Scientific Temperaments: Three Lives in Contemporary Science

by Philip J. Hilts

SCIENTIFIC TEMPERAMENTS explores in detail the private and professional lives of three scientists and shows how the personality and individual style of each one influence not only his work, but often the course of an entire branch of science as well. Each a key figure in his field, the scientists profiled here are: Robert Wilson, Mark Ptashne, and John McCarthy. SCIENTIFIC TEMPERAMENTS is a unique and absorbing inquiry into the ways of science and the ways of the scientist. The result is a new perspective that reveals how science, far from being an objective and impersonal search for the truth, is very much the product of the people engaged in it.

Genres: Science, Biography

Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

Reviews

[Ina]

Actually, I gave up on the first of the three biographical essays, so maybe my rating should be 2 1/2 stars. Too much technical content about physics for me. The other two sections were interesting. One was about a geneticist, and the other was about a computer inventor. His ideas about the use of home computers were prescient.