Einstein's Heroes: Imagining the World through the Language of Mathematics [Hardcover]

Robyn Arianrhod (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0195183703 | ISBN-13: 978-0195183702 | Publication Date: June 23, 2005

Imagine you are fluent in a magical language of prophecy, a language so powerful it can accurately describe things you cannot see or even imagine. Einstein's Heroes takes you on a journey of discovery about just such a miraculous language--the language of mathematics--one of humanity's most amazing accomplishments.
Blending science, history, and biography, this remarkable book reveals the mysteries of mathematics, focusing on the life and work of three of Albert Einstein's heroes: Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, and especially James Clerk Maxwell, whose portrait hung on Einstein's laboratory wall and whose work directly inspired the theory of relativity. In this engaging book, Robyn Arianrhod bridges the gap between science and literature, portraying mathematics as a language and arguing that a physical theory is a work of imagination involving the elegant and clever use of this language. Her narrative centers on the work of Maxwell, the first scientist to embrace the ambiguous relationship between language and reality--the first to accept that, in a very real sense, language is reality. The heart of the book illuminates how Maxwell, using the language of mathematics in a new and radical way, resolved the seemingly insoluble controversy between Faraday's idea of lines of force and Newton's theory of action-at-a-distance. In so doing, Maxwell not only produced the first complete mathematical description of electromagnetism, but actually predicted the existence of the radio wave, something utterly unexpected, teasing it out of the mathematical language itself.
Here then is a fascinating look at mathematics: its colorful characters, its historical intrigues, and above all its role as the uncannily accurate language of nature.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Einstein respected Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, and James Clerk Maxwell more than all the rest of his scientific forebears. They discovered and formulated the physical theories that enabled his theories of relativity. They communicated directly to Einstein, for despite being Anglophone while he was Germanophone, they shared the language of mathematics (though the largely self-taught Faraday ruefully confessed knowing only the dialect, so to speak, of geometry). That common language is Arianrhod's ground theme as she recaps the work of Einstein's heroes, and the story behind their stories is the development of mathematics into a means not just of accurate physical description of known reality but also of finding further reality. Newton "found" gravity by means of analytical geometry, Faraday "found" electrical fields by noting the behavior of magnetized iron filings, and Maxwell created the laws of thermodynamics by "flipping" Newton's method (from integral to differential calculus) to describe Faraday's fields. Arianrhod's achievement is to so masterfully combine history, biography, and mathematics as to absorb and enlighten even the mathematically maladroit. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"Arianrhod is an infectiously enthusiastic writer, keen for her audience both to admire Einstein's heroes and to understand their contributions to fundamental mathematical physics."--Physics Nature

"Arianrhod's achievement is to so masterfully combine history, biography, and mathematics as to absorb and enlighten even the mathematically maladroit."--Booklist

"A magnificent saga...well worth reading.... For those who are interested in scientific subjects but have no experience with math or physics, the author takes particular care to include simple descriptions and drawings to illustrate the ideas. Thus this really is a book for all who would like to know the essentials of a key part of modern science."--American Scientist

"An intriguing blend of science, history, and biography.... Arianrhod's well-written, fascinating discussion of intertwined topics not usually presented in one book aimed at general readers is highly recommended."--Library Journal (starred review)

"A thrilling story.... Arianrhod is an easy author to like, and not simply for the clarity of her narrative. She brings out the human side of the scientists. She also is a student of imaginative prose: Her explication of a novel by the Australian David Malouf helps introduce ideas about mathematics, and she quotes the poet William Blake to crystallize a thought about Maxwell.... Scientists' quest for knowledge is exhilarating to Arianrhod, and she conveys that to the reader."--bloombergnews.com

"Offers readers an engaging intellectual exercise combining physics, language, mathematics, and biography."--Science News

"On one level, Robyn Arianrhod's Einstein's Heroes is about the crowning achievement of classical physics--James Clerk Maxwell's understanding of electricity, magnetism, and light. But on another level, Arianrhod adeptly examines a much deeper idea: why is mathematics the language of nature and how do physicists tap the hidden power of numbers to understand the physical world? Einstein's Heroes does an admirable job of explaining the strange allure that mathematics holds over the scientists who so dramatically altered the way we look at the universe."--Charles Seife, author of Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (June 23, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195183703
• ISBN-13: 978-0195183702
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,937,590 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear Exposition of Mathematics and its Use in Science, February 23, 2007

By 

G. Poirier (Orleans, ON, Canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Einstein's Heroes: Imagining the World through the Language of Mathematics (Paperback)

Despite its title, this book's central themes are: the work of James Clerk Maxwell and the expression of scientific principles in the language of mathematics. In discussing Maxwell's life and work, the author allows a few excursions mainly into the work of Newton and Faraday - work related to that of Maxwell. In addition, the book contains a few digressions on some extremely basic mathematical principles, e.g., basic geometry, basic algebra, elementary graphs, etc. - material that is likely covered at the junior high school level if not earlier. Other material is presented on more advanced concepts such as vectors and vector spaces. The explanations are so clear, basic and painless that this book should be very popular among those who are mathematically challenged but who would like to know more about important scientific developments that have a mathematical flavor. As stated, the prose is quite clear, friendly and engaging. Science buffs that are better versed in mathematics should also enjoy this book because of its fascinating historical and biographical information.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Should be better known, November 28, 2007

By 

magellan (Santa Clara, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Einstein's Heroes: Imagining the World through the Language of Mathematics (Paperback)

This book doesn't really say whether the scientists discussed were Einstein's heroes, but it does a superb job of detailing the life and work of three scientists: Newton, Faraday, and Maxwell. Focusing mainly on Faraday and Maxwell, the author shows how the relationship between these two very different men produced one of the most important contributions in the history of physics: the theory of electromagnetism and electromagnetic waves.

The two men couldn't have been more different, Faraday, the self-taught, working class experimenter, and Faraday, the intuitive mathematical genius and theoretician. However, the author is quite correct in pointing out how important Maxwell thought Faraday's own theoretical ideas were, such as the idea of varying density of lines of force with distance. In fact (and the author doesn't mention this), late in life Maxwell was once asked what his most important discovery was, and he said, "Michael Faraday."

One interesting theme that the author uses to good effect in the book is to show the power of mathematics as a creative language to express concepts that would be otherwise impossible. In this ability Maxwell was probably the greatest of his age, and Arianrhod points out that Maxwell, although not always the fastest with arithmetic talents, knew that mathematics at the highest level wasn't just simple arithmetic and bean-counting; it was a different language and a profound way of thinking about reality that could be used to discover the universe's otherwise hidden secrets.

Maxwell understood how difficult it would be to mathematically formalize Faraday's ideas, even though he suspected Faraday was right. Their two contributions created the greatest achievement of 19th century physics, and one of the greatest scientific achievements of all time. Part biography and part popular science writing, Arianrhod's achievement recall's the great John Casti's earlier book, The One True, Platonic Heaven in it's lively blend of biography and science writing.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great overview of the influences on Einstein, February 20, 2006

By 

Rocco (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Einstein's Heroes: Imagining the World through the Language of Mathematics (Hardcover)

This book gave a valuable overview of the influences of Newton, Faraday, and Maxwell, and how their discoveries led from Newton's inverse square law of gravitation, Faraday's electric and magnetic fields, and to Maxwell's work that mathematically described electromagnetic waves are the same as light waves. The book contains a few equations, but those do not need to be understood to appreciate the discoveries and contributions of the scientists who contributed to our current knowledge.

I will further my knowledge by digging deeper into the mathematics of these scientist to further my knowledge, but this book was a great start for me.