Customer Reviews

Edmond Halley: Charting the Heavens and the Seas

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An outstandingly thorough and meticulously researched biography of one of history's most outstanding scientists. Matters related to events in Halley's life are notoriously difficult to reconstruct. He was not a pack-rat like Newton or Kepler, and failed to keep thorough diaries like Hooke. Biographers have to rely on the notes of others, public records, and published papers. Cook rises to the occasion and has produced a biographic work that will rival those of of other important scientists of the era.

Though remembered chiefly for the comet that bears his name, Halley was a scientist of extraordinary breadth and depth. Cook reconstructs all the major categories of Halley's productivity. Chapters are devoted to his youth, the year spent at St. Helena mapping the southern stars, his key role in prying the Principia out of Newton, his role in the quest for longitude at sea, his years as the Astronomer Royal, as well as his career on the high seas, both as a ship's captain (civilian) and scientist/explorer. A scientist like Halley demands a biography of considerable scope, and Cook delivers.

As much as any biography I've read, Cook's "Halley" spends considerable space delving into the contemporary zeitgeist. The 30 page opening chapter "Halley's World," is a splendid essay on the culture and spiritual/political/popular world of the late 17th and early 18th century in Great Britain and Europe.

This book is not an easy read, but it is absolutely essential for any student of the golden age of science. Halley lived in Newton's shadow, but was never eclipsed. Cook has done the literary world a great service in this book.

Edmond Halley is famous for his comet - or more specifically for showing that the comet returned by calculating its orbit. We also know of his relationship with Isaac Newton, and Halley's crucial role in the publishing of Newton's Principia from Westfall's major biography of Netwon.

Alan Cook has produced a well researched and sympathetic biography of Halley. Here we find details of Halley's upbringing, his voyage to St Helena to survey the southern skies and observe a transit of Venus, and his appraisal of Hevelius's observations by naked eye compared with telescopically aided observations. There is a basic account of his marriage (Mary Halley has left little trace behind her) and a good account of Halley's finances. The circimstances of the murder of his father are explored, and once again we are reminded of the autocratic and mercantile flavour of those times.

There is a full account of Halley's sea voyages, undertaken as they were in tiny unstable wooden ships. His mapping of the magnetic deviation of the compass, and of the tides and depth of the sea in the Channel mark Halley as perhaps one of the first government scientists.

Halley's time as the Royal Astronomer is documented, together with his fractious time at the Chester Mint during the recoinage overseen by Newton. Cook provides a mildly critical account of Halley's involvement with the publication of Flamsteed's star catalogue.

Halley is shown as a man of action, a shaper, and a man prepared to trust his judgement in difficult circumstances. This is a sharp contrast to the Newton revealed by Westfall's book, the obsessive and semi-reclusive thinker concerned mainly with his own thoughts.

Halley's world is described, and his interactions with Wren, Hooke, Pepys and the royal households of the time are well documented. The myth of Halley's poverty after his father's murder is laid to rest with some detailed examination of estates, wills and chancery court proceedings.

There are technical details of the Venus transit measurements, and a very welcome analysis of Newton's lunar theory, together with a statistical comparison of the Moon positions of Halley and Flamsteed.

Alan Cook is a scientist and a busy academic administrator. The book is composed in 15 chapters each divided into many sections. One has the image of a busy man typing the odd page or two when possible, and the text does not 'flow' as a narrative. You get the facts with sound judgements backed up by references.

I don't know of any more repetitious dissonance than this effort. I looked forward to an examination of Halley's life, understanding that he left little in the way of personal documentation. That's why I looked to a research scholar. But here we get a smattering of details restated endlessly and a complete dismissal if any attempt at characterization of Halley in the flesh. Halley was, in fact, an intellect, scientist, spy, a cursing seaman, and vigorous modern man in the awakening era of 17th Century England. He wove an interesting path among high political power, great scientists, publishers, shipmates, and London society with almost defiant, irreligious self-assurance. He was married, raised children, and developed Newton's new mathematics into practical results others could understand. We see none of this in Cook's account. The text is dry enough that by midway through I had developed a cough complete with clouds of dust. The author is judiciously reluctant to draw any conclusions or added insight from the details commingled throughout. And the repetition is unbearable. Some statements are made a dozen or more times. It's a cacophony that make one almost dizzy and then, at last, the noise simply ends. If you want more, simply extract any 40 paragraphs at random and string them on at the end. Like the comet, it would just keep going round and round.