Customer Reviews

The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey and Hidden Error that Transformed the World

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

What do the United States, Myanmar, and Liberia have in common, as opposed to every other nation in the world? The answer is that they are the only nations not to have embraced the metric system. Inevitably, they will; their scientists all use it, and cars are made by it, and trading with other nations requires it. The inevitability of victory of the metric system is something Napoleon himself recognized: "Conquests will come and go," he declared, "but this work will endure." The work he spoke of was the defining of the meter, and it was a task begun in the final days of the French monarchy. In 1792, two French astronomers set out separately on the quest to make an accurate measurement of the globe, a measurement that would enable people to use the constant of the size of the globe as the foundation for rational weights and measures. Their plan was to measure enough of the distance of a north-south meridian through Paris that they would then be able to calculate the distance from the equator to the north pole, and one ten-millionth of that natural distance would be the meter. They aimed for unprecedented precision, and they got it, but they didn't get it exactly, for fascinating reasons all wonderfully told in _The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey and Hidden Error That Transformed the World_ (The Free Press) by Ken Alder.

It seems a simple task; a line of longitude from Dunkirk south to Barcelona would be mapped and calculated by triangulating high points, like mountains and steeples, along the line. In practice, it was devilishly, maddeningly, and lethally difficult. Weather, disease, the ravages of time, superstition, politics, and war all conspired to make the work of a few months stretch into years. The astronomer Delambre, heading north, was mistaken for an aristocrat, detained, and suspected of using a church tower as a royalist beacon. His partner Méchain, who took the southern route, had similar problems, and worse ones, as war with Spain erupted while he was in Spain. He had a fiendish obsession with exactitude, and made measurements of Barcelona's latitude by reckoning from the stars. Unfortunately, they were wrong due to refraction from the atmosphere, and Méchain knew they were wrong, but couldn't get them right. The knowledge of the error tortured him for the rest of his life. Méchain's error is not the error referred to in the book's subtitle. All the triangulation work had shown that the critics had been right from before the beginning, for the work could not produce a perfectly precise meter; the world was too irregular for that. The astronomers' work had produced, however, documentation of the more interesting fact of Earthly irregularity.

This story could not have been presented in a more dramatic and entertaining manner. An epic about the foundation of the metric system might seem to be impossible, but Alder has made the personalities interesting. He has also made clear the process of triangulation, the equipment required, and the scientific philosophy of what an error actually is. He has well described the history of the period, and the failures of the French Revolution, such as the calendar containing twelve months of three ten-day weeks each, or the clock with ten one-hundred minute hours in a day. Beside the origin of the admirable metric system of weights and measures, Alder has also given a brief history of how the world has adopted the system, which Americans ought to know about, since, with reluctance, we are having to use it more and more

This is another book in the tradition of Dava Sobel's Longitude--taking a relatively unknown but important event in scientific history and describing the drama of discovery. In this case, Ken Alder has decided to tell the story of Mechain and Delambre, two "savants" who were charged with determining the length of the meter. Originally, the meter was defined to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the north pole to the equator. So Mechain and Delambre set out to measure the length of the meridian more accurately than had ever been done before.

Like the best books about science, The Measure of All Things shows the nature of real science. First, that science is performed by real people like Mechain and Delambre with their own strengths and foibles; it does not just appear miraculously in textbooks. Second, the development of science is influenced by the history of the time such as the revolutionary period in France through which most of this story takes place.

But because this book is describing the determination of the meter--the basis of the scientific measurement system--it shows other important aspects of science that are often forgotten. For example, the important idea that how we measure things is ultimately completely arbitrary. Despite our natural desire to find the "absolute" meter, there is no such thing as Mechain and Delambre discover. We can choose the length of the meter to be whatever we want as long as--and here's the difficult part--we get everyone to agree. The problems of getting the meter accepted, even in France where it was developed, is a fascinating part of this book.

The cover of my edition of this book touts the "hidden error that transformed the world." This is a bit of marketing strategy to entice those, I think, who like to read about other's mistakes. But, as a scientist, I see this notation of error as being a part of what science is. Modern science understands that measurement is never error-free but this was not always understood and bothered scientists like Mechain. It is very worthwhile for non-scientists to see how scientists learned to deal with the fact that there are always limitations to their measurements.

