Links for 2010-12-05

A carol to move the hardest of hearts...

"Isaac Newton, when he wasn't revolutionizing mathematics and almost single-handedly inventing physics as a systematic discipline, wrote some really ridiculous stuff. Alchemy, occult esoterica, you name it. In his defense, it was the 1600s. He didn't have a whole lot of prior scientific understanding to help him sort the wheat from the chaff.

Until he reached the age at which the position is traditionally handed to a successor, Stephen Hawking occupied Isaac Newton's chair at Cambridge University. I don't know what his excuse is."

"On the anomalous combustion of oleic and linoleic acid mixtures
J. Maccabeus et al., Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Judea"

"At least one author drew his inspiration for atomic structure directly from the observation of radioactivity.  In 1903, Paris scientist Filippo Re wrote a short paper titled, "Hypothèse sur la nature des corps radioactifs," in which he speculated that atoms coalesce from a cloud of constituent parts much like stars form from the condensation of gas in nebulae.  This model provides yet another fascinating insight into the thinking of physicists of the time, and we discuss Re's entire paper here."