Hugh Aldersey-Williams

Like the alphabet, the calendar, or the zodiac, the periodic table of the chemical elements has a permanent place in our imagination. But aside from the handful of common ones (iron, carbon, copper, gold), the elements themselves remain wrapped in mystery. We do not know what most of them look like, how they exist in nature, how they got their names, or of what use they are to us. Unlocking their astonishing secrets and colorful pasts, Periodic Tales is a passionate journey through mines and artists’ studios, to factories and cathedrals, into the woods and to the sea to discover the true stories of these fascinating but mysterious building blocks of the universe.

A Cultural History of the Elements, from Arsenic to Zinc

Periodic Tales

Paola Antonelli

Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.)

Peter Hall

Rebecca Roberts

In the past few decades, individuals have experienced dramatic changes in some of the most established dimensions of human life: time, space, matter, and individuality. Minds today must be able to synthesize such transformations, whether they are working across several time zones, travelling between satellite maps and nanoscale images, drowning in information, or acting fast in order to preserve some slow downtime. Design and the Elastic Mind focuses on designers ability to grasp momentous advances in technology, science and social mores and convert them into useful objects and systems. The projects included range from nanodevices to vehicles, appliances to interfaces and building facades, pragmatic solutions for everyday use to provocative ideas meant to influence our future choices. Designed by award-winning book designer Irma Boom, this volume also features essays by Paola Antonelli; design critic and historian Hugh Aldersey- Williams; visualization design expert Peter Hall; and nanophysicist Ted Sargent that further explore the promising relationship between design and science.

Design and the Elastic Mind

Sir Thomas Browne (1605 1682) was an English writer, physician, and philosopher whose work has inspired everyone from Ralph Waldo Emerson to Jorge Luis Borges, Virginia Woolf to Stephen Jay Gould. In an intellectual adventure like Sarah Bakewell's book about Montaigne, How to Live, Hugh Aldersey-Williams sets off not just to tell the story of Browne's life but to champion his skeptical nature and inquiring mind. Mixing botany, etymology, medicine, and literary history, Aldersey-Williams journeys in his hero's footsteps to introduce us to witches, zealots, natural wonders, and fabulous creatures of Browne's time and ours. We meet Browne the master prose stylist, responsible for introducing hundreds of words into English, including electricity, hallucination, and suicide. Aldersey-Williams reveals how Browne s preoccupations how to disabuse the credulous of their foolish beliefs, what to make of order in nature, how to unite science and religion are relevant today. In Search of Sir Thomas Browne is more than just a biography it is a cabinet of wonders and an argument that Browne, standing at the very gates of modern science, remains an inquiring mind for our own time. As Stephen Greenblatt has written, Browne is "unnervingly one of our most adventurous contemporaries.""

The Life and Afterlife of the Seventeenth Century's Most Inquiring Mind

In Search of Sir Thomas Browne

Combining science, history, and culture, explores every aspect of human anatomy from ancient body art to modern plastic surgery, discussing why some people are left-handed and why some cultures think the soul resides in the liver.

Anatomies: A Cultural History of the Human Body

The Sunday Times Science Book of the Year, Anatomies by Hugh Aldersey-Williams, author of bestseller Periodic Tales, is a splendidly entertaining journey through the art, science, literature and history of the human body.'Magnificent, inspired. He writes like a latter-day Montaigne. Stimulating scientific hypotheses, bold philosophic theories, illuminating quotations and curious facts. I recommend it to all' Telegraph *****'Splendid, highly entertaining, chock-full of insights ... It inserts fascinating scientific snippets and anecdotes about our organs into the wider history of our changing understanding of our bodies' Sunday Times'A relentlessly entertaining cultural history of the human body ... brims with fascinating details, infectious enthusiasm ... the terrain he covers is so richly brought to life' Guardian'Elegant and informative ... For Aldersey-Williams, [the body] is a thing of wonder and a repository of fascinating facts' Mail on Sunday ****It is the most fraught and fascinating, talked-about and taboo, unique yet universal aspect of our lives.It is the inspiration for art, the subject of science and the source of some of the greatest stories ever told. It is our most intimate ally against the world, provider of all pleasurable sensations, the repository of all we feel and know. And yet what a source of puzzlement and worry the body is: a home we never chose, a facade that we continually disguise, a protector that we know will fail us in the end.Until we fall ill, most of us take this extraordinarily complicated collection of flesh, bones and fluids entirely for granted. But from ancient body art to plastic surgery, from early anatomists to conceptual artists, grave-robbers to bionic athletes, our changing attitudes to the human body - how it works, what it should look like, how to live with it, what it means - tell us more about ourselves than almost any other subject in human history.Blending history, science, art, literature and the everyday, one of our finest science writers investigates this most marvellous and mysterious of creations. The result is a treasure trove of surprising facts, remarkable stories and startling information that encompasses everything from the first finger-printing to the physiology of angels, from synaesthesia to the clown-egg register, from the death-mask of Isaac Newton to the afterlife of Einstein's brain.'More than a science book - it's also history, biography and autobiography - Anatomies is writing at its most refined, regardless of genre' Sunday TimesPraise for Periodic Tales:'Science writing at its best ... fascinating and beautiful ... if only chemistry had been like this at school ... to meander through the periodic table with him ... is like going round a zoo with Gerald Durrell ... a rich compilation of delicious tales, but it offers greater rewards, too' Matt Ridley'Immensely engaging and continually makes one sit up in ­surprise' Sunday Times'Splendid ... enjoyable and polished' Observer'Full of good stories and he knows how to tell them well ... an agreeable jumble of anecdote, reflection and information' Sunday Telegraph'Great fun to read and an endless fund of unlikely and improbable anecdotes ... sharp and often witty' Financial TimesHugh Aldersey-Williams studied natural sciences at Cambridge. He is the author of several books exploring science, design and architecture and has curated exhibitions at the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Wellcome Collection. His previous book Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements was a Sunday Times bestseller and has been published in many languages around the world. He lives in Norfolk with his wife and son.

