Edmond Halley
Edmond Halley is known far and wide thanks largely to the comet bearing his name, the nature of which he predicted in 1705. While that discovery is enough to make the career of any scientist, Halley’s massive contributions to the fields of astronomy, philosophy, history, mathematics, engineering, and actuarial science – the latter of which he founded single-handedly – as a young man and eventually as Astronomer Royal are mostly overlooked. Edmond Halley: The Astronomer Royal Who Brought the Universe to Earth is a revelatory and deeply researched biography of a man whose defining achievement isn’t even the half of it.
A jack-of-all-trades when it came to scientific reasoning, an all-around academic, Renaissance man, and workaholic who couldn’t leave well enough alone, Halley was amazingly productive and prolific. He was behind some of the most groundbreaking pieces of discovery in human history: it was Halley who was the first to survey the skies and plot the stars of the southern hemisphere; he published Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica, which many argue is the most important scientific text ever written; in the field of history, he translated the works of ancient Greek mathematician Apollonius and calculated the date of Julius Caesar’s arrival in Britain; he captained the ship Paramore on a scientific expedition to plot the Earth’s magnetic fields, not losing a single original crewmember on the mission; Halley was the first to calculate mortality annuities, creating the foundation for actuarial science; he made improvements to the diving bell, surveyed the tides of the English channel, and led the movement to accurately measure the distance between the Earth and Sun, unlocking the key to determining the distance to the nearest stars.
In this incisive and surprising biography, author David K. Love reveals the boundless mind and endless curiosity of Edmond Halley, a man whom many readers may think they already know. From his inventions and innovations to his personal life, Edmond Halley firmly cements the legacy of the second Astronomer Royal among the first-rate scientists of his time.
David K Love is a member of the Royal Astronomical Society and holds a BSc honors degree from University College London. After a career as an accountant at British Telecom, he took early voluntary retirement to pursue his scientific interests and writing. He is the author of Kepler and the Universe, a biography of the famous 17th century German astronomer Johannes Kepler. He used to lecture frequently on the history of astronomy and on the origins and evolution of the Universe, but now finds that his grandchildren take up this time instead. Love lives in Exeter, in Devon County, England.