Rating: 
Summary: Very readable
Review: Newton is your hero in the first half of the book and somehow in the second part, the story loses steam. For the price, I think it's ok. A mistake that all 'Newton' books tend to make is to eulogize Newton to a point where the achievements of the other greats like Fermat take a backstage. Gleick certainly did better here than with his Feynman story.
Rating: 
Summary: Newton was not a Newtonian
Review: One of the aspirations of my life is to come to a layman's understanding of science. One general aspect of learning and teaching that has always fascinated me has been the ability to present a subject matter in such a fashion that despite its complexity, can be understood by presenting simple metaphor and building concepts in a linear fashion leading to comprehension. A dream of mine would be someday to teach general history survey courses in college, and perhaps in High School as well, and do so in such a fashion that was both exciting, inspiring and educational. Anyway, science is an area that I am trying to build up an understanding of. I have a friend who inspires me, he is a bona fide a nuclear physicist and it always amazes me at his scientific knowledge. In pursuit of understanding I set off to read this biography.Gleick has written a terse and dense biography of one of the most intellectually influential "scientists" of the "modern" era. I write scientist and modern in quotes to denote that our perception is particular skewed with the latent meaning we bring to both of those concepts and that not only is it not clear that Newton associated himself with either terms, it is certain that his world view was very different from our own. One particularly striking point along these lines, was the fact that Newton was avid in his pursuit of alchemy, although this fact was not known till long after his death. In the current Newtonian world of formalized science there is a clear distinction between the reputable study of the elements known as chemistry and the disreputable unscientific magical study of alchemy. But Newton lived in a pre-Newtonian world. Newton himself was not a Newtonian, in all the sense that we think of the word. Gleick makes Newton accessible. He distills an essence of Newton, and skillfully presents vista's into Newton's life, in a short 191 pages of a very small book whose dimensions are only 8 by 5 1/2 inches. This is amended by 47 pages of footnotes as well as 18 pages of acknowledgment and sources. I am not knocking the size, merely noting its shape. Gleick is a great writer, mostly pulling off a well written and understandable presentation of Newton, his research, writings and habits. He has done a great service, for Newton was a prodigious writer. Tucked away in one of the last footnotes of the book is an enlightening quote regarding one of Newton's books described as a "work of colossal tedium...read today only by the tiniest remnant who for their sins must pass through its purgatory". Gleick notes that Newton had written a million words prior to the publication of one. Newton was a very isolated and withdrawn individual who often would spend days in his room, and he prodigiously copied entire books, paraphrasing and filling volumes with his own writing. Writing seemed a vehicle for focusing and organizing his thought processes. Much of his writing was never published, and so this biography in many ways allows a view of man whose breadth otherwise would be inaccessible to save but a remnant, if not by the staggering volume, then the inscrutable intellectualism. One final point that struck me was how much of the modern world view, that I am so much akin to, is grounded in Newtonian principles. Gleick notes that "What Newton learned entered into the marrow of what we know without knowing how we know it." Namely a reducible universe, with first causes, and laws that govern behavior in a universal fashion. First principles and universal gravity have at their philosophical underpinnings fundamental principles that are the very fabric of the way we perceive the world. Post Script, while Newton described and laid bare the laws of the universe, he could not do so without wonder and mystery. Gravity had no known cause, no known agent as its first principle, Newton noted this "question I have left to the consideration of my readers" And so it goes.
Rating:
Summary: A Work of Genius
Review: Sir Isaac Newton truly was, in Gleick's happy phrase, "chief architect of the modern world". As with Gleick's previous scientific biography ("Genius", a life of Richard Feynman), one struggles to understand how a genius at understanding and interpreting the natural world was able to put it in mathematical language. This is difficult to convey, and Gleick does not succeed. Perhaps no one could. In every other way, this biography itself is a work of genius. Newton was a turning point in the Western world-view. In a sense, he made civil, mechanical, and even electronic engineering possible. When you look at brilliant scientists or inventors, you can ask if their discoveries or inventions would have been made by someone else, perhaps within only a few years. In most cases (perhaps even in Feynman's), the answer is yes. With Newton we cannot be so sure. Of course Leibniz discovered, or invented (and that is an interesting epistemological fine point), calculus independently of Newton, but would the realization of our current large-scale model of the physical universe have come about without Newton? We cannot be sure. Gleick makes this point, and does it with sensitivity to the context of 17th century England and Europe. Newton was not of our age, the English language as it was written then is subtly and not-so-subtly different from ours (though we believe we can understand it). One of Gleick's strong points is that he adopts a style that leads the careful reader into a beginning of an understanding of 17th century language, beliefs, and thought. What would have happened without Newton? Perhaps a very different world, perhaps better, perhaps worse. This Gleick addresses, and you cannot imagine a more academic scientific biographer doing so.
Rating:
Summary: excellent
Review: There is something to be said about a book, such as Gleick's Isaac Newton, when one can read it on the beach. That is not to say that Gleick is light on substance, or that this is a typical 'beach read'. But, it is to say that the economy of his prose, the clarity of his thought, and the rigor of his analysis is always interesting, and always illuminating.
The one complaint I have about the book is that Gleick frequently tries to adduce what precisely Newton was thinking at various points in time. This is an interesting attempt at trying to contextualizing a confounding man (what genius other than Newton has been so apparently devoid of ego as to wish his work not to be published?) But, it is not clear to me how, given a lack of contemporary accounts of Newton's state of mind (Freud and William James did not create psychology when Newton was alive) Gleick can claim to understand the nature of Newton's character.
