Science History

It may surprise those who know of my Ulster Protestant background that I am something of a fan of Flannery O’Connor. As yet, I have not delved into her novels, but I have read all her stories, and also Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose, from which I ...

Article - Robert H Olley - Aug 18 2010 - 3:09pm

Did The Ancient Greeks Record Halley's Comet First?

Even though Halley's Comet has a regular orbit it's not an easy task to map its appearances throughout history- and it may be that one of those appearances matches an ancient Greek testimony and has only now been realized, write Daniel W. Graham ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Sep 11 2010 - 4:30pm

The Lost Letters Of Francis Crick Found

Sydney Brenner and Francis Crick shared a lab from 1956 to 1977 and in boxes of papers donated to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library, some choice bits of biology history were discovered and Nature was first with the story. Crick thought his earlier pe ...

Blog Post - Hank Campbell - Sep 30 2010 - 2:46pm

The Heavy Side

“England is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity, heresy, anomalies.” So wrote George Santayana http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Santayana in 1922. ...

Article - Robert H Olley - Nov 2 2010 - 3:02pm

Maxwell and Faraday

Having read the biography of Oliver Heaviside, I remain aware that I am not really au fait with inductance as I am with resistance and capacitance. Searching without much success for a textbook that would explain it in a way I could understand, I came upo ...

Blog Post - Robert H Olley - Nov 8 2010 - 11:06am

At The Hazard Of His Ears

At The Hazard Of His Ears What has the hazard of a person's ears to do with science history? The history of Arctic science, exploration and discovery is sprinkled with many as yet unsolved mysteries, many concerning the meanings of words in old docum ...

Article - Patrick Lockerby - Nov 14 2010 - 11:34am

A Waymark Called Hvitsark

A Waymark Called Hvitsark The Vikings did not use charts and instruments to navigate the open seas. Having developed skills in coastal navigation they extended those skills to pelagic navigation, or 'island-hopping'. Using the sun as a referen ...

Article - Patrick Lockerby - Nov 20 2010 - 10:48pm

There's an awful lot of coffee in...

... India, actually. Today, Wikipedia flagged up a new article, Coffee production in India, with a interesting piece of history. Quoting in full from the article: ...

Blog Post - Robert H Olley - Dec 10 2010 - 8:43am

Have A Merry William The Conqueror Day?

In the category of lesser-known holidays that could be celebrated on December 25th, the coronation of William of Normandy in 1066 A.D. as first King of what we know as modern England would have to be considered. It was the last time a foreign nation wou ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Dec 25 2010 - 2:17pm

Ibn Al-Haytham- The Mad Egyptian Polymath Who Proved Aristotle Wrong

Ibn al-Haytham can be called the father of modern optics. His 11th-century Book of Optics, which was published 1000 years ago, is considered by some to be in the same league as Newton's Principia regarding its influence in physics, yet very little is ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 6 2011 - 4:45pm