[.uk] The Prism and the Pendulum: The Ten Most Beautiful ... (ISBN 0812970624)

Wonderful science for non-scientists:
An easy to read and usually very comprehensible selection of ten crucial experiments in science, each pair interspersed with an "interlude" of science philosophy. The realities of choosing experiments were fairly presented, which is that the scientist(s) involved thought in advance that a certain relationship existed, then designed an experiment to verify. Good scientists admit it when the experiment does not confirm their notions. None of the idealized "hypothesis, experiment, theory, experiment, law" that we were taught in school. The judgment of the scientists on what data points to accept or reject, and their close relation with the apparatus was seen as most important. The importance of peer-review and replication was down-played. The experiments were chosen by polling the authors contacts, and are Eratosthenes' measurement of the earth's circumference, Galileo's work on gravity by dropping things and by using inclined planes, Newton's analysis of colors by using two prisms on sunlight, Cavendish's determination of the mass of the earth, Young's double slit experiment showing the wave nature of light, Foucault's pendulum demonstrating the rotation of the earth, Millikan's oil-drop experiment to determine the charge of the electron, Rutherford's gold foil bombardment that showed the structure of the atom, and a team's experiment that showed the wave nature of single electrons. All good choices, but the lack of Chemistry and Biology experiments is the biggest fault of the choices. Crease visited a number of the sites where the experiments were done. The book also has a large number of endnotes to sources. The placement of the experiments in the context of their times was well done. Personalities of the scientsts were discussed. The public's reactions to the experiments was given. What makes an experiment beautiful and comparisons of art and science were well done. No other recent book of this type was found on searching www.Amazon.com. My only complaints are that some of the diagrams that would have made comprehension easier were not presented. More was needed on Galileo's inclined planes to show F = M.a better; it was hard to see how Cavendish's experiment worked; and Rutherford's experiment sorely needed a picture of atoms in foil deflecting alpha rays as in any Chemistry text. Maybe to be done for a second printing, as this book should deserve.

Plodding and uncompelling:
Having read Robert Crease's other significant book (The Second Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Twentieth-Century Physics, his excellent collaboration with Charles Mann), I was eagerly looking forward to this solo-effort. Unfortunately, the book takes what should be an inherently exciting subject (the ten most beautiful experiments of the title) and plods through them competently but with a surprising lack of enthusiasm. I almost felt as though Crease had a great idea for a book, but lost interest in his own subject matter about half-way through. Crease spends far too much time trying to explain why we should consider the experiments beautiful rather than capture that beauty in his writing. It as though Crease were trying to explain why the Sistine Chapel is beautiful when a picture would have expressed so much more. Clearly, a scientific experiment is not so easily captured in words as a painting can be in a photgraph, but Crease's narratives consistently fall short. Finally, Crease has chosen to insert his own philsophical interludes (ten in all) after each experiment. Each interlude is 4 to 5 pages and explores the nature of beauty and the various criteria that can be used to determine whether an experiment is beautiful. While the subject of beauty in science might be interesting, these interludes often seem self-indulfent. Crease is clearly pleased with his own classification schemes and pet theories -- I am not so sure that the reader will find them quite as interesting. So overall, not a great popular science book, but certainly not terrible. If you are looking for an articulate synopsis of ten of the most "beautiful" experiments in history, it is a diverting enough read. If you are looking for something more compelling, skip it.

Good Refresher/Introduction:
Robert Crease is a professor at Stony Brook University in NY and writes the Critical Point column every month in Physics World magazine. Any Top Ten list will spur discussion (?I can?t believe he included that/excluded this?) and this list is no different. Some are no-brainers and will be familiar to even casual science aficionados. But the book isn?t about the most important experiments - it?s about the most ?beautiful? experiments. Crease explains the science but also gets into the people behind the science and the creativity and, yes, beauty of the process. He starts with Eratosthenes 3rd century BC experiment that measured the circumference of the Earth with sticks, shadows and basic geometry. Galileo has two experiments in the Top 10 - dropping the balls from the Leaning Tower of Pisa to show the same rate of fall even for different weights and his Alpha experiment involving the inclined plane that you may have duplicated in Physics 101. We read about Newton?s splitting of light with prisms and Young?s slits and ripple tanks to show the wave nature of light (contradicting Newton). I remember more success with the ripple tanks than the slits in high school lab. Foucault?s Pendulum had to be included and it is still a source of wonder when viewed at dozens of local Museums. Yes, it is we (on the Earth) that are constantly moving. The later choices are less evident - dealing with the atom, electrons and quantum theory - than the classics of mechanics, but still good choices. The book is a good introduction or refresher to some great science.

