Longitude

2010-07-05 Biography & Autobiography

Author : Dava Sobel
Release : 2010-07-05
Genre : Biography & Autobiography
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 433/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Longitude by : Dava Sobel

Download or read book Longitude written by Dava Sobel. This book was released on 2010-07-05. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of one man's forty-year obsession to find a solution to the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day--"the longitude problem." Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that "the longitude problem" was the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day-and had been for centuries. Lacking the ability to measure their longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. Thousands of lives and the increasing fortunes of nations hung on a resolution. One man, John Harrison, in complete opposition to the scientific community, dared to imagine a mechanical solution-a clock that would keep precise time at sea, something no clock had ever been able to do on land. Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of Harrison's forty-year obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. Full of heroism and chicanery, it is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation, and clockmaking, and opens a new window on our world.

Looking for Longitude

2022 Longitude

Author : Katy Barrett
Release : 2022
Genre : Longitude
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 338/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Looking for Longitude by : Katy Barrett

Download or read book Looking for Longitude written by Katy Barrett. This book was released on 2022. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Looking for Longitude

2022-11-17 History

Author : Katy Barrett
Release : 2022-11-17
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 974/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Looking for Longitude by : Katy Barrett

Download or read book Looking for Longitude written by Katy Barrett. This book was released on 2022-11-17. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why make a joke out of a niche and complex scientific problem? That is the question at the heart of this book, which unearths the rich and surprising history of trying to find longitude at sea in the eighteenth century. Not simply a history on water, this is the story of longitude on paper, of the discussions, satires, diagrams, engravings, novels, plays, poems and social anxieties that shaped how people understood longitude in William Hogarth’s London. We start from a figure in one of Hogarth’s prints – a lunatic incarcerated in the madhouse of A Rake’s Progress in 1735 – to unpick the visual, mental and social concerns which entwined around the national concern to find a solution to longitude. Why does longitude appear in novels, smutty stories, political critiques, copyright cases, religious tracts and dictionaries as much as in government papers? This sheds new light on the first government scientific funding body – the Board of Longitude – established to administer vast reward money for anyone who found a means of accurately measuring longitude at sea. Meet the cast of characters involved in the search for longitude, from famous novelists and artists to almost unknown pamphleteers and inventors, and see how their interactions informed the fate of longitude’s most famous pursuer, the clockmaker John Harrison.

Longitude and Latitude, with Attitude

2017-10-20

Author : Rufus McGaugh
Release : 2017-10-20
Genre :
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 724/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Longitude and Latitude, with Attitude by : Rufus McGaugh

Download or read book Longitude and Latitude, with Attitude written by Rufus McGaugh. This book was released on 2017-10-20. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rufus McGaugh knew early on that he wanted to see the world-all of it. And, later on, he did just that.Longitude and Latitude, with Attitude chronicles Rufus's 49 years of travels around the globe to every country in the world. It relates his experiences, both harrowing and humorous, in entertaining and amusing (sometimes even instructive!) vignettes.Rufus, a Vietnam vet who was awarded the Purple Heart in 1970, became a Vietnam vet against the war, got a college degree, and taught social studies at Brownell Middle School in the affluent Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe for 39 years. During that time-and before and after-he spent his summers, vacations, and retirement fulfilling a life-long dream to travel to every corner of the Earth. He has visited countries near and far, well known and obscure (including the closed regimes of North Korea and Libya). He has met interesting people, seen fascinating sights, and observed unusual events.He has been hassled by the authorities in Russia (twice in one day). He was arrested-and later stalked by a leopard-in Zimbabwe. He met Miss America (well, Miss South Carolina) in Vietnam, outfoxed (or so he thought) a tailor in Hong Kong, and broke both arms bicycling in Cuba.Longitude and Latitude, with Attitude is the unpretentious, often comic, frequently informative chronicle of these and other adventures and misadventures he experienced on his journeys. Other wanderers like him-and armchair travelers everywhere-will be captivated by it. The lively writing is supplemented by more than 50 pictures that inveterate photographer Rufus has taken in the course of his trips.

The Illustrated Longitude

2008-10-08 Chronometers

Author : Dava Sobel
Release : 2008-10-08
Genre : Chronometers
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 321/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis The Illustrated Longitude by : Dava Sobel

Download or read book The Illustrated Longitude written by Dava Sobel. This book was released on 2008-10-08. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new illustrated edition of the best-selling Longitude chronicles the tale of the eighteenth-century inventor John Harrison, who created the chronometer and, in the process, saved thousands of lives and great fortunes. Reprint.

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Longitude

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