Newsletter for Friday 16 November

 

 

TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY

NEWSLETTER - NOVEMBER 16

Before you look at today's web page, see if you can answer some of these questions about the events that happened on this day. Some of the names are very familiar. Others will likely stump you. Tickle your curiosity with these questions, then check your answers on today's web page.

You may be starting to think of gift-giving to someone with a bright enquiring mind, so today's Science Store pick is Does Anything Eat Wasps?; And 101 Other Unsettling, Witty Answers to Questions You Never Thought You Wanted to Ask, by New Scientist. In this runaway best-seller, you'll satisfy your curiosity about such mind wanderings as: Did nature invent any wheels? How fat do you have to be to become bulletproof? Why do people have eyebrows?  Why do pineapples have spines?  How much does a head weigh?  What affects the color of earwax? How quickly could I turn into a fossil? New: $12.00 Price: $9.60. Also, Used from $1.48 (as of time of writing). Yesterday's pick: William Herschel. For picks from earlier newsletters, see the Today in Science Science Store home page.

Browse the new Science Store pages of Science Titles in Bargain Books.

Quotations for Today

"And as we continue to improve our understanding of the basic science on which applications increasingly depend, material benefits of this and other kinds are secured for the future." - Henry Taube, Canadian-born American Nobel prize-winning chemist (died 16 Nov 2005)  "One violle is the intensity of a square centimeter of platinum, glowing at its melting temperature of 1769 °C (3216 °F)." The unit was the first unit of light intensity that did not depend on the properties of a particular lamp. Now obsolete, 1 violle=20.17 candela. Proposed in 1881 by Jules Violle (born 16 Nov 1841) "The invention of IQ did a great disservice to creativity in education. ... Individuality, personality, originality, are too precious to be meddled with by amateur psychiatrists whose patterns for a 'wholesome personality' are inevitably their own." - Joel H. Hildebrand, American educator and chemist (born 16 Nov 1881)

QUIZ

Births

Jules Violle, born 16 Nov 1841, was a physicist who made the first high-altitude determination of the solar constant, which he made in 1875 on Mont Blanc in the French-Swiss Alps. He also was interested in the theory of geysers, the origin of hail, and atmospheric exploration through balloon soundings. For high-temperature radiation, he proposed a photometric unit, the violle or Violle's standard. What was his nationality?

Deaths

Carl von Linde (1842-1934) was a German engineer who invented a continuous process of liquefying gases in large quantities. This formed the basis for what modern technology?

Events

On 16 Nov of a certain year, two newly discovered elements were announced: americium (atomic number 95) and curium (atomic number 96) In what decade were these elements announced?

On 16 Nov 1620, British settlers at Provincetown, Massachussetts, first found a now common vegetable which was unknown to them until then. Sixteen Pilgrims there were led by Myles Standish, William Bradford, Stephen Hopkins, and Edward Tilley.  What was the vegetable?

Answers

When you have your answers ready to all the questions above, you'll find all the information to check them, and more, on the November 16 web page of Today in Science History. Or, try this link first for just the brief answers.

Fast answers for the previous newsletter for November 15: Uranus; Margaret Mead; the planets move in elliptical orbits with the Sun at one focus; the decade containing the year 1887; Christopher Columbus.

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