An unusual silver celestial planisphere in the Whipple Museum

An unusual silver celestial planisphere is held in the collection of the Whipple Museum of the History of Science (Wh.1762); little information about this object is recorded in the museum’s documentation. A comparison of this silver example with celestial planispheres printed on paper, coupled with the consideration of other aspects of the lives and work of the cartographers and instrument-makers involved in producing such objects, suggests some possibilities regarding its production. Through this individual case study, I aim to demonstrate that the careful examination of an individual instrument, coupled with an understanding of the class of instruments to which it belongs and the milieu in which it was produced, can result in a deeper understanding of any given artefact, its circumstances of design and manufacture, and its intended use and users.     

The celestial mechanics of Leibniz in the light of Newtonian criticism

By the middle of the nineteenth century science was developing into a profession demanding advanced training and devotion to research. American institutions, however, were still better suited to an earlier stage of popular science. Many of the difficulties and frustrations for would-be scientists created by the time lag in institutional change are illustrated in the career of Cleveland Abbe. In the fifteen years between 1856 and 1871 his attempts to become an astronomer touched upon many significant aspects of American science as a profession, including the American observatory movement, the creation of graduate education, government support for science, and the tension between the joint goals of the increase and the diffusion of knowledge.     

Mogg’s celestial sphere (1813): the construction of polite astronomy

In this paper I discuss a cardboard dissected globe made in 1813 by Edward Mogg, a cartographer and map seller, to instruct children in the principles of astronomy. Since little is known about the maker or the specific object, I draw on evidence beyond the sphere itself to construct an account of how the object might have been used. In particular I address conversation as a key part of astronomical education and examine the way in which the cardboard plates of the sphere, the presentation slipcase and the accompanying booklet would have prepared young learners for polite astronomical discourse around large instruments in later life.     

The Early Development of the Algebraic Theory of Semigroups

In the history of mathematics, the algebraic theory of semigroups is a relative new-comer, with the theory proper developing only in the second half of the twentieth century. Before this, however, much groundwork was laid by researchers arriving at the study of semigroups from the directions of both group and ring theory. In this paper, we will trace some major strands in the early development of the algebraic theory of semigroups. We will begin with the aspects of the theory which were directly inspired by, and were analogous to, existing results for both groups and rings, before moving on to consider the first independent theorems on semigroups: theorems with no group or ring analogues. Dedicated to the memory of Professor W. Douglas Munn. This article was begun when the author was an EPSRC-funded research student at the University of York, UK, and completed at CAUL under FCT post-doctoral research grant SFRH/BPD/34698/2007.     

Early eighteenth-century Newtonianism: the Huguenot contribution

John Theophilus Desaguliers’s allegorical poem The Newtonian system of the world, the best model of government (1728) crystallizes the contribution of several important French Protestant exiles to the construction of early Newtonianism. In the context of diverging interpretations of Newton’s scientific achievement in terms of natural religion, writers such as Des Maizeaux, Coste, Le Clerc and others actively disseminated a version of Newtonianism which was close to Newton’s own intention. Through public experiments, translations, correspondence, reviews and books, they managed to convey a vision of Newtonian science which coincided with their propaganda of English liberties in Church and State. Therefore their effort on behalf of Newtonianism can be interpreted as part of a wider strategy of assimilation into English society at a time when most exiled Huguenots had given up hope of ever recreating a French Reformed Church at home.     

Growth and the average duration of larval life in the southern hemisphere lamprey,Geotria australis Gray

Summary The average duration of larval life in the anadromous lamprey,Geotria australis (the sole representative of the Geotriidae) is estimated as 41/4 years. Compared with other lampreys, the ammocoetes ofG. australis have a slow growth rate, increase in length during the year preceding metamorphosis and typically enter metamorphosis at a small mean length (<100 mm) and weight (<1.2 g).     

Egg pigment: Early elimination from the developing retina of the frog

Zusammenfassung Die während der Oogenese entstandenen Melaningranula werden aus dem neuralen Netzhautanteil ausgeschieden und vom Pigmentepithel aufgenommen. Dies geschieht, bevor das Zentralnervensystem pigmentfrei geworden ist, und ermöglicht wirkungsvolle Lichtaufnahme in den Photorezeptoren.

---

---

I thank Mrs.Adriana Ward for her excellent assistance during this study and Dr.G. K. Smelser for the use of his electron microscope facilities. This study was supported in part by grants No. EY 00624-01 and No. EY 00190-15 from the National Institutes of Health.     

Physiological effects of the meteorologically abnormal year 1974 observed in healthy males in the Netherlands and southern Norway.

Convincing evidence of biological effects during long-term abnormal weather conditions is very rare because usually no continuous series of physiological data from the same animals or humans (either single or in groups) have been collected over many years during the period preceding the meteorological event. Since 1955, at the Biometeorological Research centre, Leiden, about 220,000 blood data were collected from healthy male blood donors at Leiden, The Netherlands, and about 110,000 data at Oslo, Norway, since 1966. It was found that during the meteorologically abnormal year of 1974, which was abnormal in many parts of the world, both in Leiden and Oslo abnormal biological patterns occurred in blood sedimentation rate, haemoglobin, diastolic blood pressure, gamma-globulin levels, Piccardi p-test percentages and a few other biological parameters. A more complete monograph will be published at a later date.