Book club selection (via me; session held (via Zoom) January 30, 2022).
I had read this in 2010, my summary from back then is here. I think I liked it better this second time around.
Notes used for book club remarks:
Age of Enrichment - starts c. 1800 - how this fit in. Industrial Revolution and trade preceded . . . knowledge, efficiency, productivity - why we are wealthy today.
General approach - lots of science/technology - this alone made the book worthwhile for me - some of the details about how the pioneers functioned, biographical touches
The difference from similar books: made far more interesting by linking these developments to how it felt, how it affected thinking about the universe, religion, man's place, etc., biographies
Banks - brought the exotic to life - a different lifestyle - seeing new worlds, new value systems. Praised by Linnaeus! Then his long role at Royal Society.
Herschel - size of the universe; likelihood of other galaxies. Finding Uranus. His sister. Geography suited to celebrity visitors - fixed location, near London etc.
Ballomania - thinking of today's space entrepreneurs - private wealth funding. Immediate recognition of military utility.
Mungo Park. The "unknownness" of Africa. Imperial considerations.
Davy - Lengthy story but perhaps the most interesting. The notion that chemistry could explain nearly everything, including workings of the brain and replacement of the soul. That we can invent safety lamps etc to deal with most any problem. Then discovering how complicated it all is. Important as we consider events of 19th and early 20th century, their optimism was not entirely irrational. Incredible level of interaction with famous poets and others. Defining what “science“ would be going forward, the idea of hope (similar to poetry), looking forward to better things.
Did the Romantic poets and artists inspire the scientists (using the newly-coined term), or vice versa? Strong synergies, I thought this part was really interesting.
Throughout the book, not this chapter alone, the idea that we knew so little circa 1800s.
When folks look back in say 2222 - how will we look circa 2022?
The ongoing tension with France, the way Bonaparte dominated British thinking. Children were threatened with Boney, not a bogeyman!
Scientists as polymaths . . . Goethe (Sorrows of Young Werther) and study of light.
Frankenstein chapter - this was probably the most interesting - another example of developing a new way of understanding key processes - thinking of Kalinithi and looking at brain lobes. Vitalism. Studying the cranium, classifying. Things we haven't made much progress understanding.
Fear of science destroying wonder - not new.
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