The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments

[Catshrink]

Colbert had the author of this book on his show Wednesday night. The book sounds great and I've ordered it already. Johnson showed Steven Faraday's coil experiment. When the spark jumped the gap, Steven put his finger in it to see if it would hurt. Watch the video here:

http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/videos.jhtml?videoId=167602


The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments (Hardcover)
by George Johnson

From Publishers Weekly
Award-winning science writer Johnson (A Fire in the Mind; Strange Beauty) calls readers away from the industrialized mega-scale of modern science (which requires multimillion-dollar equipment and teams of scientists) to appreciate 10 historic experiments whose elegant simplicity revealed key features of our bodies and our world. Some of the experiments Johnson describes have a sense of whimsy, like Galileo measuring the speed of balls rolling down a ramp to the regular beat of a song, or Isaac Newton cutting holes in window shades and scrambling around with a prism to break light into its component colors. Other experiments—such as William Harvey's use of vivisected animals to demonstrate the circulation of blood, and the truncated frogs Luigi Galvani used in his study of the nervous system—remind us of changing attitudes toward animal research. Joule's effort to show that heat and work are related ways of converting energy into motion, Michelson's work to measure the speed of light, Millikan's sensitive apparatus for measuring the charge of an electron: these experiments toppled contemporary dogma with their logic and clear design as much as with their results. With these 10 entertaining histories, Johnson reminds us of a time when all research was hands-on and the most earthshaking science came from... a single mind confronting the unknown. 73 b&w illus. (Apr. 9)


http://www.amazon.com/Ten-Most-Beautiful-Experiments/dp/1400041015/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1210388686&sr=8-1

[gristy]

1. In high school I completed Millikan's oil drop experiment to measure the charge on an electron

1.60217646 × 10-19 coulombs. Didn't get it to that many digits :D but we got it to a couple. I've got the lab report (and reports for 1/2 a dozen other experiments) in a box somewhere in the garage. I got an "H" in the class. AP Physics. And yes, I am still a geek. You gotta problem with that? :D

[Catshrink]

3. No problem here

I think it's cool. I love history of science stuff. It bores the heck out of my students -- they just want a formula to plug numbers into.

[evlbstrd]

2. That was a good interview.

It made me want to read the book and have a beer with Mr. Johnson.

[Catshrink]

4. Me too.

I don't think I'd join him and Colbert sticking my finger in the gap though. I thought Steven's reaction was hysterical!

[evlbstrd]

5. That's funny.

I would have stuck my finger in it, too. Betcha Farraday did it.

[Catshrink]

6. I admit it, I'm a chicken

students always want to try that kind of thing. I once had a student put a charged capacitor on his tongue! No point in yelling at him -- the pain was punishment enough.

[evlbstrd]

7. Did you ever do 9 volt batteries?

Tingly.

[caraher]

12. reminded me of this

The difference between scientists and other people

[seriousstan]

8. I googled Ten Most Beautiful Experiments and also found this. Thanks for the idea, it was fun.

http://www.emsb.qc.ca/laurenhill/science/beaut.html

And here is a summary of the ten in the book in the OP


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/04/29/eexperiments.xml

That was time well spent. I thoroughly enjoyed myself at both sites.

On edit:

My bad...THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!

[Catshrink]

11. No, thank YOU!

I just read your links -- they're great!

[nam78_two]

9. Very cool

Thanks for posting that :thumbsup:.

[comradebillyboy]

10. that book is a must buy for me

At this stage of my life I pretty much confine my book buying to books about Joseph Stalin, Books about physics and murder mysteries.