I’ve mentioned before in previous book-related posts how I quite often find my reading material in the charity shops of Mutley Plain (Plymouth). Well one such book that I bought some time ago but have only just got round to reading was Melvyn Bragg’s “On Giants’ Shoulders: Great Scientists and their Discoveries. From Archimedes to DNA”. This book was produced to accompany a Radio 4 series in which Bragg (a non-scientist) talked to various scientists about the lives of a selection of famous scientific figures from history (including Archimedes, Galileo, Newton, Laviosier, Darwin, Poincare, Freud, Curie, Einstein, Crick and Watson) about the nature of their work and about the nature of scientific genius.
I found this book a really interesting read and also quite inspiring (it made me want to be a better scientist). It made me think quite deeply about what it means to be a scientist and to contribute to scientific knowledge. Good stuff.
Tim O'Hare 