Illuminating Instruments

by Peter Morris (Editor), Klaus Staubermann (Editor)

Overview

This 7th volume in the Artefacts series—a collaboration between the Smithsonian Institution, the Deutches Museum, and the London Science Museum—looks at a number of significant instruments that were created to serve various scientific purposes. The contributors examine the roles these instruments played both as scientific devices developed to advance our knowledge of the world and as cultural artifacts manufactured and used in specific settings.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781935623755
Publisher:	Smithsonian Institution Press
Publication date:	09/08/2015
Series:	Artefacts: Studies in the History of Science and Technology
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	184
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.90(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Peter Morris is Principal Curator of Science at the Science Museum in London. Klaus Staubermann is Principal Curator of Technology, Department of Science and Technology at the National Museums Scotland.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Series Preface Chapter 2 Introduction Part 3 Instruments in Practice Chapter 4 Instrument and Image: Inside the Nineteenth Century Scientific Lantern Slide Chapter 5 The Enlightened Microscope: Working with Eighteenth Century Solar Microscopes Part 6 Instruments in Industry Chapter 7 Refractometers and Industrial Analysis Chapter 8 Regional Styles in Pesticide Analysis: Coulson, Lovelock, and the Detection of Organochlorine Insecticides Part 9 Instruments in Motion Chapter 10 Hard Times: The Difficult Lives of Three Instruments in the Museum Chapter 11 Why Display? Representing Holography in Museum Collections Chapter 12 Inside the Atom: Two Sides of a Story Chapter 13 Looking into (the) Matter: Scientific Artifacts and Atomistic Iconography Chapter 14 Select Listing of Museum Instrument Collections

What People are Saying About This

Paolo Galluzzi

Illuminating Instruments is a remarkable collection of insightful essays on the difficult task of exhibiting scientific instruments in museums. The volume is especially intriguing in its ability to reconstruct the function and historical context of diverse instruments, while making these often complex and arcane apparatuses understandable to a large audience. The editors understand well that scientific progress does not occur in a vacuum, and they develop in this book an outstanding model for the presentation of the material and cultural history of scientific instruments, experimental apparatuses, and laboratory life.

Editorial Reviews

Illuminating Instruments is a remarkable collection of insightful essays on the difficult task of exhibiting scientific instruments in museums. The volume is especially intriguing in its ability to reconstruct the function and historical context of diverse instruments, while making these often complex and arcane apparatuses understandable to a large audience. The editors understand well that scientific progress does not occur in a vacuum, and they develop in this book an outstanding model for the presentation of the material and cultural history of scientific instruments, experimental apparatuses, and laboratory life. -Paolo Galluzzi

From the Publisher

Illuminating Instruments is a remarkable collection of insightful essays on the difficult task of exhibiting scientific instruments in museums. The volume is especially intriguing in its ability to reconstruct the function and historical context of diverse instruments, while making these often complex and arcane apparatuses understandable to a large audience. The editors understand well that scientific progress does not occur in a vacuum, and they develop in this book an outstanding model for the presentation of the material and cultural history of scientific instruments, experimental apparatuses, and laboratory life.

Paolo Galluzzi