Description
Book SynopsisThe great biologist Louis Pasteur suppressed ''awkward'' data because it didn''t support the case he was making. John Snow, the ''first epidemiologist'' was doing nothing others had not done before. Gregor Mendel, the supposed ''founder of genetics'' never grasped the fundamental principles of ''Mendelian'' genetics. Joseph Lister''s famously clean hospital wards were actually notorious dirty. And Einstein''s general relativity was only ''confirmed'' in 1919 because an eminent British scientist cooked his figures. These are just some of the revelations explored in this book. Drawing on current history of science scholarship, Fabulous Science shows that many of our greatest heroes of science were less than honest about their experimental data and not above using friends in high places to help get their ideas accepted. It also reveals that the alleged revolutionaries of the history of science were often nothing of the sort. Prodigiously able they may have been, but the epithet of the ''m
Trade ReviewReview from previous edition Waller writes with clarity and flair . . . [he] has a real talent for telling a story. * Roy Porter *
Everyone with an interest in science should read this book. * Focus *
a great read * Nature *
Waller tells these stories well ... [his] examples are a valuable look sideways at the rolling juggernaut of modern science. * Martin Ince, New Scientist *
Table of ContentsPART 1: RIGHT FOR THE WRONG REASONS ; PART 2: TELLING SCIENCE AS IT WAS
