Whewell’s Gazette: Year 2, Vol. #10

Whewell’s Gazette

Your weekly digest of all the best of

Internet history of science, technology and medicine

Editor in Chief: The Ghost of William Whewell

Year 2, Volume #10

Monday 21 September 2015

EDITORIAL:

Another seven days have slipped by and once again it’s time for Whewell’s Gazette the weekly #histSTM links list bringing its eager readers the best from the last seven days of the histories of science, technology and medicine swept up from the distance corners of cyberspace for their perusal and delectation.

The history of science theatre event of the year is without any doubt Nicole Kidman making a rare appearance on the London stage as Rosalind Franklin in “Photograph 51”. Unfortunately the play, which is not new, perpetuates a major history of science myth in its very title. The myth says that Maurice Wilkins showed Franklin’s x-ray crystallography photograph 51 of DNA to James Watson without her permission and he was able to solve the structure of DNA upon seeing it.

As Matthew Cobb has clearly shown in his new book Life’s Great Secret nearly everything in this story is false. Photograph 51 was not made by Franklin but by Raymond Gosling who had been Wilkins’ doctoral student, was then transferred to Franklin and then back to Wilkins’ as Franklin decided to leave the King’s College laboratory. At the time Wilkins showed the photo to Watson he was Gosling’s doctoral supervisor and so was perfectly entitled to do so, although whether he was wise to do so is another question. More important despite the claims he made in his book, The Double Helix, Watson would not have been able to determine the structure of DNA from this photo.

More interestingly it was Crick who actually derived the structure of DNA using, amongst other things, data from Franklin’s work that she herself had made public in a lecture that Crick attended.

It is interesting to see how the critics reacted to this new historical information. In her review in the Telegraph Kate Mulcahy claims that “The debate rages on” whilst at the same time linking to Cobb’s earlier Guardian article laying out the true facts; in my opinion more than somewhat disingenuous. In his excellent review in the Guardian, Stephen Curry points out that “the real story is…more complex” (with reference to the use of Photograph 51) whilst linking in a footnote to the Cobb article with the comment. Matthew Cobb’s recent article gives an efficient summary of the facts of the matter”.

Whatever it would appear from the review that the piece is well worth going to see.

Noël Coward Theatre: Photograph 51 Till 21 November 2015

Nicole Kidman as Rosalind Franklin Photograph: Johan Persson/Johan Persson
Source: The Guardian

The New York Times: In ‘Photograph 51’, Nicole Kidman Is a Steely DNA Scientist

The Telegraph: Rosalind Franklin should be a feminist icon – we women in science need her more than ever

The Guardian: Photograph 51: how do you bring science to the stage?

New Scientist: Photograph 51: Inside the race to understand DNA

Quotes of the week:

“Genius and science have burst the limits of space, and few observations, explained by just reasoning, have unveiled the mechanism of the universe. Would it not also be glorious for men to burst the limits of time, and, by a few observations, to ascertain the history of this world, and the series of events which preceded the birth of the human race?” – Georges Cuvier h/t @hist_astro

“Every book is the wreck of a perfect idea.” – Iris Murdoch h/t @askpang

“In the UK we call them lifts but in the US they call them elevators, because we’re raised differently”. – Moose Allain (@MooseAllain)

“Does anyone know what the smallest number is that can’t be described in a single tweet?” – Guy Longworth (@GuyLongworth)

Ding dong dell

Pussy’s in the well

Who put her in?

Schrödinger, Erwin

What is her state?

Indeterminate – Matthew Hankins (@mc_hankins)

He was very careful during bondage sessions. He always used a safe word that contained upper and lower case letters and at least one number. – @50Nerds of Grey

[History] does not use induction or deduction, it does not demonstrate, it narrates. —Collingwood discussing Croce. h/t @gabridli

Birthday of the Week:

John Goodricke born 17 September 1764

Yovisto: John Goodricke and the Variable Star Persei

teleskopos: Sights and sounds: darkness and silence

Alexander von Humboldt born 14 September 1769

Portrait of Alexander von Humboldt by Friedrich Georg Weitsch, 1806
Source: Wikimedia Commons

New Scientist: The Invention of Nature finds science’s lost hero

National Geographic: Why Is the Man Who Predicted Climate Change Forgotten?

PHYSICS, ASTRONOMY & SPACE SCIENCE:

Inside the Science Museum: Russia’s 19^th century cosmic pioneers

Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 14 – Charles François de Cisternay du Fay

Charles François de Cisternay du Fay
Source: Wikimedia Commons

arXiv: 100 Years of General Relativity (pdf)

Scientific American: Guest Blog: Paris: City of lights and cosmic rays

AIP: Murray Gell-Mann

New Science Theory: William Gilbert On The Magnet (Full text English New Translation)

Forbes: New Evidence The Nazis Didn’t Come close to the Bomb

Starts with a Bang: Maxwell’s Unification Revolution

World Digital Library: Explanation of the Telescope

journals.cambridge.org: Connecting Heaven and Man: The role of astronomy in ancient Chinese society and culture

The Timaru Herald: Big telescope with an even bigger history to be restored in Fairlie

