Josiah Willard Gibbs

The History of a Great Mind

Lynde Phelps Wheeler

"This...biography deserves warm praise, for both the extent and quality of its new material concerning Gibbs' life and for its adroit exposition of Gibbs' scientific work...the reader will find an admirable summary in relatively nontechnical language of Gibbs' achievements with reference to later developments in which they played an important part."
Scientific American

Lynde Phelps Wheeler learned his science as a student of Josiah Willard Gibbs. Many years later he crafted a biography of his mentor in which he retells the man's life in terms of his provides an explanation of Gibbs' most significant discoveries in terms that can be understood by the non-specialsts interested in the life of a genius.

CONTENTS: Backgrounds ­ Family, Civic and Educational ­ Tutor at Yale and Student Abroad ­ Return to New Haven and Appointment at Yale ­ Professor of Mathematical Physics: Thermodynamics ­ Recognition ­ Professor of Mathematical Physics: Mathematics and Optics ­ Widening Contacts ­ Statistical Mechanics and Teaching ­ The Last Years.

270 + xx pages, 5 x 8.
Reprint of first edition published in 1951.

Paper $35.    ISBN 1-881987-11-6

Omphalos
An Attempt to Untie the Geological Knot

Philip Henry Gosse

"...historians of science and many others will delight in the re-publication of Omphalos."
Biosciences

Over one hundred and fifty years ago, two years before Darwin's Origin of Species, Philip Henry Gosse, faced with impending battle between his two passions, Fundamentalist Christianity and Science, wrote the book Omphalos to resolve the conflict. He postulated that the Lord had created the world the biblical five thousand years ago with evidence of a long prior existence to provide continuity of process such as annual rings on trees in the Garden of Eden for years that didn't exist. This book is an important work in the history of science and ideas. It speaks to conflicts that are still being fought. Its reprinting is an important event in cultural history.

Paper $34.95    ISBN 1-881987-10-8

Ludwig Boltzmann Man, Physicist, Philosopher

Engelbert Broda

As the scientific theories of the twentieth century have sorted out into the ephemeral and the enduring, the contributions of Boltzmann have assumed an increasingly important position in the foundations of physics. Dr. Broda, a longtime student of Boltzmann's life and work, has crafted an intellectual biography that covers all aspects of Boltzmann's thought. Based on an earlier German edition, the present work includes the results of new findings and new assessments.

179 pages, photos, 5 1/2 x 8 1/2 .
First published in 1983 by Ox Bow Press.

Cloth $30.    ISBN 0-918024-24-2

Goethe's Botanical Writings

Johann Wolfgang Goethe


The educated world, familiar with Faust, Werther, and Wilhelm Meister, is not so generally aware of the scientific achievements of the man who had a genus of plants (Goethea) and a mineral (goethite) named for him; who coined and first used the word morphology; who contributed to the understanding of the physiology of color; who established the first system of weather stations; who made the first systematic classification of minerals; and who came unwittingly close to achieving the greatest concept in biology, the theory of organic evolution and the descent of man.

257 + x pages, 6 x 9.
Reprint of first English edition published 1952.

Cloth $40.    ISBN 0-918024-69-2

Paperback $30.    ISBN 0-918024-68-4    Back in Print