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François Arago A 19th Century French Humanist and Pioneer in Astrophysics

:	James Lequeux
:	François Arago A 19th Century French Humanist and Pioneer in Astrophysics
:	Springer-Verlag
:	9783319207230
:	1
:	CHF 95.40
:

:	Allgemeines, Lexika
:	English

:	343
:	Wasserzeichen/DRM
:	PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
:	PDF

François Arago, the first to show in 1810 that the surface of the Sun and stars is made of incandescent gas and not solid or liquid, was a prominent physicist of the 19th century. He used his considerable influence to help Fresnel, Ampere and others develop their ideas and make themselves known. This book covers his personal contributions to physics, astronomy, geodesy and oceanography, which are far from negligible, but insufficiently known. Arago was also an important and influential political man who, for example, abolished slavery in the French colonies. One of the last humanists, he had a very broad culture and range of interests. In parallel to his biography, this title also covers the spectacular progresses of science at the time of Arago, especially in France: the birth of physical optics, electromagnetism and thermodynamics. Francois Arago's life is a fascinating epic tale that reads as a novel.

James Lequeux completed his PhD thesis in radioastronomy in 1962 and was an assistant, then associate, professor of physics and astronomy at Paris University until 1966. He was an Astronomer from 1966-1999 and an invited scientist at CalTech from 1968-1969. Dr. Lequeux was also the Director of the Marseilles Observatory from 1983-1988 and was Editor-in-Chief of the journal Astronomy& Astrophysics for 15 years. He retired in 1999 and then began work on the history of astronomy, a subject he presently writes about. Dr. Lequeux has published over 403 papers and five books, including The Interstellar Medium (Springer 2005) and Le Verrier: Magnificent and Detestable Astronomer (Springer 2013).

	Preface	6
	Acknowledgements	10
	Contents	12
	Chapter 1: Scientific Life in France at the Time of Arago	17
	The Great Scientific Institutions	18
	The Academy of Sciences	18
	Some Other Scientific Societies	22
	The Board of Longitudes	23
	The Grandes Écoles	25
	The École Polytechnique	26
	The École Normale Supérieure	28
	The Conditions for Scientific Research	29
	The Nature of Research	29
	Science and Society	31
	Financing Research	32
	Publications	33
	An International Science	37
	Chapter 2: The Life of Arago	38
	The Arago Family	39
	Youth (1756 1809)	42
	The Catalan Odyssey	44
	The Friendship of Humboldt	45
	The Time of Major Scientific Activity (1809 1830)	47
	Elected to the Academy of Sciences	47
	Professor at the École Polytechnique	49
	The Scientific Work	50
	At the Observatory	53
	The Politician (1830 1838)	55
	The Deputy	56
	The 1848 Revolution22	60
	The Abolition of Slavery	62
	The End of a Dream	63
	The Last Years	66
	Chapter 3: The Nature of Light	71
	The Precursors	71
	The Polarization of Light	77
	What Is Polarization?	77
	Malus and the Discovery of Polarization	82
	Arago s Contribution	83
	Arago and Fresnel	87
	Fresnel s Come Out	87
	Fresnel and Arago in Paris	91
	Infrared and Ultraviolet	98
	Chapter 4: The Velocity of Light	102
	The Constancy of the Velocity of Light	103
	The Aberration of Light	103
	John Michell and the Variations of the Velocity of Light	104
	Arago s Experiment	106
	The Intervention of Fresnel	110
	Fizeau s Experiment	112
	The Modern Interpretation of Arago s and Fizeau s Experiments	115
	Arago s Crucial Experiment	117
	The Rotating Mirror	117
	Fizeau and Foucault Pick Up the Torch	119
	Problems of Deontology	120
	The Direct Measurement of the Velocity of Light	122
	The Precursors	122
	Fizeau s Toothed Wheel	125
	The Velocity of Light After Fizeau and Arago	127
	Chapter 5: The Birth of Electromagnetism	132
	The Electric Battery	132
	rsted s Experiment	135
	Ampère s First Experiments	138
	Arago Intervenes	140
	Arago and Faraday: Transformation of Energy	142
	The First Electric Motors	142
	The Magnetism of Rotation	145
	Controversies	146
	The Discovery of Induction	147
	Arago s Stubbornness	148
	Faraday and the Magnetic Field	149
	Wild Imaginings and Discoveries on Electricity	150
	Some of the First Applications of Electricity	151
	The Electric Telegraph	151
	Electric Motors	155
	Magnetos and Dynamos	156
	Chapter 6: Measuring the Earth	161
	Geodesy Before Arago	161
	The Origins	161
	The Length of the Degree and the Shape of the Earth	164
	The Beginnings of Gravimetry	165
	Geodesy and Cartography: The Cassini Map of France	166
	Triangulations at the End of the Eighteenth Century	168
	Measuring the Paris Meridian During the French Revolution	172
	Arago s Work	176
	Extending the Measurements of the Meridian to the Balearic Islands: Should One Change the Length of the Meter?	176
	The New Geodesic Linkage of France and England	179
	Leveling and New Maps of France	182
	Leveling	182
	New Maps of France	182
	Chapter 7: Arago and the Paris Observatory	184
	The Paris Observatory Before Arago	185
	The Beginnings	185
	Eighteenth Century Improvements	189
	The Observatory of the Board of Longitudes13	191
	The Observatory upon Arago s Arrival	191
	The Instruments of Arago	191
	The Great Equatorial Telescope of the East Tower19	195
	The Amphitheater	200
	Life at the Observatory	200
	The Astronomers and the Arago Clan	200
	The Visitors	203
	The Observations	205
	The Le Verrier Affair32	207
	The Observatory at Arago s Death	212
	Chapter 8: Arago Astronomer	214
	Astronomy in France in Arago s Time	215
	The Triumph of Newtonian Mechanics	215
	William Herschel s Contribution	216
	The Program of the Board of Longitudes	218
	Astrometry at the Paris Observatory	220
	Proper Motion and Parallax	221
	Arago s Micrometer	225
	The Polarization of Light and the Physical Nature of Celestial Bodies	227
	The Moon	227
	The Sun	228
	Solar Total Eclipses	230
	Stars	231
	Comets	233
	Photometry	235
	The Limb Darkening of the Solar Disk	236
	The Brightness of the Sky, and Stellar Photometry	239
	Scintillation, Seeing and the Diameter of Stars	242
	Arago s Explanation	242
	Arago s Scintillometer	244
	The Diameter of Stars	244
	Chapter 9: Arago Geophysicist and Meteorologist	246
	Arago and Meteorology	248
	The Birth of Scientific Meteorology	248
	Meteorological Forecast	248
	A Synoptic Approach	250
	Storms, Lightning and Waterspouts	250