Anyone interested in the importance of measurement in science would be amiss is passing this book by. Alder has provided a readable account of the development of the basis of our modern, nearly-universal method of measurement. It is definitely worth a read.

I have no hesitation in recommending this book to just about any interest or level of scientific knowledge or background. There is a wealth of information that is generally little known. How many of us knew that metrication was a unifying factor beyond simply the impaired meter measurement? How many of us knew that the most advanced nation in the world, the USA, is one of few hold-outs in the world (along with N. Korea, for instance) that have not accepted metrication -- and screwed up a very expensive Mars landing expedition as a consequence?

Why only three stars? I'm sorry Mr. Alder, but I bought your book primarily because I wanted to know how the two guys did it -- but you didn't tell me in any detail! OK, so this was not intended as a text book and if it had been packed with all the geometry it would not have sold as well. But even so, surely we should have been provided with some access. An appendix with some example calculations would have been welcome. How about a web site reference to the detailed mathematics? It is a great wonder to me how these guys managed to do all these detailed calculations when all they had was stylus and paper. And the precision to which they worked was very great, requiring either reams of trigonometric tables or very tedious calculations for every trig function they used.

It took me a long time to read this book, because I spent a lot of time on the Internet trying to find references to how they performed their calculations. Surprisingly I found nothing significant. So Mr. Alder, having researched all the original papers, missed an oportunity to enlighten us. I think how they did the calculations to the precision they were able would have been at least as interesting a story.

Perhaps you can add this as a sequel, Mr. Alder...

From page 1 I have really enjoyed reading The Measure of All Things. The story is put well and sympathetically. The weaving of the facts within the contemporary situation (the French were thoroughly enjoying their Revolution), the hardships, anxiety, fear of imprisonment for getting the numbers wrong etc etc just added to the pace and excitement.
The book is nicely written, the style is light and airy. Just the thing for long journeys.
I have critisisms, but these do not really detract from the enjoyment or value of the book as a work of history.
Mr Alder might have consulted a geodetic surveyor and preferably one who knows the history of geodesy and is familiar with the instruments and techniques. The claim regarding the superb accuracy of the de Borda repeating circle versus Ramsden's theodolite was flawed - the circle suffered from systematic errors and it was this that led to its extinction in the 1830's in favour of the theodolite. Again, some expert advice would have removed the errors regarding the astro-geodesy such as the deviation of the vertical etc. My last complaint is the impression that the savants of the Academie Royal led the world in the science. Little mention is made of the science work the British contributed and the collaboration that existed between the scientists of both nations. On the other hand, this is a book about the metre so I suppose it's reasonable to give the French due credit!!
These complaints are purely academic and, in my mind, do not detract one iota from what is an excellent piece of work. Well done, Mr Alder.
If my next book is half as good as this, I shall be satified.
Edwin Danson, author of Drawing the Line: How Mason and Dixon Surveyed the Most Famous Border in America (another excellent book!!!)

This book follows a recent trend, which has produced some very good books, to take a relevant but poorly known scientific development and telling its story and the story of its main protagonists. Alder has chosen the story of how, in the late XVIII Century, the Royal Academy of Sciences in France was trying hard to reach the definitive measurement of the meter, and hence of all the metric system, the one which today dominates weights and measures around the world. The meter was supposed to be a ten millionth of the distance from one of the poles to the equator. The French proposed taking a sample of one meridian, the segment running from Dunkirk down to Barcelona, measuring it to perfection and then inferring the rest of the distance of the meridian. One ten millionth of that would be the meter. Two outstanding astronomers are chosen for the job, which was supposed to last no more than a year. But alas, the French Revolution comes to full gear at the beginning of the labors, and our scientists suffer all kinds of setbacks, prolonging the task for seven long and hard years.

Who were these gentlemen? Well, here is where the story gets all its fascinating features, illuminating the reader about how much the personalities involved in research can affect the scientific outcome of it. The first man is Jean Baptiste Joseph Delambre. He is a man of humble origins, a Classicist who has become tutor to a noble and rich family. A late bloomer, Delambre has become a remarkable astronomer almost all by himself, as a disciple of renowned (a magnificent and eccentric character) Jerome Lalande. The other man is a professional astronomer, also a disicple of Lalande's. His name is Pierre Francois Andre Mechain, who lives in the Royal Observatory in Paris.

