelyn
Embryo Project: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (1890– )
Why Evolution is True: Another DNA anniversary, which ells a different story from the textbooks
Current Biology: Oswald Avery, DNA, and the transformation of biology
New Historian: Navy Drove Fishing Globalisation in 16th Century England
CHEMISTRY:
Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 15 – Aleksandr Mikhaylovich Butlerov
Conciatore: Deadly Fumes
The Renaissance Mathematicus: A breath of fresh air
Stephen Hales
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 18 – Edwin Mattison McMillan
META – HISTORIOGRAPHY, THEORY, RESOURCES and OTHER:
Creator unknown
Lady Science: Issue 12: The Pill in America: Subscribe!
oral contraceptives, 1970s
Source: Wikimedia Commons
University of Glasgow Library: Themes from Smith and Rousseau: the best and the worst aspects of archival research
Now Appearing: On a Bacon Hunt
Double Refraction: Is it post-modern to be present-centred? Thoughts prompted by Nick Tosh
American Science: We’re Back, or, Monday on the Blog with George
Bookplate of George Sarton
Source: Wikimedia Commons
The Recipes Project: Teaching High School American History With Cookbooks
the many-headed monster: What is to be done? Mending academic history
NHM: Digital Museum: Mobilising the world’s natural history collections for the benefit of human well-being
The Renaissance Mathematicus: When Living in the Past Distorts the Past; Or, Why I Study the Victorian Era
Forbes: History as Big Data: 500 Years of Book Images and Mapping Million of Books
The Recipes Project: Spicing up the Victorians: Teaching Mrs. Beeton’s Recipe for Mango Chutney
Niche: New Scholars New Links
History in Photographs: Vintage Harvard
Observatory group, ca. 1910
The Renaissance Mathematicus: Revolution contra Gradualism: Let the debate begin
International Commission on the History of Meteorology: History of Meteorology – Volume 7 (2015) Contents Page
Macro-Typography: Glory of Asia
Chronologia Universalis: On the Road: In Royal Prussia
The Washington Post: How publishing a 35,000-word manifesto led to the Unabomber
A view from the bridge: The undisciplinarian
Making Science Public: Naturel/artificial
ESOTERIC:
Forbidden Histories: Two Years of ‘Forbidden Histories’
Academia: Scientific rationalism, occult empiricism? Representations of the microphysical world, c. 1900
Hermetic.com: The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz (full text English)
Conciatore: A Network of Alchemists
“The Alchemist” 1558, Pieter Brugle the Elder.
British Library: Digitised Manuscripts: Alchemical Rolls (The Ripley Scrolls)
BOOK REVIEWS:
Science Book a Day: House Guests, House Pests: A Natural History of Animals in the Home
University of Glasgow Library: Glasgow Incunabula Project Update: The Nuremberg Chronicle
Academia: Women at the Edge of Science
Public Books: Speaking in Science
Popular Science: Eureka: How Invention Happens – Gavin Weightman
Elle Thinks: Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
The Independent: The Royal Society Winton Prize: Top scientists and shortlisted authors share that have excited them
Science Book a Day: The Value of Believing in Yourself: The Story of Louis Pasteur
NEW BOOKS:
VRIN: Alzheimer La vie, la mort, la reconnaissance
Renaissance Mathematicus: The growing pile – too many good books not enough time
Historiens de la santé: Soigner le cancer au XVIIIe siècle. Triomphe et déclin de la thérapie par la ciguë dans le Journal de Médecine
Palgrave Macmillan: Psychiatry in Communist Europe
Academia: Dis/unity of Knowledge: Models for the Study of Modern Esotericism and Science
David Wootton: The Invention of Science Web Site
Museum Boerhaave: Stripboek: Ehrenfest!
