Author: Thomas Young

Publisher: Burns & Oates

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 648

ISBN-13:

Thomas Young's Life and Works illustrates the greatest scientific achievements of Thomas Young (1773-1829). Chiefly remembered for his work on physiological optics, Young initiated important paths of investigation which other scientists were later able to take up and complete. Originally published separately, but intended as companion works, the one-volume Life of Thomas Young, edited by George Peacock, and the three-volume Miscellaneous Works of the Late Thomas Young, edited by George Peacock and John Leitch, complete this collection of all of Young's major works. Volume 1 of this four-volume collection is the standard Life of Thomas Young originally published in 1855 and edited by the Young scholar, Peacock. The work features rare manuscripts, including the now lost Young journal; it is not only the definitive source on Young's life, but also a valuable historical resource on the development and context of Young's scientific breakthroughs. Miscellaneous Works of the Late Thomas Young collects Young's contributions to the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, including his famous Bakerian Lectures and key articles prepared for the Supplement of the Encyclopædia Britannica. The collection also features Young's book reviews from the Quarterly Review, such as a review of Laplace's Memoir"Sur la Loi de la Réfraction extraordinaire dans les Cristaux diaphanes" and Humphry Davy's Elements of Chemical Philosophy. Volume two contains Young's innovative essays on optics and correspondence between Young and influential scientists of the time, including the great British physicist David Brewster. Volumes three and four contain informative biographies (with extensive bibliographies) of the great scientists of the eighteenth century, including the natural philosopher John Robison, the great mathematician and astronomer Joseph Lagrange, and the Astronomer Royal Nevil Maskelyne. The collection concludes with essays which vividly illustrate Young's pioneering work on deciphering the Rosetta Stone, including his correspondence with his great rival Champollion. The Thoemmes reprint of these two key works is an indispensable resource for historians of science and an excellent companion to Thomas Young's Lectures on Natural Philosophy and the Mechanical Arts (also printed by Thoemmes Press, January 2002).