| Description |
1 online resource (xi, 514) : illustrations |
| Series |
Dibner Institute studies in the history of science and technology |
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Dibner Institute studies in the history of science and technology.
|
| Contents |
Introduction / Jed Z. Buchwald and Andrew Warwick -- I, Corpuscles and electrons. J.J. Thomson and the electron, 1897-1899 / George E. Smith -- Corpuscles to electrons / Isobel Falconer -- The questionable matter of electricity: the reception of J.J. Thomson's "corpuscle" among electrical theorists and technologists / Graeme Gooday -- Paul Villad, J.J. Thomson, and the composition of cathode rays / Benoit Lelong -- II, What was the newborn electron good for? The Zeeman effect and the discovery of the electron / Theodore Arabatzis -- The electron, the protyle, and the unity of matter / Helge Kragh -- O.W. Richardson and the electron theory of matter, 1901-1916 / Ole Knudsen -- Electron gas theory of metals: free electrons in bulk matter / Walter Kaiser -- III, Electrons applied and appropriated. The electron and the nucleus / Laurie M. Brown -- The electron, the hole, and the transistor / Lillian Hoddeson and Michael Riordan -- Remodeling a classic: the electron in organic chemistry, 1900-1940 / Mary Jo Nye -- The physicists' electron and its appropriation by the chemists / Kostas Gavroglu -- Philosophical electrons. Who really discovered the electron? / Peter Achinstein -- History and metaphysics: on the reality of spin / Margaret Morrison -- What should philosophers of science learn from the history of the electron? / Jonathan Bain and John D. Norton -- The role of theory in the use of instruments; or, How much do we need to know about electrons to do science with an electron microscope? / Nicolas Rasmussen and Alan Chalmers |
| Summary |
In the mid to late 1890s, J.J. Thomson and colleagues at Cambridge's Cavendish Laboratory conducted experiments on "cathode rays" (a form of radiation produced within evacuated glass vessels subjected to electric fields) -- the results of which some historians later viewed as the "discovery" of the electron. This book is both a biography of the electron and a history of the microphysical world that it opened up. The book is organized in four parts. The first part, Corpuscles and Electrons, considers the varying accounts of Thomson's role in the experimental production of the electron. The second part, What Was the Newborn Electron Good For?, examines how scientists used the new entity in physical and chemical investigations. The third part, Electrons Applied and Appropriated, explores the accommodation, or lack thereof, of the electron in nuclear physics, chemistry, and electrical science. It follows the electron's gradual progress from cathode ray to ubiquitous subatomic particle and eponymous entity in one of the world's most successful industries -- electronics. The fourth part, Philosophical Electrons, considers the role of the electron in issues of instrumentalism, epistemology, and realism. The electron, it turns out, can tell us a great deal about how science works |
| Analysis |
SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY & SOCIETY/History of Science |
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PHYSICAL SCIENCES/General |
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ENGINEERING/Electrical Engineering |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Print version record |
| Subject |
Thomson, J. J. (Joseph John), 1856-1940.
|
| SUBJECT |
Thomson, J. J. (Joseph John), 1856-1940 fast |
| Subject |
Electrons -- History
|
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SCIENCE -- Physics -- Nuclear.
|
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SCIENCE -- Physics -- Atomic & Molecular.
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|
Electrons
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| Genre/Form |
History
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| Form |
Electronic book
|
| Author |
Buchwald, Jed Z
|
|
Warwick, Andrew
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| ISBN |
9780262269483 |
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0262269481 |
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