Michael Faraday's The Chemical History of a Candle: With Guides to Lectures, Teaching Guides and Student Activities

by Bill Hammack

This book introduces modern readers to Michael Faraday's great nineteenth-century lectures on The Chemical History of a Candle. This edition is a companion book to the popular EngineerGuy YouTube series of the lectures. This books contains supplemental material to help readers appreciate Faraday's key insight that "there is no more open door by which you can enter into the study of science than by considering the physical phenomena of a candle." Through a careful examination of a burning candle, Faraday's lectures introduce readers to the concepts of mass, density, heat conduction, capillary action, and convection currents. They demonstrate the difference between chemical and physical processes, such as melting, vaporization, incandescence, and all types of combustion. And the lectures reveal the properties of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide, including their relative masses and the makeup of the atmosphere. The lectures wrap up with a grand, and startling, analogy: by understanding the chemical behavior of a candle the reader can grasp the basics of respiration. To help readers understand Faraday's key points this book has an "Essential Background" section that explains in modern terms how a candle works, introductory guides for each lecture written in contemporary language, and seven student activities with teaching guides.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Physics

190 pages, Paperback

Published May 20, 2016

About the author

Make magazine called Bill a "brilliant science-and-technology documentarian", whose "videos should be held up as models of how to present complex technical information visually." Wired called them "dazzling." His work has been recognized by an extraordinarily broad range of scientific, engineering, and journalistic professional societies. From journalists he has won the trifecta of the top science and engineering journalism awards: The National Association of Science Writer's coveted Science in Society Award; the American Chemical Society's Grady-Stack Medal, and the American Institute of Physics' Science Writing Award--all typically given to journalists. From his engineering peers he's been recognized with the ASME's Church Medal, ieee's Distinguished Literary Contributions Award, ASEE's President's Medal, and the AIChE's Service to Society Award. He is a Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Illinois - Urbana. He may be reached at bill@engineerguy.com or voice/text at 217-689-1461.

Reviews

[Irene · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read the introduction to each lecture, then watched Bill Hammack deliver the lecture on youtube: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0...

Very exciting and enlightening! (Pun intended)

[Teri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written--this book is a little gem! nice that there is a corresponding youtube video series

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrHnL...

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

A perfect introduction to science for anyone, not just your children. Read the intro to the lectures and then watched the lectures on YouTube, twice actually because they were short and he spoke quickly so twice was good to catch all the interesting stuff he said. The experiments offered in the book were excellent and the explanations. My only small beef would be that the experiments could be marked as which one should go with which lecture. But I simply read ahead and notated it myself.

[Mykyta Kuzmenko · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ця книжка є дуже вдалим поєднанням перевіреного часом тексту з найновішими досягненнями науки та технологій. За основу взяті тексти лекцій Майкла Фарадея. Це мабуть один з перших успішних прикладів науково-популярної літератури. Хоча вони записані більше 150 років тому, але і сьогодні той підхід який використав Фарадей виглядає дуже цікавим, простим і доречним. Втім за весь цей час наука теж не стояла на місці і тому рішення осучаснити тексти виглядає досить слушним. Я маю сказати, що автори дійсно створили щось дуже вартісне.

Хоч декому може здатися підхід досить тавтологічним, спробувавши його я не розачарувався. Всього основний матеріал розбито на 6 лекцій і вони існують у трьох різних форматах. Через це існує декілька шляхів прочитання цього твору і нижче я подам мій. Кожна лекція має зроблене авторами резюме, потім подано текст лекцій Фаредея з певними коректурами і ще на Ютубі існує відео версія лекцій з демонстраціями експерементів, які слово в слово повторюють коректований текст Фарадея.

Я робив так: читав текст Фарадея, потім повертався до резюме сучасних авторів де прояснюються певні моменти, а на завершення ще й дивився відео лекцій з експериментами. Така тавтологія при навчання досить доречна. Книжка невеличка, але я на кожну лекцію виділяв окремий день.

Хоч лекції і про елементарні речі, але мені дуже сподобалось. Дуже рекомендую.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book - clear , interesting and informative.

[IU_read · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this for my wiork. This book is standalone but i recommend to watch with youtube videos for further explanation. Its common knowledge but the lab experiments that make this book interesting.

[Kashmira · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really fun experience to read this book and watch the videos created by them showing each of the experiments used by Faraday to display the brilliance of the candle as it burns. One can almost imagine being part of the audience when Faraday was presenting in the mid-1800's. Makes me wish I was back at school in the physics and chemistry laboratory trying out these experiments for myself..