The Human Body, Its Parts and the Stories They Tell

Anatomies

An eye-opening, spine-tingling, heartwarming tour through the extraordinary history and secrets of the human body. The human body is the most fraught and fascinating, talked-about and taboo, unique yet universal fact of our lives. It is the inspiration for art, the subject of science, and the source of some of the greatest stories ever told. In Anatomies, acclaimed author of Periodic Tales Hugh Aldersey-Williams brings his entertaining blend of science, history, and culture to bear on this richest of subjects. In an engaging narrative that ranges from ancient body art to plastic surgery today and from head to toe, Aldersey-Williams explores the corporeal mysteries that make us human: Why are some people left-handed and some blue-eyed? What is the funny bone, anyway? Why do some cultures think of the heart as the seat of our souls and passions, while others place it in the liver? A journalist with a knack for telling a story, Aldersey-Williams takes part in a drawing class, attends the dissection of a human body, and visits the doctor’s office and the morgue. But Anatomies draws not just on medical science and Aldersey-Williams’s reporting. It draws also on the works of philosophers, writers, and artists from throughout history. Aldersey-Williams delves into our shared cultural heritage—Shakespeare to Frankenstein, Rembrandt to 2001: A Space Odyssey—to reveal how attitudes toward the human body are as varied as human history, as he explains the origins and legacy of tattooing, shrunken heads, bloodletting, fingerprinting, X-rays, and more. From Adam’s rib to van Gogh’s ear to Einstein’s brain, Anatomies is a treasure trove of surprising facts and stories and a wonderful embodiment of what Aristotle wrote more than two millennia ago: “The human body is more than the sum of its parts.”

Fatos surpreendentes, histórias extraordinárias e informações espantosas através de uma jornada reveladora pelos segredos do corpo humano. O corpo humano é com frequência descrito como uma maravilha da natureza, mas, sem dúvida, é a maravilha da natureza que menos nos detemos para admirar. Quando tudo está bem, a maioria de nós não dá a menor atenção a essa coleção extraordinariamente complexa de carne, ossos e fluidos. Em Anatomias, o best-seller Hugh Aldersey-Williams revela, como o corpo humano funciona, qual deveria ser sua aparência, como conviver com ele, o que ele significa. Mesclando história, ciência, arte, literatura e questões do cotidiano, Anatomias investiga essa que é a mais maravilhosa e misteriosa das criações.

Uma história cultural do corpo humano

Anatomias

Die Wiederentdeckung eines vergessenen Genies: Wie der Niederländer Christian Huygens die Grundlagen der modernen Naturwissenschaft legte Das 17. Jahrhundert war das Goldene Zeitalter für die Niederlande. Es zog Künstler und Geschäftsleute ebenso an wie Gelehrte und Naturforscher. Im Zentrum dieser intellektuellen Blüte stand ein Mann, dessen Schaffen sämtliche Zeitgenossen in den Schatten stellte – und der doch in Vergessenheit geraten ist: Christiaan Huygens, Erfinder von Teleskopen und der mechanischen Uhr, Entdecker des Saturnrings, Vater der Wellentheorie des Lichts, Bekannter von Descartes, Newton und Spinoza, Lehrer von Leibniz und Erbe einer in ganz Europa bestens vernetzten Dynastie. Hugh Aldersey-Williams zeichnet ein schillerndes Porträt eines außerordentlichen Mannes und einer bewegten Epoche, ohne die die Welt heute eine andere wäre. Eine packende Geschichte über die vergessenen Wurzeln der modernen Naturwissenschaft.