Delambre goes north of Paris to Dunkirk while Mechain goes south to Barcelona. In the early days of their quest, political events (the execution of King Louis XVI and the instauration of the Terror) impose severe setbacks to both scientists. So severe, that the original year of labor will stretch to seven years. This is where the book reaches high altitudes, when it describes the differences in personalities between Delambre and Mechain. Granted, Mechain suffers much more, including a terrible accident and exile in Italy. But while Delambre is patient, practical and business-going, Mechain starts developing a severe anguish, emotional imbalance and paranoia. All this is aggravated by a mysterious situation, which really becomes the axis of the story: while measuring up the latitude at Montjuich, south of Barcelona, Mechain seems to make a mistake which will torment him for the rest of his life. One of the meditions (each one related to a different star) simply doesn't fit with the rest. Delambre or any other practical astronomer would simply have dismissed the incongrous data as a mysterious distortion, but Mechain, a man obsessed with an accuracy impossible for his age, decides not to disclose the mistake, fearing it might destroy his reputation. And so, year after year, he carries along his guilt and his paranoia.

Somehow, the book has a happy ending I will not spoil here. Suffice it to say this a very interesting and well written story about a true and relevant scientific quest. Don't get bogged down in scientific detail if you don't get everyting right. The adventure and the human story are more than satisfactory enough.

This is a fascinating book! Ken Alder covers the birth of the metric system, but manages to work in a marvelous overview of measurement, history of science, philosophy, politics, and a front-row seat at the French Revolution. While the rationalists wanted a new unit of measurement based on the earth itself, politics in government and among the thinkers (savants) kept derailing the project. The survey of the Paris Meridian, expected to take a few months, ended up taking seven years due to war, plague, inflation, politics, fear, jealousy, rivalry, insular business practices, and despondency.

Alder introduces us to the two men driving the survey, Delambre and Mechain, and describes all the problems preventing a quick measurement from Dunkirk to Barcelona. He covers the multitude of measurement units, different in each city or town, and even varying by profession, that led to the demand for standard measures. Yet this "rational" way meant uprooting existing social contracts, such as the "just price" of a product that reflected not only costs, but the relationships between customer and vendor, or lord and peasant. Fields were measured not by area but in how long it took to plow them or how many bushels of seed they required. Lords actually owned reference measurement units and received royalties when they were copied. Differing units kept outsiders from taking advantage of a town's economy. Delambra and Mechain's project would upset all this, and not everyone supporting the Revolution wanted to eliminate these old ways.

This is a book not only about how we measure and why, not only about Delambre and Mechain's arduous and separate journeys through France, or the political fallout over adoption of the metric system, but also the change in philosophy that turned savants into scientists and forced them to deal with the concept of error. Mechain could not accept that his meticulous work was "wrong" so he suppressed his results, but this drove him to worse than distraction. Delambre only found out the truth upon Mechain's death, for the latter would not part with his raw data. And Alder achieves a coup in discovering Delambre's correspondence and notes on the whole matter, including the resultant meter that wasn't as accurate as advertised.

Informative, wide-ranging, and evocative, a terrific addition to your science shelf.

The Measure of All Things tells the incredible story of the Metric System's origin. During the early days of the French revolution, two astronomers are sent on a mission to precisely measure a part of the meridian arc passing through France and Spain. The plan is to use these measurements to calculate the length of the Meter, which was then defined as one ten millionth of the distance between the North Pole and the Equator. The book is exceptionally well researched and written, and Adler is not satisfied with simply relating dry historical facts to his readers. This book truly makes 18th century Europe come to life.

What I found fascinating about this book was not so much the story of the creation of a new measurement system, but the fact that this ambitious mission took place in an age of extreme political and societal turmoil. While this mission was in progress, governments in France changed several times, wars and battles were won and lost, and hyper inflation devastated the French economy.

My biggest complaint about this book, and it is a major one, is that I often felt that Adler was taking creative freedom with history - conjuring the thoughts and feelings of historical figures without basing his conjectures on any reliable source. I feel that this is not appropriate in a book about the history of science.

Bottom line: this is a very good book that I warmly recommend to anyone interested in history in general and in the history of science in particular. For those who enjoy the subject, I would also like to recommend "Measuring Eternity: The Search for the Beginning of Time" by Martin Gorst.

