Seeing Further: The Story of Science and the Royal Society

Seeing Further: The Story of Science, Discovery & the Genius of the Royal Society with Bill Bryson as the editor is a marvelous book. I have read thousands of times that the pace of science and innovation causes knowledge to double and replace itself at an alarmingly fast rate. Of course, it's not in the actual doubling of knowledge that a problem exists but in the fact that it is virtually impossible for us to keep track of that very same new knowledge. However, even in a world that is creating so much new knowledge it is reassuring to consider that the Royal Society is celebrating its 350th anniversary this year. That is a marvelous accomplishment and to be honest I can't name many institutions that have been around that long. Bill Bryson is the perfect person to have headed this project. As a general science writer Bryson is aware of how important science and the Royal Society has been to the development of modern society. Then there is the rather eclectic group of contributors that have each offered a discussion on the development of science. Authors include James Gleick, Margaret Atwood, Margaret Wertheim, Neal Stephenson, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, Simon Schaffer, Richard Holmes, Richard Fortey, Richard Dawkins, Henry Petroski, Georgiana Ferry, Steve Jones, Philip Ball, Paul Davies, Ian Stewart, John D. Barrow, Oliver Morton, Maggie Gee, Stephen H. Schneider, Gregory Benford, and Martin Rees. I'd have to admit that Margaret Atwoods discussion of Jonathan Swift's Academy, and Richard Dawkins' Darwin's Five Bridges: The Way to Natural Selection is for me the highlight of the book. However, each and every chapter is eye opening and worthy of your time. It is a difficult fact to get your head around that when the Royal Society was established in 1660 we knew so little of the causes of the physical phenomenon of our planet. Whether the topic was the causes of the tides or why summer was warmer than winter, mystery tended to shroud almost everything. The Royal Society created the scientific method thus allowing discoveries to be measured and duplicated and encouraged good scientific exploration. "Good" in this case is relative, meaning that it was better than what preceded it. "Good" by today's standard still left much to be desired. Seeing Further is written for the general public and even the most "unscientific" of us will have no problem making sense of what is read. Well written and containing a section devoted to further reading, Seeing Further is a fun and inspiring read. I give it five stars after reading the whole book. Peace to all.

I have enjoyed reading several books by Bryson. This one is a book I had to take in spurts because it was so dense with ideas. Taking on a book covering so much science and math was a huge task and he has organized it well. It was nice seeing some historical perspective as well as literary insights! Plan on giving yourself time to reflect on so much! Well worth it.

It's filled with loads of interesting and important information. It's also filled with some slanted chapters that deviate significantly from the matter at hand: The Royal Society of London. I was for some reason expecting a book that contained more of Bill Bryson's witty writing. Think again. It's worth a read for sure but it's largely a series of essays ranging from great and informative to preachy and dull.

Review on the Kindle book as of November 10th... Someone has argued that a poor review solely based on the formatting of the book is inadequate. However good the point may be, I still would not recommend a book, whether paperback or Kindle, to a friend if the organization of it were bad. This book is poorly formatted, and given the dramatically increasing number of people using Kindle, I think the two stars I am giving this book are relevant. The content is great. Fascinating as usual with Bryson, though most of it obviously has not been written by himself but by 21 different scholars. But the KINDLE formatting make reading it a slightly annoying experience. As mentioned previously, not only have the illustrations been completely omitted, but their captions have been left behind right in the text. Really? Kindle books are outrageously expensive, sometimes more than plain, good old paperbacks. Don't get me wrong, I love the Kindle. But if we're going to pay so much for a book (that we can't sell, exchange or return) the least we can expect from Amazon is to provide quality stuff. EDIT: Amazon sent out an email informing me that there was a free update available for this book!!! It downloaded in a few seconds and all the pictures are now available! So I now there are no reasons whatsoever for not buying this great read! As usual, great Amazon customer service. Disappointed I have to say. If you are looking into the paperback, you should go for it though.

The content is at times a tad dense for we non-scientists but overall very informative and certainly thought provoking. If you enjoy reading Bryson as I do, this is not the book for you since he contributes very little.

Update -- I was very pleased to receive a notice this week that Seeing Further was being updated. The standard email said the update was for corrections, but it was a transformation to include the visual content that was lacking in the kindle version. As I mentioned below, the writing is great and having the visual content for addt'l context makes this a wonderful book - especially for the iPad/kindle! This is a book that exemplifies the opportunity for a great reading experience on the electronic medium. Wonderful writing that is complemented by graphics and pictures that support the content. Pity that this was neglected. No visual content was included and oddly, the picture/graphic references are embedded in the paragraph content. Loved the writing and short stories. I have to assume that it was rushed to kindle and they ran short on $ to do the electronic version correctly. I'm holding out hope that amazon comes through for the customer and improves upon this release and then offers the update to those who have already purchased. I'm nothing if not an optimist.