Christiaan Huygens und die Erfindung der modernen Naturwissenschaft

Die Wellen des Lichts

Favole periodiche

A profound and delightful jeu d'esprit of a book, mixing biography, etymology, cultural history and quixotic scientific experiments. Aldersey-Williams pulls the unfairly neglected yet enormously influential writer Thomas Browne out of the obscure pages of Pseudodoxia Epidemica and into the 21st century, to apply his generous curiosity and rational intelligence to the vagaries and contradictions of life today. Browne has had some impressive fans (Sebald, Woolf, Borges, Poe, Marias) but this book will revive him, bringing his extraordinary genius to a whole new audience.

The Adventures of Sir Thomas Browne in the 21st Century

Simon Briscoe

What exactly are your chances of being struck by a meteorite? Think you�re having less sex than the French? How high will sea levels actually rise? We live in an increasingly uncertain world. There�s so much to worry about it is often hard to know what to really panic about. But stay calm! For Panicology is the perfect answer to the conundrums and questions that bedevil modern life. Putting a lit match to the lies, headlines and statistical twaddle that seeks to frighten us, it explores 40 reasons for worry: from binge-drinking to Frankenstein foods, bird flu to alien abductions � and explores what, if any, effect they will have on your life. Why worry in ignorance when you can be a happy, informed sceptic?

Panicology

In The Tide, celebrated science writer Hugh Aldersey-Williams weaves together centuries of scientific thinking with the literature and folklore the tide has inspired to explain the power and workings of this most remarkable force. Here is the epic story of the long search to understand the tide: from Aristotle, who is said to have drowned himself in his efforts to figure out the Greek tides, to the pioneering investigations into the role of the moon by Galileo and Newton, to the quest to understand and even control the tide in our own time. Throughout, Aldersey-Williams whisks the reader along on his travels in search of the most remarkable tidal phenomena. He visits the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, where the tides are the strongest in the world; arctic Norway, home of the raging tidal whirlpool known as the maelstrom; and Venice, to investigate efforts to defend the city against flooding caused by the famed Acqua Alta.

The Science and Stories Behind the Greatest Force on Earth

The Tide

Hugh Aldersey-Williams transports us to the Dutch Golden Age - a time of immense scientific and artistic innovation - in this histo-biography of Christiaan Huygens, one of Europe's leading, yet unsung, thinkers.

Christiaan Huygens and the Making of Science in Europe

Dutch Light

The Most Beautiful Molecule "The molecule, buckminsterfullerene, is beautiful physically and intellectually. Its qualities, and even some of its properties, can be appreciated instantly and intuitively by nonscientists. Its uniqueness is bound to lead to novel applications-superconductivity is the leading contender at the moment." "The commercial potential of buckminsterfullerene has heightened the excitement and controversy in recent years, while the exact nature of the discovery process in 1985 has been the subject of a heated feud between the British and American scientists involved."-Hugh Aldersey-Williams Ten years ago, the discovery of buckminsterfullerene, a previously unknown form of carbon, stunned the scientific community, as much for the discovery itself as for the manner in which it came about. In the words of author Hugh Aldersey-Williams, it was an example of "classic bootleg science". The work was done on the back of other, funded projects, and when time would allow. Yet its commercial implications are probably immense. Now, with objectivity and insight, The Most Beautiful Molecule recounts the events leading up to this momentous discovery and chronicles the ongoing, often frenzied aftermath. Hugh Aldersey-Williams leads us on a thrilling expedition to the very forefront of modern chemistry research. Houston, Texas, 1985. Two industrious chemists discover a previously unknown form of carbon and christen it buckminsterfullerene, for its striking resemblance to American architect Richard Buckminster Fuller's geodesic domes. This unusual molecule-also known as the buckyball-is composed of 60 carbon atoms arranged in a hollow sphere, with hexagonal and pentagonal configurations similar to those found on a soccer ball. Its near-perfect symmetry is just one reason why scientists have since dubbed it "the most beautiful molecule." The discovery of buckminsterfullerene-by American physicist and chemist Richard Smalley and British physical chemist Harry Kroto-rocked the scientific community. After all, generations believed graphite and diamond to be the only pure forms of carbon. How had this third form gone undetected? In fact, the actual discovery was merely the beginning of an intense-and ongoing-quest to master this newest form of the most basic of elements. Confirmation would take five years and launch an unprecedented flood of investigation and investment. The unique physical structure of buckminsterfullerene-a "cage" into which atoms of other materials may be inserted-had huge commercial potential and inspired scientists, industrial laboratories, and corporations alike. Backed by such giants as AT&T, DuPont, Exxon, and IBM, a highly competitive search for practical applications began-and continues. Possibilities range from the creation of a revolutionary rocket fuel to nanotechnology-the construction of microscopic "molecular machines"-to developments in the fight against AIDS. Here, then, is a fascinating, multilayered look at one of the most important scientific findings of our time. The Most Beautiful Molecule is a brain-teasing detective story, a marvelously detailed, inside look at the workings of the scientific community, and an exciting contemplation of what lies ahead. From the forefront of research in modern chemistry, author Hugh Aldersey-Williams offers, in his own words, "a celebration of the intimate world of physical science and its practitioners."

