History of Science

Paleontologist Neil Shubin's 2008 book Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body comes to PBS in a three-part series airing April 9, 16th and 23rd. Steve Mirsky reports

 

Over the past couple of days, I have been reviewing some citations for student projects.  Several of the students submitted citations in which they expressed confusion over what page numbers to include.

Just about 20 years ago, I abandoned a career as a physical chemist to become a philosopher science. For most of those 20 years, people (especially scientists) have been asking me what the heck the philosophy of science is, and whether scientists have any need of it.

Invisible ink was a key method for spy communications throughout history
 

Last week, I was asked by an acquisitions editor at a publishing company to review a 2 page proposal for a new reference work that would be available in print and electronically.

From March 20-23, Atlanta attracted hundreds of people with diverse backgrounds who communicated in the lingua franca of Martin Gardner. Perhaps the last true polymath, Gardner has inspired so many people over the last five decades that they are almost compelled to seek each other out and share their latest discoveries.

New genome sequencing recommendation will enable patients to opt out of testing 

The man who piloted the first submersible to reach the deepest point in the ocean—in 1960—recounts the excitement and tension he experienced diving to 35,846 feet

Yet again, the world is cockahoop and head-over-heads in awe over another thrilling, dumbfounding, truly novel zoological discovery. No, I'm not talking about the discovery of suspension-feeding anomalocarids, ancient echolocating odontocete cetaceans, or even of new tapirs (did I mention the new tapir?), but of a stupendous new living bird, discovered clinging to existence in [...]

Friends and colleagues who know that I illustrated Neil Shubin’s first book, Your Inner Fish, have been asking if I was involved in the three-part PBS series hosted by Shubin that will air next week on April 9th.

Integral calculus originated in a 17th-century debate that was as religious as it was scientific