Skip to Main Content (Press Enter)
The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments by George Johnson
Add The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments to bookshelf
Add to Bookshelf

The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments

Best Seller
The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments by George Johnson
Audiobook Download
Apr 08, 2008 | ISBN 9780739359235 | 235 Minutes

Buy from Other Retailers:

See All Formats (2) +
  • $16.95

    Mar 10, 2009 | ISBN 9781400034239

    Buy from Other Retailers:

  • Apr 08, 2008 | ISBN 9780307268662

    Buy from Other Retailers:

  • Apr 08, 2008 | ISBN 9780739359235

    235 Minutes

    Buy from Other Retailers:

Buy the Audiobook Download:

Listen to a sample from The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments

Product Details

Praise

“Johnson’s lively book nicely evokes the lost world of the tabletop experiment. . . . His vision is broad . . . [and] finds beauty throughout science.”—The New York Times Book Review “A page turner that documents moments of genius from Galileo to Millikan.”—The Washington Post“As elegant as the experiments it describes.”—The Wall Street Journal "Johnson’s . . . crystalline prose is like the pull of gravity . . . an irresistible force."—Scientific American “As a science journalist, Mr. Johnson is a seasoned translator of technical jargon. He also has a sharp eye for human plot, both in and out of the laboratory . . . a certain spirit of wonder breathes through Mr. Johnson’s chapters.”—The New York Sun“Delightful, succinct, elegant.” —Roger Penrose“Absorbing . . .”—Discover “Johnson’s book is as elegant as the experiments he features . . . . The writing here is lively, mixing bits of biography with the experiments themselves, offering the human element that explains the scientists’ motivation as well as the science. Johnson shares personal anecdotes as well as theory in an engaging, compelling style. The result is a little gem of a book, enjoyable to read both as history and science.”—Bookpage“Johnson deftly relates the circumstances and eccentricities integral to the findings behind science’s most seminal experiments.”—Seed Magazine“Johnson engagingly dramatizes his stories with failure-crowned-by-success narratives, adding biographical sparks . . . Johnson exerts classic appeal to science readers: presenting the lone genius making a great discovery. Good to go in any library.”—Booklist“Concise, evocative . . . pays wonderful homage to the science and scientists that helped create the modern world.”—Publisher’s Weekly“George Johnson knows his stuff, and his stuff is science.”—The Santa Fe New Mexican“George Johnson’s The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments makes its point as elegantly as the experiments it describes.”—Wall Street Journal“Unusual and engaging . . . unfussy, jargon-free . . . Johnson is an experienced science writer with a knack for making biology and physics clear, and for finding the humanizing details in this world.”—Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune“[An] entertaining physics text by a skilled science writer.”—Jeffrey Bairstow, In My View

Table Of Contents

Prologue

1. Galileo: The Way Things Really Move

2. William Harvey: Mysteries of the Heart

3. Isaac Newton: What a Color Is

4. Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier: The Farmer’s Daughter

5. Luigi Galvani: Animal Electricity

6. Michael Faraday: Something Deeply Hidden

7. James Joule: How the World Works

8. A. A. Michelson: Lost in Space

9. Ivan Pavlov: Measuring the Immeasurable

10. Robert Millikan: In the Borderland

Epilogue: The Eleventh Most Beautiful Experiment

Notes and Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index

Looking for More Great Reads?
21 Books You’ve Been Meaning to Read
Back to Top