science newsletter: Newsletter for Tuesday 15 January

Newsletter - January 15 - Today in Science History

TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY

NEWSLETTER - JANUARY 15

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.

On 15 Jan 1900, Richard Bevan Braithwaite was born, a British physicist and mathematician who turned to the philosophy of science. Today's Science Store pick is Scientific Explanation: A Study of the Function of Theory, Probability and Law in Science, by Richard Bevan Braithwaite. The first chapters deal with models, theoretical terms and deductions, followed by chapters on probability and statistical hypotheses and concludes with an analysis of induction, causality and teleological explanation. His focus throughout is not on how science should work, but on how science does work. Available Used from $3.00 (as of time of writing).
Yesterday's pick: Alfred Tarski: Life and Logic. For picks from earlier newsletters, see the Today in Science Science Store home page.

Quotations for Today

"...while the theoretical terms of a scientific theory are implicitly defined by their occurrence in initial formulae in a calculus in which there are derived formulae interpreted as empirical generalisations, the theoretical terms cannot be explicitly defined by means of the interpretation of the terms in these derived formulae without the theory thereby becoming incapable of growth." - Richard Bevan Braithwaite (born 15 Jan 1900) (source)

"I wanted to work on theoretical physics, not on weapons. Until the day after Hitler invaded Belgium and Holland. That was the day I heard President Roosevelt speak. He spoke to a Pan American scientific congress, and he said that if scientists in the free countries won't work on weapons, freedom will not survive. I knew what President Roosevelt meant in an essential point. And I had the irrational, strange, but powerful, feeling that he was talking to me. That is when I made up my mind, and I have not changed it since." - Hungarian-born American nuclear physicist in the quiz below.

"It is evident, therefore, that one of the most fundamental problems of psychology is that of investigating the laws of mental growth. When these laws are known, the door of the future will in a measure be opened; determination of the child's present status will enable us to forecast what manner of adult he will become." - Lewis M. Terman, American psychologist who pioneered individual intelligence tests (born 15 Jan 1877)

QUIZ

Births

A Hungarian-born American nuclear physicist, born 15 Jan 1908, participated in the production of the first atomic bomb (1945) and led the development of the world's first thermonuclear weapon, the hydrogen bomb. He is sometimes known as "the father of the H-bomb." His unfavourable evidence in the Robert Oppenheimer security-clearance hearing lost him some respect amongst scientists.
Can you name this scientist?

Deaths

Alpheus Hyatt (1838-1902) was a U.S. zoologist and paleontologist who studied invertebrate fossil records, the evolution of the cephalopods. Along with E. Cope, he was the most prominent American neo-Lamarckian.
What are cephalopods?

Events

On 15 Jan of a certain year, the first solar-heated and radiation-cooled house in the U.S. started its system. It was built by Raymond W. Bliss in Tucson, Arizona. The system was built at a cost of nearly $4,000 for labour and materials. It was made using a large slanting slab of steel and glass that converted sunlight into heat, which was ducted into the house.
In what decade was this solar heating system started?

On 15 Jan 1907, the three-element vacuum tube was issued a U.S. patent to its inventor, Dr Lee de Forest.
What was the useful function of this tube?

On 15 Jan 1861, the safety elevator was patented as a "Hoisting Apparatus" by its American inventor. His invention was designed to arrest a fall in case of the lifting rope breaking. It used spring-loaded pawls that would release and engage in a mortised track in the walls of the shaft.
Can you name this inventor who is well-known as an elevator manufacturer?

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 January 15 web page of Today in Science History.

Or, try this link first for just the brief answers.

Fast answers for the previous newsletter for January 14: cottonseed oil; crude oil; Charles Lutwidge Dodgson; the decade including the year 1914; Isle of Wight.

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