You don't. This wonderful account weaves science into the backdrop of the French Revolution. The need for "rational" measures, for uniform thinking, and for centralized control shaped not only the politics of a nation but the measure of the world. Mr. Alder does a wonderful job of describing the trials and triumphs of Mechain and Delambre, the two savants charged with determining the length of the meridian from Dunkerque to Barcelona for the purpose of determining the true length of the meter. The results of this expidition were both shocking and unexpected and withheld from the public. You will be introduced to other wonderful savants of the day, Laplace, Lalande (my favorite), Cassinni, even Napoleon (not that he was much of a savant). Mr. Alder writes an engaging narrative giving the reader history with humanity. I highly recommend this book.

When I first saw this book displayed in a bookstore,
I thought, "Geez, why would anyone waste time in reading
a whole book just about meter ?"
After a month, I happened to watch the author's introduction
of the book in CSPAN2 Book Review channel. I found that
the book is not just the details about meteric system,
but the real stories behind, and stories about the intelligent
scientiests. The author is very eloquent, the book is not
difficult to read even for the non-science majors.

I am a engineering major, understanding science is not really
a problem. But too many science history books
explain too much details which can be understood only by the
people who major in the particular subject.
This book is not. I hope that he writes
other books, for example, about Newton, or other famous
scientists.

BTW, the author's introduction of the book in CSPAN2 Book Review
Channel alone deserves a good attention. It was very nice,
and I regret that I didn't record it.

An engaging read, Measure of all things is the story of the meter and the two intreprid astronmers who set about measuring it. Imagine, France three centuries ago. There were quarter million different units of weights and measures being used across the country. Perfectly natural for the people in those days, but unimaginable and chaotic in our current era. French Astronomers at that time came up with a radical proposal of having a single measure. To make it acceptable not only to the French denizens, but all the people around the world, they wanted to get the measurement from the earth itself. The concept was to fix the value of meter as one ten-millionth of the distance from the NorthPole to the Equator. They set out to measure the meridian arc from Dunkrik to Barcelona, running through Paris and then extrapolate this measurement. The catch was in their assumption that the Earth is a perfect sphere, whereas it is warped, due to which their measurement fell short minutely from the actual value.
This error has been perpetuated in every subsequent redefinition of it's length, including our current definition of the meter in terms of the distance travelledby light in a fraction of second. The meter fell short by 0.2 millimeters short.

The tale is not a dry essay on science or measurements. It's a personal saga of courage and dedication from the two astronomers whose expedition stretched for seven years admist political upheavals and war. Even as the French revolution claimed millions of lives, even as many of their scientific colleagues like Lavosier ended up in gullotine, Mechaine and Delambre soldiered on their task. Ending up in enemy territory in the middle of war didn't deter Mechaine. The savant community was unified irrespective of their political affliations, for this was a effort for the whole of mankind.

Mechaine is a punctilious astronmer, extremely obsessed in his measurement. A mismatch in his measurements drowned him in paranoia and fearful of loss of his reputation. Even though errors of this nature in an expedition of this nature was expected, Mechanie's nature of being self-critical and monomaniac turned him melachonic and forced him to fudge measurements to match the existing meter value of that time.

Delambre on the other hand is practical and open about his efforts. A geodesic of equal calibre, he completes the northern portion of measurement and provides emotional and logistic support to Mechaine.

The very act of measuring length is done using the principle of triangulation. If you know the three angles of a triangle and length of one side , you can calculate the length of other two sides. Hence if you know all the angles in a set of triangles connected side by equalside in a chain, plus the length of any single side, you can calculate the length of all their sides.

The strength of the book is it is a easy read, which is targeted for all audiences. It is well written without lingering or digressing on extraneous turns. The element of human drama, especially the state of Mechaine during his worse times, the triumph of human spirit, the highs and lows of human nature, the camaraderie and squabbles in the savant community, all of this is superbly expressed by KenAlder's prose. It's a story of human spirit and Alder fittingly concludes, Man is the measure of all things! Afterall, measurement is an accepted standard. So what if the atheletes who are running a 100m race are actually running 99meters and 98 centimenters. It's the same distance for all the runners!

The quibble is the book could have been 100 pages shorter without losing it's imapact or details or message. The philosopher in Alder keeps coming forth to make observations on human triumph and foibles and the last two chapters are observations on the importance of errors and their understanding for better measurements.

The dreams of Mechaine and Delambre has come true. Except three countries (USA, Burma and Liberia), every country in the world follows metric system.