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Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything by Philip Ball (Paperback, 2014)

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With the recent landing of the Mars rover Curiosity, it seems safe to assume that the idea of being curious is alive and well in modern science--that it's not merely encouraged but is seen as an essential component of the scientific mission. Yet there was a time when curiosity was condemned. Neither Pandora nor Eve could resist the dangerous allure of unanswered questions, and all knowledge wasn't equal--for millennia it was believed that there were some things we should not try to know. In the late sixteenth century this attitude began to change dramatically, and in Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything, Philip Ball investigates how curiosity first became sanctioned--when it changed from a vice to a virtue and how it became permissible to ask any and every question about the world. Looking closely at the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Ball vividly brings to life the age when modern science began, a time that spans the lives of Galileo and Isaac Newton. In this entertaining and illuminating account of the rise of science as we know it, Ball tells of scientists both legendary and lesser known, from Copernicus and Kepler to Robert Boyle, as well as the inventions and technologies that were inspired by curiosity itself, such as the telescope and the microscope. The so-called Scientific Revolution is often told as a story of great geniuses illuminating the world with flashes of inspiration. But Curiosity reveals a more complex story, in which the liberation--and subsequent taming--of curiosity was linked to magic, religion, literature, travel, trade, and empire. Ball also asks what has become of curiosity today: how it functions in science, how it is spun and packaged for consumption, how well it is being sustained, and how the changing shape of science influences the kinds of questions it may continue to ask. Though proverbial wisdom tell us that it was through curiosity that our innocence was lost, that has not deterred us. Instead, it has been completely the contrary: today we spend vast sums trying to reconstruct the first instants of creation in particle accelerators, out of a pure desire to know. Ball refuses to let us take this desire for granted, and this book is a perfect homage to such an inquisitive attitude.

Product Identifiers

Publisher
The University of Chicago Press
ISBN-13
9780226211695
eBay Product ID (ePID)
208878157

Product Key Features

Author
Philip Ball
Publication Name
Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything
Format
Paperback
Language
English
Subject
Engineering & Technology, Science, History
Publication Year
2014
Type
Textbook
Number of Pages
480 Pages

Dimensions

Item Height
226mm
Item Width
152mm
Item Weight
658g

Additional Product Features

Title_Author
Philip Ball
Country/Region of Manufacture
United States

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Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything by Philip Ball (Paperback, 2014)

About this product

Product Information

Product Identifiers

Product Key Features

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Additional Product Features

Best Selling in Adult Learning & University

Australian Native Bee Book: Keeping Stingless Bee Hives for Pets, Pollination and Sugarbag Honey by Tim Heard (Paperback, 2015)

The Weed Forager's Handbook: A Guide to Edible and Medicinal Weeds in Australia by Adam Grubb, Annie Raser-Rowland (2012, Paperback)

Permaculture: A Designer's Manual by Bill Mollison (Hardcover, 1988)

The Falsification of History: Our Distorted Reality by John Hamer (Paperback, 2013)

In-Basket Case Studies by Guy Adamson (Paperback, 1986)

Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History by S.C. Gwynne (Paperback, 2011)

Botanical Field Guide by Stefan Mager (Fold-out book or chart, 2021)

Save on Adult Learning & University

Netter Atlas of Human Anatomy: Classic Regional Approach

Havard's Nursing Guide to Drugs

Steven Holzner Physics Essentials For Dummies (Paperback)

T. Jared Bunch Matthew LaPlante John D. Day The AFib Cure (Paperback)

Care of People with Diabetes: A Manual for Healthcare Practice

The Fourth Turning By Neil Howe, William Strauss

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