On October 6, Chiara Mingarelli, assistant professor of physics, organized a viewing at the Yale Beinecke Library of Yale-owned historical scientific works for students in her General Physics Laboratory class, in collaboration with Anna Franz, Assistant Program Director of Education at Beinecke and Kayleigh Bohemier, Science Research Support Librarian at Yale’s Marx Library.
Mingarelli said, “The students interacted with 15 rare books written by Galileo, Newton, Gibbs, and other great physicists who invented the experiments we do in our lab class. I wanted to give the students the opportunity to interact with these important pieces of history, in an effort to bring their experiments to life: they were done by real scientists who wrote these books hundreds of years ago, and as a Yale student you get to read them!”
Yale News covered the experience in an article on October 23 called, “Reaching across the centuries, these seminal science books speak volumes”. The full article, as well as a brief video about the experience, called “History in Hand,” are linked below.
The books viewed included:
- Galileo 1638 two new sciences
- Da Vinci , madrid codices
- Newton, Principia
- Newton’s Opticks with forward from Einstein
- Faraday, experimental researches in electricity
- Gibbs, 1863, on the form of the teeth of wheels..
- Maxwell treatise on electricity and magnetism 1873
- Copernicus, Nicolaus. 1543. Nicolai Copernici Toriensis De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium Libri VI :
- Du Châtelet, Gabrielle Emilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil. 1744. Dissertation Sur La Nature et La Propagation Du Feu. A Paris: Chez Prault, fils ..
- Cassini, Giovanni Domenico. 1681. Abregé Des Observations & Des Reflexions Sur La Comete Qui a Paru Au Mois de Decembre 1680, & Aux Mois de Ianvier, Fevrier, & Mars de Cette Année 1681.
- Boyle, Robert. 1664. Some Considerations Touching the Vsefvlnesse of Experimental Naturall Philosophy .. Oxford: Printed by H. Hall for R. Davis.
- Kepler, Johannes. 1606. De Stella Nova in Pede Serpentarii : Et Qui Sub Ejus Exortum de Novo Iniit, Trigono Igneo … Accesserunt I. De Stella Incognita Cygni: Narratio Astronomica. II. De Jesv Christi Servatoris Vero Anno Natalitio, Consideratio Novissimae Sententiae Lavrentii Svsligae Poloni, Quatuor Annos in Usitata Epocha Desiderantis .. Pragae.
- Kepler, Johannes. 1609. Astronomia Nova Aitiologetos, Seu Physica Coelestis : Tradita Commentariis de Motibus Stellæ Martis, Ex Observationibus G.V. Tychonis Brahe : Jussu & Sumptibus Rudolphi II … Plurimum Annorum Pertinaci Studio Elaborata Pragæ .. Germany Heidelberg: Gotthard Vögelin.
- Newcastle, Margaret Cavendish. 1655. The Philosophical and Physical Opinions. London: Printed for J. Martin and J. Allestrye.
- Brahe, Tycho. 1666. Historia Coelestis. Avgvstae Vindelicorum: apud Simonem Utzschneiderum.