Bryson tackled the history of The Royal Society and its impact on science and everyday life in modern society. He handles the topic with his usual diligence along with his wonderful sense of humor. He bridges the cultural gap between the USA and England beautifully.

I really love Bill Bryson his books are great this is only book I could not find as a audiobook cuz I love listening to him in the car but I guess I got to use my eyeballs for this one

I found the book sadly disappointing. With someone like Bill Bryson editing the book and other well-known writers contributing chapters, I expected a book that was a far better than this rather disjointed work.

The book was written to commemorate the 350th anniversary of the Royal Society founded in 1660 and in the process marking the beginning of modern science. The momentous event was precipitated by a lecture given to a dozen people by a 28-year-old astronomer, Christopher Wren, who would later design St Paul's cathedral. These gentlemen were followers of Sir Francis Bacon, a 17th-century statesman and philosopher who argued that knowledge could be gained by testing ideas through experiments. Inspired by the lecture and Bacon, they determined to meet every week to discuss scientific matters and to witness experiments conducted by different members of the group. Two years later Charles II granted the Society its royal charter. The establishment of the Royal Society marked the invention of processes on which modern science rests, including scientific writing and peer review. During its illustrious history the Royal Society counted among its members such stellar scientists as Charles Darwin, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell and Lord Ernest Rutherford while Sir Isaac Newton served as its President;the election of Leibniz, a Hanoverian, as Fellow of the Royal Society in 1673 established its cosmopolitan character since its inception. The book introduced and edited by Bill Bryson, comprise twenty-one essays written by distinguished personalities-men and women-of science but also letters reflecting on science and technology since the foundation of the Royal Society. The essays in their commanding majority are truly excellent. Early in the book Margaret Wertheim provides a profound insight on the challenge that modern science which we identify with the Royal Society posed to existing worldviews and systems of meaning. This is immediately followed by an equally profound essay by Neal Stephenson relating to one of the sharpest intellectual disputes in the early days of the Royal Society between the two giants Newton and Leibniz. I do not allude here to their well known feud on the fatherhood of Calculus. But on a most profound debate on the nature of physical reality. Newton, of course, was well aware that his model led to a deterministic world posing a problem on free will. Lebniz in his theory of monads, primary entities interacting with all other similar entities anticipates contemporary thinking that matter is a secondary manifestation of the primary physical reality. Richard Dawkins' essay on Darwinian evolution is as always beautifully written and incisive. Georgina Ferry's essay on crystallography is written with sensitivity and among other relates woman recognition in science. One of the heroins, Dorothy Hodgin, was not only elected Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS 1947) but was awarded the 1964 Nobel prize for Chemistry, the first (and so far the only) British woman to win a science Nobel. Ian Stewart convincingly reveals the all permeating nature of Mathematics underpinning science and technology. Stephen H. Schneider, Nobel prize laureate and member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) relates among other how Bayenesian probability aids in tackling risk management in climate change. The concluding essay is appropriately written by Martin Rees, President of the Royal Society who reminds us that for Bacon, science was driven by two imperatives:the search for enlightenment, and the 'relief of man's estate'. But additionally and importantly articulates his own position that contemporary scientists have a special responsibility. They should as 'citizen scientists', be prepared to engage in public debate and discussion. And this is particuarly important because challenges of the twenty-first century are more complex and intractable than those of the twentieth century. The book is richly illustrated drawing on the arhives of the Royal Socitey. Photographs include pages with the signatures of the founding members of the Royal Society but also of the 2001 and 2002 members some of whom are contributors in the book;photographs of Isaac Newton death mask;and photographs of original editions of monumental publications such as Newton's Principia, Darwin's on the Origin of Species and Einstein's Uber die spezialle und die allgemeine relativitast theorie (On the Special and Ceneral Theory of Relativity).

und ein hervorragendes Buch als Geburtstagsgeschenk. In zahlreichen Kapiteln wird die Geschichte der RS von den Anfängen bis ins 21. Jahrhundert beleuchtet. Die Kapitel sind von verschiedenen erprobten (und guten!) Wissenschaftsjournalisten geschrieben worden, das Papier ist hervorragend und das Buch ist einfach gut gemacht!

Slightly sloppy, which makes me suspect a lot of cut-and-paste creation and production. Still, Bryson is entertaining, and this work is no exception. Who knew the Royal Society was so interesting?