The historic Brashear telescope will be the centrepiece of the new Astronomy Centre built by Earth and Sky near the shore of Lake Tekapo.
Source: The Timaru Herald

In the Dark: A Botanic Garden of Planets

guff: Einstein’s Amazing Scientific Contemporaries That Changed the World

EXPLORATION and CARTOGRAPHY:

BuzzFeed News: The Wreck of HMS Erebus: How a Landmark Discovery Triggered a Fight for Canada’s History

Scientific Data: Roads and cities of 18^th century France

PBA Galleries: The Warren Heckrotte Collection of Rare Cartography

Miguel Costansó’s Carta Reducida Del Oceano Asiatico, Ó Mar Del Sur – See more at: http://www.pbagalleries.com/content/2015/09/14/the-warren-heckrotte-collection-of-rare-cartography/#sthash.KgAcxIEl.dpuf

globes.consciencebibliotek.be: Erfgoed Antwerpen, Blaeu Globes

MEDICINE & HEALTH:

Dr Alun Withey: Medicine in a Vacuum – Practitioners in Early Modern Wales

Yovisto: William Budd and the Infectious Diseases

storify: Things I’m going to miss teaching my medical students

Embryo Project: Margaret Higgins Sanger (1879–1966)

Margaret Sanger in 1922
Source: Wikimedia Commons

Center for the History of Medicine: Barbara Barlow

Morbid Anatomy Museum: Anatomical Atlases Digitized

19^th Century-Disability Cultures and Contexts: Talking Gloves

Thomas Morris: The supernumerary leg

Science Notes: Today in Science History – September 17 – Guillaume-Benjamin-Amand Duchenne du Boulogne

Thomas Morris: Give that man a medal

Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow: Glasgow Surgical Instrument Makers

Newman’s cytoscope for examination of the bladder by John Trotter Ltd.

Thomas Morris: Nutmeg is the best spice for students

The Harvard Crimson: Harvard Field Hospital Unit Active in England

Academia: Typhoid Fever and Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, 1891

Remedia: Gossip, News and Manners: the Barber-Surgeon in 16^th Century Italy

Thomas Morris: The mystery of the poisonous cheese

The Medicine Chest: Mapping histories of medicine

TECHNOLOGY:

Conciatore: The Discovery of Glass

English Heritage: 5 Clocks Which Tell the Story of Time

The Grandfather Clock at Mount Grace Priory
Source: English Heritage

Capitalism’s Cradle: How many industrial Revolutions?

Teyler’s Museum: Dompelbatterij

99% Invisible: Episode 180: Reefer Madness

Yovisto: Happy Birthday Linux

Tux the penguin, mascot of Linux
Source: Wikimedia Commons

Contributor: Decoding Alan’s apple

Leaping Robot: Frank Malina’s Cosmos

Still image of Malina’s Vortex and 3 Molecules (1965)
Source: Leaping Robot

EARTH & LIFE SCIENCES:

Why Evolution is True: The duck-faced lacewing, its baby and an ancient Egyptian inscription

York Daily Record: Dover Intelligent Design trial: 10 years later

3 Quarks Daily: The Scopes “Monkey Trial”, Part 1: Issues, Fact, and Fiction

Scopes in 1925
Source: Wikimedia Commons

3 Quarks Daily: The Scopes “Monkey Trial”, Part 2: Evidence, Confrontation, Resolution, Consequences

AMNH: Digitizing Darwin’s Work

Hakai Magazine: The Great Quake and the Great Drowning

Embryo Project: Wilhelm Roux (1850–1924)

Google Cultural Institute: Historic Moments: Beauty from Nature: Art of the Scott Sisters

Notches: Revisiting Loves Golden Age

Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience: Mechanical Neuroscience: Emil du Bois-Reymond’s Innovations in Theory and Practice

The Guardian: Revealed: how Indigenous Australian storytelling accurately records sea level rises 7,000 years ago

Indigenous rock art in Kakadu national park in the Northern Territory. Researchers say stories about sea level rises in Australia date back though more than 7,000 years of continuous oral tradition. Photograph: Helen Davidson for the Guardian

Jacob Darwin Hamblin: The Atom does not wait for favors from nature

The Raw Story: The ‘missing link’ in evolution is a myth that comes from medieval theology not modern science

Public Domain Review: Dr Mitchill and the Mathematical Tetrodon

PNAS.org: Strong upslope shifts in Chimborazo’s vegetation over two centuries since Humboldt (pdf)

Notches: Out in the Open: Rural Life, Respectability, and the Nudist Park

NCSE: Huxley’s Paley, Part 3

News Works: How Old Faithful earned its name

Until Darwin: The “American School”: A brief timeline of the Monogenist/polygenist Debate

Until Darwin: Digital Biography for the Works Cited in Darwin’s “A Historical Sketch of the Recent Progress of Opinion on the Origin of Species” (Updated)

Geschichte der Geologie: Von den Untiefen der Meere zu den Gipfeln der Welt

University of Cambridge: Research: The Magna Carta of scientific maps

Sigmund & Jocelyn: Fine Art: Birdman 1: George Edwards