# Beautiful Experiments: An Illustrated History of Experimental Science - Hardcover

by **Philip Ball** (Author)

**A _New Scientist_ Best Book of 2023**

Featuring two hundred color plates, this history of the craft of scientific inquiry is as exquisite as the experiments whose stories it shares.

This illustrated history of experimental science is more than just a celebration of the ingenuity that scientists and natural philosophers have used throughout the ages to study--and to change--the world. Here we see in intricate detail experiments that have, in some way or another, exhibited elegance and beauty: in their design, their conception, and their execution. Celebrated science writer Philip Ball invites readers to marvel at and admire the craftsmanship of scientific instruments and apparatus on display, from the earliest microscopes to the giant particle colliders of today. With Ball as our expert guide, we are encouraged to think carefully about what experiments are, what they mean, and how they are used. Ranging across millennia and geographies, _Beautiful Experiments_ demonstrates why "experiment" remains a contested notion in science, while also exploring how we came to understand the way the world functions, what it contains, and where the pursuit of that understanding has brought us today.

### Author Biography

**Philip Ball** is a freelance writer and broadcaster whose many books on the interactions of the sciences, the arts, and the wider culture include _Bright Earth_, _Curiosity_, _Patterns in Nature_, _How to Grow a Human_, _The Modern Myths_, _The Elements_, and, most recently, _The Book of Minds_, all also published by the University of Chicago Press. His book _Critical Mass_ won the 2005 Aventis Prize for Science Books. Ball is also the 2022 recipient of the Royal Society's Wilkins-Bernal-Medawar Medal for contributions to the history, philosophy, or social roles of science. He trained as a chemist at the University of Oxford and as a physicist at the University of Bristol, and he was an editor at _Nature_ for more than twenty years. He lives in London.

**Number of Pages:** 240

**Dimensions:** 0.87 x 9.98 x 7.81 IN

**Publication Date:** September 15, 2023

## Details

- **Price:** 35.0 USD
- **Vendor:** Books by splitShops
- **Type:** Books
- **Tags:** Books by splitShops, Shopify Collective

## Variants

| Variant | Price | Available |
|---------|-------|-----------|
| Default Title | 35.00 USD | In stock |

## Images

- Beautiful Experiments: An Illustrated History of Experimental Science - Hardcover

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