ART & EXHIBITIONS
Science Museum: Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age Opens 18 September 2015
Galileo’s World: e-newsletter September
BBC: Tenby man who invented the equals sign remembered in exhibit
The first known equation, equivalent to 14x+15=71 in modern syntax.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Museum Boerhaave: Einstein & Friends 19 September 2015–3 January 2016
Science Museum: Julia Margaret Cameron: Influence and Intimacy 24 September 2015–28 March 2016
Painting of Julia Margaret Cameron by George Frederic Watts, c. 1850-1852
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Dundee Science Centre: Nature’s Equations: D’Arcy Thompson and the Beauty of Mathematics Till 25 October 2015
Science Museum: Cosmos and Culture Till 31 December 2015
The Old Operating Theatre, Museum & Herb Garret: The Operating Theatre
THEATRE AND OPERA:
Gielgud Theatre: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Till 18 June 2016
FILMS AND EVENTS:
Florence Nightingale Museum: Please, Matron! Dramatic reconstruction of a 1900 lecture to nursing students 22 October 2015
Florence Nightingale Museum: Meet the Florence Nightingale Museum Curator 28 September 2015
Victoria University in the University of Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies: Early Modern Interdisciplinary Graduate Forum I: Adam Richter Biblical History in the Natural Philosophy of John Wallis (plus other talks) 6 October
Bodleian Library: Women in Science: Wikipedia improve-a thon 14 October
Wellcome Library: A celebration of Elizabeth Garrett Anderson and 150 years of medicine 29 September 2015
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson
RGU Sport, Aberdeen: Journey to the Centre of the Earth 29 September 2015
Surgeon’s Hall Museum Edinburgh: Leonardo da Vinci: The Mechanics of Man Lecture 28 September 2015
PAINTING OF THE WEEK:
The student of chemistry and pharmacy by Karl Joseph Litschaur
Source: Wikigallery.org
TELEVISION:
PBS America: 1,000 Days of Fear: The Deadly Race at Los Alamos
SLIDE SHOW:
Fadesingh: The Age of Games: Black Magic, Mathematics, Automata & Games
VIDEOS:
Youtube: The Einstein Theory of Relativity (Max Fleischer, 1923)
Youtube: Tidal predicting machine Part II
Youtube: How the Moon Affects the Ocean Tides – Tides and the Moon – CharlieDeanArchive / Archival Footage
Youtube: Visita do físico Albet Einstein ao Brasil completa 90 anos
RADIO:
BBC: Ada Lovelace: Letters shed light on tech visionary
BBC: Computing Britain
PODCASTS:
Nevada Public Radio: Even Einstein Made Mistakes
Physics Buzz Blog: A Time Capsule of the Universe
Science for the People: Eye of the Beholder
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
HaPoC 2015: 3rd International Conference on the History and Philosophy of Computing Pisa Italy 8–11 October 2015
Advances in the History of Psychology: Workshop: Photography, Representation, and Therapy Villa Di Breme Oven, Via Martinelli 23 in Cinisello Balsamo 24 September
MPIWG: Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe” Colloquia 2015/16
BSECS: CfP: BSECS 45th Annual Conference St Hugh’s College Oxford 6-8 January 2016
Athens: Workshop: Science Fiction. Jules Verne and 19th Century Science 17–18 December 2015
University of Cambridge: History of Medicine Seminars
University of Paderborn: International Workshop: Emilie du Châtelet – Laws of Nature/Laws of Morals 23–24 October 2015
Advances in the History of Psychology: Round up: Calls for Papers in Allied Fields
LOOKING FOR WORK:
H–Physical Sciences: American Physical Society StudTravel Grants
NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering: Dibner Chair in History or Philosophy of Technology
Bern Dibner
Source: Wikimedia Commons
University of Queensland: 3 Research Fellows Harnessing Intellectual Property to Build Food Safety
University of Vienna: 1 Fully paid student position + 6 associate positions
University of Pittsburgh: Assistant Professor History and Philosophy of Science
University of Pittsburgh: Associate Professor History and Philosophy of Science
MIT: Program in Science, Technology, and Society Assistant, Associate, or Full Professor
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