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No easy answers : science and the pursuit of knowledge / Allan Franklin.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Franklin, Allan, 1938-
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Science--Popular works.
- Science.
- Science--Methodology--Popular works.
- Science--Methodology.
- Genre:
- Popular works.
- Physical Description:
- xii, 258 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
- Place of Publication:
- Pittsburgh : University of Pittsburgh Press, [2005]
- Summary:
- Allan Franklin offers an accurate picture of science to both a general reader and to scholars in the humanities and social sciences who may not have any background in physics. Through the examination of nontechnical case studies, he illustrates the various roles that experiment plays in science. He uses examples of unquestioned success, such as the discoveries of the electron and of three types of neutrino, as well as studies that were dead ends, wrong turns, or just plain mistakes, such as the "fifth force," a proposed modification of Newton's law of gravity. Franklin argues that science is a reasonable enterprise that provides us with knowledge of the natural world based on valid experimental evidence and reasoned and critical discussion, and he makes clear that it behooves all of us to understand how it works.
- Contents:
- Introduction
- Experiment
- Making or Breaking Theories
- The Violation of Parity Conservation
- The Meselson-Stahl Experiment: "The Most Beautiful Experiment in Biology"
- Emil Konopinski and the Theory of ?-Decay
- The Rise and Fall of the Fifth Force
- The Search for What Is There
- The Discovery of the Electron
- The Road to the Neutrino
- How Many Neutrinos?
- The Appearance and Disappearance of the 17-keV Neutrino
- The Missing Solar Neutrinos
- Blas Cabrera and the Search for Magnetic Monopoles
- The Trouble with Scientists
- Robert Millikan and the Charge of the Electron
- The Early Searches for Gravity Waves
- Atomic Parity Violation: Do Mutants Die of Natural Causes?
- Conclusion: No Easy Answers.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-252) and index.
- ISBN:
- 082294250X
- OCLC:
- 55887570
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