ITT: Some of the greatest Scientists of all time.

[3am scholar]

Be it Mathematicians, Chemists, Physicists, Doctors, Biologists, Astronomers, Inventors, Ancient Times, whatever. Post some interesting people.

Sir Isaac Newton

http://www.biographyonline.net/scientists/isaac-newton.html

Albert Einstein

http://www.biographyonline.net/scientists/albert-einstein.html

Nikola Tesla

http://www.biographyonline.net/scientists/nikola-tesla.html

Charles Darwin

http://www.biographyonline.net/scientists/charles-darwin.html

Gregor Mendel

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregor_Mendel

Dmitri Mendeleev

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitri_Mendeleev

 

[futuremd]

DEMOCRITUS:

ELON MUSK AKA TONY STARK:

 

[RIP sleazyy]

thread needs more Carl Sagan.

 

[yeah]

Tesla was that dude too.

 

[yeah]

double

 

[equality]

My mathematics teacher in high school always told me that although Einstein gets tons of attention and credit for his genius discoveries, Newton's work and accomplishments far far excel that of Einstein's. Not sure if accurate though

 

[kangaroobombs]

I know Tesla and Edison had beef.

Einstein is my personal hero though.

As a future chemist, I can only try to make a minute contribution to science compared to these great thinkers.

 

[solefrsh]

Posting for later, I love history plus science. 

 

[Master Zik]

Dope thread. Gotta appreciate the influential minds and molders of our civilization today.

Bohr, Planck, Volta, Edison, Aristotle, Carver, Chappelle.

 

[firepower23]

"Dickie" Dawkins

Francis Crick and James D Watson should be mentioned here as well as the discoverers of DNA.

Brian Cox is more familiar to UK viewers and also a bit of a "hero" of mine.
He has also presented some of the best BBC Science documentaries to date...

If you guys get a chance, check out "Wonders of the Solar System" & "Wonders of the Universe"

 

[nycknicks105]

IDK how true this is, but I've read somewhere that Newton died a virgin.

 

[futuremd]

My mathematics teacher in high school always told me that although Einstein gets tons of attention and credit for his genius discoveries, Newton's work and accomplishments far far excel that of Einstein's. Not sure if accurate though

Newton was just an outright genius but we didn't know enough about the world for him to get where Einstein did.

Newton was still an alchemist and while people like to tout that he was "christian," his views on the role of an actual god changed radically and he would have been seen as a heretic by the time he died with some of his more radical views. Most people were religious back then as there simply wasn't enough known about the world. Newton's understanding of what the universe was simply limited to many other things that weren't known about the natural world up until that point, however everything that he deduced could no longer be the result of any "god" in his eyes, as he knew why things happened in a different manner from the rest.

He still was an alchemist and took heavily into other since disproved notions like the aether. 

I don't think its really fair to compare them to each other at times but this is my favorite explanation of why newton was a badass. 

 

[jamesrustler]

Newton was simply brilliant, a dazzling genius.

This is a guy who, dissatisfied with the inadequacy of the mathematics of his time, just went out and invented an entire new field, calculus, to express his ideas.

Our moon program was based on little else than his 3 laws and their corollaries.

And yet, his primary work, about 95% was in alchemy, philosophy, religion, metaphysics and such. Math and science, which constitute about 10% to 5% of his work, were merely hobbies. Simple distractions for him.

Einstein was astoundingly clever, but he also had the benefit of living in 20th century US. His life and works were immortalized on film and video, which made him something of a pop-icon. But I'd argue that Newton was more impressive.

Yet, the average person walking down the street knows Newton first and foremost as "the guy who died a virgin," illustrates how petty and stupid people are. 

 

[kangaroobombs]

"Dickie" Dawkins

Francis Crick and James D Watson should be mentioned here as well as the discoverers of DNA.

Brian Cox is more familiar to UK viewers and also a bit of a "hero" of mine.
He has also presented some of the best BBC Science documentaries to date...

If you guys get a chance, check out "Wonders of the Solar System" & "Wonders of the Universe"

Fun fact: I have heard from my peers and some of my mentors that Watson is a
Bigot and most of today's top scientists are aceholes in real life.

 

[jamesrustler]

Fun fact: I have heard from my peers and some of my mentors that Watson is a
Bigot and most of today's top scientists are aceholes in real life.

[h1]Watson’s Black D.N.A.: Ultimate Irony?[/h1]By MIKE NIZZA

Dr. James D. Watson (Photo: John Dunn for The New York Times)

¶It turns out that the Nobel-winning geneticist who was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” is inherently 16 percent African, or an amount of “someone who had a great-grandparent who was African,” according to a scientist who made the discovery.

¶Two months ago, Dr. James Watson, who helped crack the D.N.A. code decades ago, apologized for suggesting black people, over all, are not as intelligent as whites. He also resigned as chancellor of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island.

¶“There are many people of color who are very talented,” he said. The comment, we now know, applied to 16 percent of him as well.

¶He also tried to stamp out any further talk by saying that “there is no scientific basis for such a belief.” Still, a debate erupted online when a Slate writer offered an academic defense of the claim that started the furor. Critics are still piling on, with Malcolm Gladwell being the latest in this week’s New Yorker.

¶Richard E. Nisbett, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, offered another thorough rebuttal in a New York Times Op-Ed, “All Brains Are the Same Color.”

¶“The evidence heavily favors the view that race differences in I.Q. are environmental in origin, not genetic,” he proposed.

¶Dr. Watson set himself up for this ironic moment by agreeing earlier this year to be the first person to publish his genetic code for all to study. But he won’t be the last, as companies race to create relatively cost-effective ways to bring D.N.A. publishing to the masses.

¶Those who join Dr. Watson in complete D.N.A. openness may be wise to remember two lessons from this episode: think before you speak, and also try to memorize all six billion letters of your genetic code.

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/10/watsons-black-dna-ultimate-irony/