Product Description

James Gleick has long been fascinated by the making of science—how ideas order visible appearances, how equations can give meaning to molecular and stellar phenomena, how theories can transform what we see. In Chaos, he chronicled the emergence of a new way of looking at dynamic systems; in Genius, he portrayed the wondrous dimensions of Richard Feynman’s mind. Now, in Isaac Newton, he gives us the story of the scientist who, above all others, embodied humanity’s quest to unveil the hidden forces that constitute the physical world.

In this original, sweeping, and intimate biography, Gleick moves between a comprehensive historical portrait and a dramatic focus on Newton’s significant letters and unpublished notebooks to illuminate the real importance of his work in physics, in optics, and in calculus. He makes us see the old intuitive, alchemical universe out of which Newton’s mathematics first arose and shows us how Newton’s ideas have altered all forms of understanding from history to philosophy. And he gives us a moving account of the conflicting impulses that pulled at this man’s heart: his quiet longings, his rage, his secrecy, the extraordinary subtleties of a personality that were mirrored in the invisible forces he first identified as the building blocks of science. More than biography, more than history, more than science, Isaac Newton tells us how, through the mind of one man, we have come to know our place in the cosmos.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #286829 in Books
• Published on: 2003-05-13
• Released on: 2003-05-13
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 288 pages

Amazon.com Review
As a schoolbook figure, Isaac Newton is most often pictured sitting under an apple tree, about to discover the secrets of gravity. In this short biography, James Gleick reveals the life of a man whose contributions to science and math included far more than the laws of motion for which he is generally famous. Gleick's always-accessible style is hampered somewhat by the need to describe Newton's esoteric thinking processes. After all, the man invented calculus. But readers who stick with the book will discover the amazing story of a scientist obsessively determined to find out how things worked. Working alone, thinking alone, and experimenting alone, Newton often resorted to strange methods, as when he risked his sight to find out how the eye processed images:

.... Newton, experimental philosopher, slid a bodkin into his eye socket between eyeball and bone. He pressed with the tip until he saw 'severall white darke & coloured circles'.... Almost as recklessly, he stared with one eye at the sun, reflected in a looking glass, for as long as he could bear.

From poor beginnings, Newton rose to prominence and wealth, and Gleick uses contemporary accounts and notebooks to track the genius's arc, much as Newton tracked the paths of comets. Without a single padded sentence or useless fact, Gleick portrays a complicated man whose inspirations required no falling apples. --Therese Littleton

From Publishers Weekly
Gleick's most renowned writing falls into one of two categories: vivid character studies or broad syntheses of scientific trends. Here, he fuses the two genres with a biography of the man who was emblematic of a new scientific paradigm, but this short study falls a bit short on both counts. The author aims to "ground this book as wholly as possible in its time; in the texts," and his narrative relies heavily on direct quotations from Newton's papers, extensively documented with more than 60 pages of notes. While his attention to historical detail is impressive, Gleick's narrative aims somewhere between academic and popular history, and his take on Newton feels a bit at arms-length, only matching the vibrancy of his Feynman biography at moments (particularly when describing Newton's disputes with such competitors as Robert Hooke or Leibniz). As might be expected, Gleick's descriptions of Newton's scientific breakthroughs are clear and engaging, and his book is strongest when discussing the shift to a mathematical view of the world that Newton championed. In the end, this is a perfectly serviceable overview of Newton's life and work, and will bring this chapter in the history of science to a broader audience, but it lacks the depth one hopes for from a writer of Gleick's abilities.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Popular sci-tech author Gleick takes as his subject one of the most written-about figures in the history of science--so what's the new angle here? A crystalline expositor of what Newton accomplished, Gleick throttles back the personal aspects of Newton's life to show the curves of his thought processes. Although Newton's reputation dimmed in the early twentieth century when his papers revealed devotion to alchemy and biblical hermeneutics--what a waste of genius, ran the theme of subsequent biographies--Gleick incorporates them with the physics and mathematics, as aspects of Newton's singular obsession with truth . . and secrecy. He suppressed for decades his invention of calculus; laws of motion; and optics; and harbored vitriolic hatred for those who disputed him, such as calculus co-inventor Gottfried Leibniz. Newton's choleric moods and blazing ideation, Gleick ventures to explain, can be understood in the context of Restoration England's intellectual climate, still heavily mystical and only incipiently rational. Weaving this background into his fine presentation of Newton's interests, Gleick renders a wonderful impression of the icon's mind. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Customer Reviews

A very detailed explanation of Isaac Newton's life and works
This audio CD based on the paperback by James Gleick is a very good source for people interested in obtaining a very detailed explanation of Sir Isaac Newton's life and works in the fields of Mathematics, Physics, Religion and Philosophy. If however, the reader wants to obtain just a summary of Newton's life and works, this CD is far too detailed for him / her.

The CD explains the cooperation and / or rivalry between Newton and other famous scientists, mathematicians and philosophers of his era. So the listener also learns about how Descartes, Bacon, Huygens, Leibniz,Locke, Hook and many others approached the same issues. The conformity and discrepancies between Newton's and these other thinkers' opinions and methodologies about various physics and mathematics topics and their views of the universe are analyzed. Sometimes differences of opinion have led to personal rivalries between Newton and some of them.

Nevertheless, Newton is one of the greatest men whose works have shaped mankind's understanding of the universe. This audio CD clearly makes us understand his contributions. It is not an abstract explanation of Newton and other scientists' theories alone but a practical application of these theories in interpreting our universe. It is made clear that subsequent works by other scientists such as the General Theory of Relativity by Albert Einstein that challenged Newton's interpretation of the universe, absolute time and space have not belittled Newton's contributions. On the contrary, Newton's ideas developed more than 250 years ago were and still are a great stepping stone that led to the development of subsequent scientific theories like those of Einstein.

Standing next to God
Newton the man was a classic, and this slim, readable biography is very good. Newton studied and wrote in secret, argued and lived in public, recreated the world we live in, and knew he stood next to God Himself in understanding the creation.

Interestingly, millions of words of his works were sold in small lots after his death and scattered about Europe; to date, much remains unpublished..

Interesting and well Written
Gleick brought Newton's world to life in this tightly written biography. I felt, though, that it left a lot out. I am interested in reading other biographies of Newton because he seemed so fascinating. It is a glimpse at an amazing figure with some elucidation on science and the world of Newton's time.

I felt that Gleick took some liberties in saying that Newton presented a fork in the road as far as the divorce of philosophy from science. That had been going on since Descartes, even if Descartes' science was mistaken philosophy wouldn't know the difference. Also, left out, was mention of Ovid's Metamorphosis as an alchemist's cookbook.

Reading this I felt like I was reading a half hour summary of movie fragments of a 12 hour motion picture; but at least I still want to see the motion picture. I think there may be better biographies out there. I hope