The Discovery of the Buckyball

The Most Beautiful Molecule

“Superb. . . . A gently studious Bill Bryson crossed with an upbeat and relaxed WG Sebald.”—James McConnachie, Sunday Times (UK) Half of the world’s population today lives in coastal regions lapped by tidal waters. But the tide rises and falls according to rules that are a mystery to almost all of us. In The Tide, celebrated science writer Hugh Aldersey-Williams weaves together centuries of scientific thinking with the literature and folklore the tide has inspired to explain the power and workings of this most remarkable force. Here is the epic story of the long search to understand the tide from Aristotle, to Galileo and Newton, to classic literary portrayals of the tide from Shakespeare to Dickens, Melville to Jules Verne. Throughout, Aldersey-Williams whisks the reader along on his travels: He visits the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, where the tides are the strongest in the world; arctic Norway, home of the raging tidal whirlpool known as the maelstrom; and Venice, to investigate efforts to defend the city against flooding caused by the famed acqua alta.

The Tide: The Science and Stories Behind the Greatest Force on Earth

“Il ritmo del racconto è da togliere il fiato. Si passa senza soluzione di continuità dall’oracolo di Delfi all’arte di Rubens, da Vesalio ai viaggi di Gulliver, da Aristotele ai racconti di Gogol’.” - The Guardian “Come un Montaigne dei giorni nostri, Aldersey-Williams ci accompagna in un viaggio nello spazio e nel tempo tra ipotesi scientifiche, teorie filosofiche a dir poco audaci, intuizioni argute e aneddoti divertenti.” - The Telegraph

Storia culturale del corpo umano

Anatomie

El cuerpo humano, nuestro tabú más incómodo. El único elemento común para todos los seres humanos. Una suma de huesos, piel, grasa y fluidos a la que, mientras todo carbura, prestamos escasa atención. Y sin embargo, desde el arte antiguo a la cirugía plástica, desde los primeros anatomistas a los artistas conceptuales, de los profanadores de tumbas a los atletas biónicos, nuestra relación con el cuerpo humano dice más de nosotros mismo que cualquier otro asunto en la historia de la humanidad. Mezclando historia, arte, literatura y vida cotidiana, Hugh Aldersey-Williams se adentra en la más misteriosa y maravillosa de las creaciones. El resultado es una obra fascinante repleta de hechos asombrosos, historias inverosímiles e información deslumbrante que va desde la primera huella dactilar hasta la psicología de los ángeles, desde la máscara fúnebre de Isaac Newton hasta el cerebro embalsamado de Einstein.

El cuerpo humano, sus partes y las historias que cuentan

Anatomías

Die Hälfte der Menschheit lebt an Küsten – trotzdem wissen wir wenig über die Elementarkraft der Gezeiten. Und das obwohl deren physische Präsenz uns seit jeher beeinflusst und vielleicht sogar unsere DNA miterschaffen hat. Schon Aristoteles brachte ihre Unberechenbarkeit zur Weißglut, und ihre potenziell zerstörerische Kraft wird die Menschheit auch in Zukunft betreffen. Hugh Aldersey-Williams beschreibt, wie der Mensch die Gesetze erforscht, denen das Wasser – und damit auch das Klima – unterworfen ist. Leichtfüßig verbindet er die Wissenschaft von Ebbe und Flut mit großen Erzählungen und Mythen. Nehmen Sie Platz, das maritime Drama mit einer Länge von 12 Stunden und 30 Minuten beginnt.

Das wilde Leben der Gezeiten

Flut

A quirky trend of building designs inspired by bizarre animals has emerged in the last few years. Why and how has this happened? Is it because of new technical possibilities in materials and structural engineering? Or is the answer to be found in new social preoccupations in science? After a brief look at the historical precedents, the book focuses on contemporary examples from around the world and shows the various ways in which the organic/animal forms inform the architectural ones. Featured architects include Frank Gehry, Michael Sorkin, and Greg Lynn.

Hugh Aldersey-Williams

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