The notebook that we are publishing here is a remarkable document. Kept by one of the major scientists of the nineteenth century, at a time when he had made his first important discoveries and was preparing for those major findings that would propel him into the very first ranks, it is a window into...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Bibliographische Detailangaben

1. Verfasser:	Faraday, Michael 1791-1867 (VerfasserIn)
Weitere Verfasser:	Tweney, Ryan D. 1943- (HerausgeberIn)
Format:	Elektronisch E-Book
Sprache:	English
Veröffentlicht:	Stevenage IET 1991
Schriftenreihe:	IEE history of technology series 17
Schlagworte:	Faraday, Michael > 1791-1867 Geschichte 1822 Chemie Experiment Faraday, Michael Biography Reviews biographies reviews Tagebuch > 1822 Quelle
Online-Zugang:	UBY01 Volltext
Zusammenfassung:	The notebook that we are publishing here is a remarkable document. Kept by one of the major scientists of the nineteenth century, at a time when he had made his first important discoveries and was preparing for those major findings that would propel him into the very first ranks, it is a window into the thoughts of a scientific genius and, at the same time, a revealing portrait of the culture and community of a new century in the history of science. In 1822, when the notebook was in use, Michael Faraday (1791-1867) was employed to assist Sir Humphry Davy and W. T. Brande in the Laboratories of the Royal Institution in London's Albemarle Street. He was also the assistant 'superintendent' or manager of the 'House'. His comment suggests that he found this notebook more useful than his previous notebooks had been. Indeed, as even the casual reader will soon discover, it is a remarkable notebook. At first sight it could seem a modest effort, almost a list of topics with the occasional suggested experiment thrown in. One cannot always judge importance by size, however, and it is our belief that the 1822 notebook, modest though it seems, contains insights for us that are not to be had from the later diaries. Faraday must have thought so too, as his title page comment indicates. Was he simply restating an old cliche, that notebooks were useful to all scientists? We think not, because his comment refers to 'such a collection.' He has singled out something about this one that makes it particularly useful and that he recommends to others. This demands that we pay close attention to exactly what sort of notebook this is. It is not a diary; the organization is topical not chronological. It is more like an 'idea-book,' a place to keep suggestions and puzzles for later work, rather than a record of things done. It is the last existing notebook Faraday designed to have a prearranged topical outline; later, as we show below, he switched to a more diary-like format, eventually incorporating an interesting 'addressing' scheme rather than outline formats. In the present case, however, the existence of the outline format suggests that he used the book in a back-and-forth, more or less parallel fashion rather than as a serial record. It is a delineation of parallel enterprises, not sequential ones. This attempt to articulate parallel research programmes probably reflects Faraday's new confidence as an independent researcher, resulting from his discovery, in September 1821, that an electric current can be made to rotate continuously about a magnet. This one contains only plans for his own work and occasional annotations indicating when a project has been attempted or completed.
Beschreibung:	1 Online-Ressource
ISBN:	9781849194075
DOI:	10.1049/PBHT017E