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13574 results in History of science and technology

Page 554 of 679

  • G. N. Lewis's Views on Bond Theory 1900–16

  • Robert E. Kohler
  • Journal:
    The British Journal for the History of Science / Volume 8 / Issue 3 / November 1975
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    05 January 2009, pp. 233-239
    Print publication:
    November 1975

  • In a recent paper on the origin of G. N. Lewis's concept of the shared electron pair bond, I argued that the sources of Lewis's novel conception were certain ideas of J. J. Thomson and Alfred Parson. Yet the only influence that Lewis explicitly acknowledged was neither of these, but Alfred Werner's. The following statement appears in his book, Valence (1923):

    I still have poignant remembrance of the distress which I and many others suffered some thirty years ago in a class in elementary chemistry, where we were obliged to memorize structural formulae of a great number of inorganic compounds. Even such substances as the ferricyanides and ferryocyanides were forced into the system, and bonds were drawn between the several atoms to comply with certain artificial rules, regardless of all chemical evidence. Such formulae are now believed to be almost, if not entirely devoid of scientific significance. Such abuse of the structural formula inevitably led to a reaction which found its best expression in the publications of Werner. His Neuere Anschauungen … (1905) marked a new epoch in chemistry; and in attempting to clarify the fundamental ideas of valence, there is no work to which I feel so much personal indebtedness as to this of Werner's.

  • BJH volume 8 issue 2 Cover and Back matter

  • Journal:
    The British Journal for the History of Science / Volume 8 / Issue 2 / July 1975
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    05 January 2009, pp. b1-b4
    Print publication:
    July 1975
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  • ‘A Less Agreeable Matter’: The Disagreeable Case of Newton and Achromatic Refraction

  • Zev Bechler
  • Journal:
    The British Journal for the History of Science / Volume 8 / Issue 2 / July 1975
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    05 January 2009, pp. 101-126
    Print publication:
    July 1975

  • There is no evidence to suggest that even as late as January 1672, when Newton was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, anyone (except those unknown few who had in the previous years attended his Lucasian lectures at Cambridge) had any inkling of his new theory of colours. His name exploded on the scientific scene as the inventor and constructor of a new kind of telescope—what later became known as the reflector (which was somewhat misleading compared with its name during the seventeenth century: the catadioptrical telescope). Had the erudition of the London virtuosi been a little broader, they would have known that in fact he was not the inventor of the telescope, even though the precise form he gave it was his. Not only was the idea a hundred years old, during which period it was repeatedly suggested by various writers, but also Newton himself took the idea straight from the most recent of these suggestions, namely that included in James Gregory's Optica promota of 1663. The situation becomes even more ironic when we realize that the new instrument was admired for wrong reasons and on merits that were far from Newton's intentions. Nevertheless, admired it was, and there was a good reason for this: Newton's instrument was in fact the first reflector actually to be constructed and, moreover, for a few weeks (before its mirror became tarnished) it performed quite well. Several astonomers became interested because of the high magnifying power relative to its dimensions (about 7 inches long, with a magnification of 38).

  • BJH volume 8 issue 2 Cover and Front matter

  • Journal:
    The British Journal for the History of Science / Volume 8 / Issue 2 / July 1975
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    05 January 2009, pp. f1-f4
    Print publication:
    July 1975
    • Article
      • You have access
    • PDF
    • Export citation

Page 554 of 679