The Harvard Classics Volume 30 Scientific Papers

by Charles William Eliot

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380 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1909

About the author

Charles William Eliot was an American academic who was selected as Harvard's president in 1869. He transformed the provincial college into the preeminent American research university. Eliot served the longest term as president in the university's history.

Reviews

[Steven H · Rating 4 out of 5]

HISTORICAL PAPERS FROM SEVERAL SCIENTISTS: Faraday, Helmholtz, Kelvin, etc.

Michael Faraday (1791–1867) was an English scientist best known for his contributions to the fields of electromagnetism and electrochemistry. Hermann Helmholtz (1821-1894) was a German physician and physicist. William Thomson Kelvin (1824-1907) was an Irish and British mathematical physicist and engineer. Simon Newcomb (1835-1909) was a Canadian-American astronomer and mathematician. Archibald Geikie (1835-1924), was a Scottish geologist and writer.

Faraday concludes his lecture on “The Correlation of the Physical Forces” by saying, “I hope that the insight which you have here gained into some of the laws by which the universe is governed, may be the occasion of some among you turning your attention to these subjects; for what study is there more fitted to the mind of man than that of the physical sciences? And what is there more capable of giving him an insight into the actions of those laws, a knowledge of which gives interest to the most trifling phenomenon of nature, and makes the observing student find ‘Tongues in trees, books in running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in everything’?” [Shakespeare, As You Like It] (Pg. 88)

Helmholtz observes, “It follows thence that the total quantity of all the forces capable of work in the whole universe remains eternal and unchanged throughout all their changes. All change in nature amounts to this, that force can change its form and locality without its quantity being changed. The universe possesses, once for all, a store of force which is not altered by any change of phenomena, can neither be increased nor diminished, and which maintains any change which takes place on it.” (Pg. 219)
Kelvin says, “Some people say they cannot understand a million million. Those people cannot understand that twice two makes four. That is the way I put it to people who talk to me about the incomprehensibility of such large numbers. I say finitude is incomprehensible, the infinite in the universe IS comprehensible.” (Pg. 270)

Geikie notes, “When first elevated from the sea, the land doubtless presents on the whole a comparatively featureless surface… giving no indicate of the grace into which it will grow under the hand of the sculptor… Patiently and unceasingly has this great earth-sculptor sat at her task since the land first rose above the sea, washing down into the ocean the debris of her labour, to form the materials for the framework of future countries; and there will she remain at work so long as mountains stand, and rain falls, and rivers flow.” (Pg. 357)

The entire Harvard Classics series is useful for anyone wanting to read collected editions of original works of philosophy, literature, poetry, science, etc.

[Mulhollandj · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this book gave me a lot of respect for our scientific forefathers. I found it amazing how they were able to discover so many things that we are just simply taught in elementary school.