That said, any effort to contextualize Newton is obviously an interesting one, if only because of his historical importance.
Rating:
Summary: Q.E.D.
Review: This book demonstrates that biography is no exception to the adage that brevity is the soul of wit. Gleick divides this short but comprehensive biography into short chapters that respectively address each aspect of Newton's work: the calculus, the laws of gravity and motion, optics, alchemy, theology and so on. Moreover, each chapter succinctly but vividly describes the phase in Newton's life in which that work was performed and finally published, so that the reader moves chronologically through Newton's life while examining each of his monumental achievements. In 188 pages (not counting the informative, pertinent footnotes) Gleick tells the story of Newton's life, describes (but,thankfully, does not try to explain) his peculiar personality, sets out, in layman's terms, the basics of his most important discoveries, and places those discoveries in their social and historical context. Other biographers should take heed; readers with an interest in science and intellectual history should hasten to buy this book!
Rating:
Summary: So Good I Got My Brother a Copy
Review: This excellent book is commendable for many reasons--clarity, brevity, organization, insight, charactarization and last but not least its fascinating subject, a genius who emerged from an isolated farmstead in 17th Century England and invented modern science. The portrait of the young, solitary Newton building experiments in light on the stone wall behind his house, honing his precise observation and experimentation in a tiny dark room, is unforgettable. Newton's world is far distant from our own, and Gleick brings it alive. Some reviewers have commented on the relative paucity of scientific and mathimatical information, but I am more impressed by the clarity of what is there. This wasn't intended to be an exhaustive biography or complete scientific appreciation (though the excellent bibliography and notes provide more possibilities than could possibly be explored.) It is a tour de force for any intelligent reader.
Rating:
Summary: fascinating masterpiece, with just the right level of detail
Review: This is a short bio of Newton that is emminently readable and explains his achievements in historical perspective. It does not go into excessive scientific detail, but explains the gist in a truly masterful popularization. I am sure that scientists will find the treatment too light, but for the general reader it is perfect in my view.
Newton essentially created a new kind of mathematics, which came to be known as calculus. It involved the use of infinities to describe certain shapes and so was a great break with previous mathematical assumptions. In what can only be called a work of genius, Newton then applied this mathematics to the motion of the planets, positing the force of gravity as the explanation for why it all held together. Newton also did fundamental experiments in optics, which reflected his remarkable ability to observe and record/descirbe what he saw in scientific language. Gleick also explores Newton's involvement in strange strains of mysticism, a remnant of the middle ages and unlike the Enlightenment with which he came to be associated.
On a personal level, Newton was a solitary man with no apparent romantic relationships. Gleick does not speculate on is sexuality and avoids other areas about which we cannot know. Late in life, he became rich as a controller of the currency for the Crown.
Warmly recommended. Gleick is a science writer of great talent.
Rating:
Summary: A universal mind
Review: With almost poetic grace, Gleick portrays the life and thinking of history's most expansive mind. Works on Newton aren't as common as might be expected. The task of addressing such a monumental mentality is formidable, to say the least. Only the most ambitious or analytical could attempt it. Gleick's effort encompasses the major facets of Newton's life, including his academic, political and religious aspects. He avoids the modern approach of delving into Newton's psyche or recapitulating three centuries of scholarly disputation. Even the "falling apple" story is redrawn as Newton's realisation that apparent size compared with distance expressed a relationship needing explanation. The result is a clean, unobstructed view of a complex man - and his legacy. From meagre beginnings Newton carved an expansive niche in European scholarship. His skills, noted early, brought him a Cambridge appointment at 27. Already showing great promise, he was a reluctant publisher. He sequestered himself in his rooms, later in a small cottage. He'd lived almost alone during his childhood, but his curiosity led him in many directions. The prism experiments, breaking sunlight with a prism, began his long career in what is now deemed "physics". Light's properties were the subject of great dispute, with Newton holding to emitted particles. Waves seemed to adhere to the Cartesian "vortices" which Newton found suspect. Playing with mirrors and lenses led to the reflecting telescope widely used today. Thinking about the heavenly bodies he observed led, of course, to his idea of gravitational attraction. Not a popular idea then, since such forces were disdained. It's difficult to assess whether his delving into the facts of nature led to his personal isolation, or the reverse holds. Gleick shows how Newton focussed on problems with an intensity few have demonstrated. Even in employment as Warden of the Mint, Newton pursued counterfeiters with a Rambo-like dedication - even accompanying culprits to the gallows. His brief stint as a Member of Parliament, however, was virtually silent. He was perturbed by his developing scepticism of the Holy Trinity - this while teaching at the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Cambridge University. These thoughts, too, he kept closely concealed. Only the dispute over gravity with Robert Hooke brought him reluctantly forth. Although Newton's accomplishments were vast, Gleick relates how the great thinker understood he was only uncovering beginnings. Even those beginnings, however, were deemed "mechanistic" by the later Romantics - a label applied to science even today. Gleick rebuts this hostile view in his conclusion. However Newton's personality is viewed, his accomplishments readily surpass puerile complaints. Without him, Gleick reminds us, much of today's world would not exist. Cassini would not be orbiting Saturn, returning its amazing images to us, without him. This book isn't highly detailed, and that's right and proper. Massive volumes of Newton's life already exist. Gleick has provided a tasteful and effective teaser for those wishing to learn more of this amazing man. He's even provided images of some of Newton's notes and observations imparting the flavour of Newton's thinking. Start here, you will not be disappointed. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
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