Customer Reviews

Galileo Galilei - When the World Stood Still

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
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Strikes a great balance between detail and readability,
unlike so many biographies whose goal seems to be to
impress the reader with the biographer's mastery of
arcane contemporary details rather than to communicate
knowledge about the principal subject.
Much better than the bio by Reston.

I actually enjoyed reading this text on who I consider, and deserves the title of, "the first scientist," He not only applied what is essentially the modern scientific method to his work, but fully understood what he was doing and laid down the ground rules clearly for others to follow. In addition, the work he did following those ground rules was of immense importance. In the late 16th century, there were others who met some of these critieria-but the ones who devoted their lives to what we now call science were often still stuck with a medieval mindset about the relevance of all or part of their work, philosophical significance of the new way of looking at the world were usually only part-time scientists and had little influence on the way others approached the investigagion of the world. It was Galileo who first wrapped everything up in one package. This text seems to wrap up everything quite nicely too in one package.
Highly recommended.