The Aesthetics of Science:
_The Prism and the Pendulum_ (2003) is centered around the assumption that there is an aesthetic element to science and that experiments can in fact be beautiful. Robert P. Chase, who writes a column for _Physics World_, asked readers to send in their candidates for "the ten most beautiful science experiments". The winners (in chronological order) were: Eratosthenes' measurement of the Earth's circumference; Galileo's dropping of heavy and light weights; Galileo's inclined plane experiment; Newton's experiment with sunlight and prisms; Cavendish's weighing of the world; Young's light wave experiment; Foucault's pendulum; Millikin's oil-drop experiment; Rutheford's discovery of the atomic nucleus; and the quantum interference of single electrons, which is still something of a mystery. The clear winner of the ten was Young's two-slit light experiment (easy to describe, but _not_ easy to do). What makes an experiment beautiful? This is not easy to neatly determine, but Crease suggests that three common characteristics are "depth, efficiency, and definitiveness" (xix). An experiment is "dynamic" (xviii), more "like a dramatic performance" (xviii) than a painting or sculpture. A beautiful experiment transforms our understanding of the world and leads us to ask more questions about it. Many of these experiments could be done by college undergraduates, and several could be done in high school or elementary school. Many of them have been repeated on film or in demonstrations. One (Foucault's pendulum) may be seen in museums, public buildings, and university buildings around the world. One (Galileo's dropping of the weights) was repeated on the Moon. These experiments have entered public consciousness enough to influence our view of the world and to make it a bit more sophisticated than common sense experience. Common sense tells us that a heavier ball will land on the ground before a lighter ball when they are both dropped at the same time. Common sense says that light is only one color. Common sense says that you can't measure the circumference of the Earth with a stick in hot Egyptian sands or calculate its weight with a tortion bar in an English laboratory. Common sense says that electrons or nuclei are no more real than elves or fairies. You can't see them, can you? There are ten chapters on each of these beautiful experiments, interspaced with "interludes" discussing various issues of aesthetics and science. Crease concludes with a list of runners-up experiments and a detailed discussion of his own personal favorite-- the muon g2 experiment. It is an example of Big Science, and it has (so far) only been done four times. All in all, an excellent book. But Crease sometimes assumes that the reader already knows something about the experiment he is discussing. If you are a little rusty in this department, you may want to refer to a good history of science encyclopedia-- one of my favorites is _Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology_ (1964)-- for that information.

Beautiful Book:
The thing which drew many people to science as children was the sense of wonder it evokes. The Prism and the Pendulum does a wonderful job of bringing out this sense in its discussion of beauty in science. The subject matter and Crease's writing style combine to show the beauty in ten historically famous scientific experiments. He cites three characteristics of a beautiful experiment: that it "shows something deep about the world in a way that transforms our understanding of it"; that its "elements have to be efficiently arranged"; and that it "should be definitive, revealing its result without need for further generalizations of inferences." He cites ten experiments, chronologically ordered from Eratosthenes' determination of the Earth's circumference to Claus Joensson`s two-slit interference experiment with electrons. Crease emphasizes science as an active, passionate endeavor, not as mechanical testing of hypotheses. He cites controversies in which scientists have heatedly opposed one another, as well as controversies between the artistic and scientific worlds. I love his rebuttal of Whitman's poem about the "learn'd astronomer." At the same time, the book is free (apart from some unclear comments on "Science and the Sublime") of the mysticism found in some popularizations of science. Quantum physics is still lacking in solid epistemological underpinnings, so any discussion of it is laden with difficulties. Crease's account isn't fully satisfactory, but he correctly places the problem with the difficulty of applying macroscopic visualizations rather than with any self-contradictions in physical phenomena. In his words, "the activities of the quantum world cannot be pictured." While the book is written for adults, it could be an excellent choice for a teenager with a developing interest in science. I think an intelligent thirteen-year-old could read it without much trouble.