---
product_id: 3637782
title: "The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors"
price: "$53.60"
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reviews_count: 13
url: https://www.desertcart.us/products/3637782-the-scientists-a-history-of-science-told-through-the-lives
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region: United States of America
---

# The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors

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Review: The human discovery of the physical world - John Gribbin has written a marvelous book that describes how men and women discovered the mechanics of the world they live in. This is the story of science and scientists, beginning in the Renaissance up to the present day. He tells us about men like Galileo and Newton and Darwin—what drew them to the study of science, how they learned, explored, argued with each other, and built upon each other's discoveries. He covers all the branches of science, including astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology and geology, and how these sciences built upon each other to come to a rounded sense of the physical world and how it works. Just two caveats. Like many scientists, Gribbin can be obsessive about data. He tells us not just the year but the month and day when his subjects were born—as if that made a difference. One wonders: Will he mention the hour of birth too? Then one reads, "Robert Hooke was born on the stroke of noon on 18 July 1635 . . ." Who cares? Obsessions with minutiae such as this can obscure the larger narrative. Second, Gribbin is so invested in empirical science that he regards all that came before as mysticism and superstition. However there are other ways of knowing. Art, poetry, philosophy--and yes, religion--are not false for being non-empirical. They can be legitimate ways of coming to the truth, and valuable correctives in an age when science is king.
Review: Thoroughly educational and enjoyable - I very much enjoy reading about the history of science. The short biographies given about each of the scientists in this history make this book even more of an interesting read. As someone trained in science however, I would have occasionally enjoyed a few more scientific details, for example the control experiments performed to rule out alternative explanations. I also strongly disagree with the authors perspective at the end of the book regarding our current understanding of the natural world. The author implies that essentially all of the major discoveries in science have been made, i.e. our theoretical understanding is complete and it is now just a matter of filling in the details. If I am not mistaken, physicists prior to Einstein had a similar belief. In my opinion, we have yet to make similar conceptual breakthroughs that will be necessary to explain both the origin of life and the origin of the universe itself. However, regardless of these criticisms I still highly recommend this book.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #353,333 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #391 in History & Philosophy of Science (Books) #465 in Biology (Books) #24,736 in Biographies (Books) |
| Customer Reviews | 4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars (340) |
| Dimensions  | 5.2 x 1.45 x 7.9 inches |
| Edition  | Illustrated |
| ISBN-10  | 0812967887 |
| ISBN-13  | 978-0812967883 |
| Item Weight  | 7.7 ounces |
| Language  | English |
| Print length  | 646 pages |
| Publication date  | August 10, 2004 |
| Publisher  | Random House Trade Paperbacks |

## Images

![The Scientists: A History of Science Told Through the Lives of Its Greatest Inventors - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71+49boXatL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ The human discovery of the physical world
*by D***Y on February 28, 2020*

John Gribbin has written a marvelous book that describes how men and women discovered the mechanics of the world they live in. This is the story of science and scientists, beginning in the Renaissance up to the present day. He tells us about men like Galileo and Newton and Darwin—what drew them to the study of science, how they learned, explored, argued with each other, and built upon each other's discoveries. He covers all the branches of science, including astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology and geology, and how these sciences built upon each other to come to a rounded sense of the physical world and how it works. Just two caveats. Like many scientists, Gribbin can be obsessive about data. He tells us not just the year but the month and day when his subjects were born—as if that made a difference. One wonders: Will he mention the hour of birth too? Then one reads, "Robert Hooke was born on the stroke of noon on 18 July 1635 . . ." Who cares? Obsessions with minutiae such as this can obscure the larger narrative. Second, Gribbin is so invested in empirical science that he regards all that came before as mysticism and superstition. However there are other ways of knowing. Art, poetry, philosophy--and yes, religion--are not false for being non-empirical. They can be legitimate ways of coming to the truth, and valuable correctives in an age when science is king.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Thoroughly educational and enjoyable
*by S***E on July 25, 2010*

I very much enjoy reading about the history of science. The short biographies given about each of the scientists in this history make this book even more of an interesting read. As someone trained in science however, I would have occasionally enjoyed a few more scientific details, for example the control experiments performed to rule out alternative explanations. I also strongly disagree with the authors perspective at the end of the book regarding our current understanding of the natural world. The author implies that essentially all of the major discoveries in science have been made, i.e. our theoretical understanding is complete and it is now just a matter of filling in the details. If I am not mistaken, physicists prior to Einstein had a similar belief. In my opinion, we have yet to make similar conceptual breakthroughs that will be necessary to explain both the origin of life and the origin of the universe itself. However, regardless of these criticisms I still highly recommend this book.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ How you see this book depends on what you expect!
*by M***S on November 28, 2009*

If you expect this book to illuminate the lives of natural philosophers and scientists; to detail their idiosyncracies, oddities, obsessions, and personalities; to explore the politics and prevailing social and religious winds of their day -- then this book will be a joy for you to read, and you will delight in its pages. If you expect this book to describe the thinking of these intellectual forefathers and -mothers of ours; to sort through their theories and how they arrived at them; to paint a big picture of the history of science that enables you to see the overarching themes and trends -- then this book, sadly, will be a disappointment. There is no doubt that Gribbin has written a tale that is grand in scope, expansive in nature, and overall exciting, enthralling and even downright juicy (who would have thought that the lives of natural philosophers and scientists were filled with such scandal and self-indulgence?). However, one should approach this book with the knowledge that it is more about quirks than quarks, more about natural passions than natural laws, and more about the history of scientific personalities than the history of scientific thought.

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*Last updated: 2026-02-22*