Looking back

Simple acts... Great discoveries

Who was asked to leave school, but went on to make one of the greatest discoveries in science?

Albert Einstein who was born in Germany in 1879 and died in the United States in 1955. Even though he is revered as the greatest scientist in the world today, his teacher asked him to leave school saying he would never amount to anything. In fact, Einstein was not someone who excelled in his studies. He was weak at most of his subjects except one - mathematics.

The so-called backward schoolboy became a genius when his two theories, special theory of relativity and general theory of relativity were proved right by scientific research and experiments.

The two theories revolutionised physics by presenting new ways of understanding fundamental aspects as mass, energy, gravity and time. His theories led to many modern developments in science, which includes nuclear power and our understanding of black holes.

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Who believed everything worked by numbers?

Pythagoras, who lived in ancient Greece around 500 BC. He was convinced that the entire universe is governed by numbers.

He became one of the earliest great scientists when he made the famous discovery that musical notes which are in harmony, are given by pipes or strings whose lengths are in simple numerical proportions such as 3:2 or 4:3.

This discovery gave rise to the belief that simple mathematical relationships underlie everything and can explain everything.

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Who saw immense power in a kettle of water?

James Watt, the great British engineer. It is said that as a child, he noticed that steam in a boiling kettle repeatedly lifted the lid. Perhaps this inspired him to improve the steam engine in the 1760s, making it an effective source of power. James Watt's prototype steam engine was called the 'Old Bess'.

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Who used his imagination to become a great scientist, even though he was useless at maths?

British chemist and physicist, Michael Faraday who lived from 1791 to 1867.

For more than 400 years in the past, most discoveries and inventions were made by scientists using mathematics or applying scientific laws. However, Faraday, the son of a poor blacksmith who received no education beyond reading and writing, used his imagination to make a great discovery. Faraday was very inquisitive and taught himself all about science. As he was also imaginative, it enabled him to gain great fame through his lectures on science.

His inquisitiveness led him to investigate electric current and its uses which was new to science in the early 1800s. Faraday couldn't express his work in mathematical terms, but he used his imagination to picture how electricity works.

He visualised that a wire carrying an electric current is surrounded by lines of magnetic force produced by the flow of the current. He used this idea to find out how electricity and magnetism are linked. In 1821, he built the first working model of an electric motor and ten years later, the first electric generator. He didn't stop there. Faraday went on to show how electricity affects chemical substances.

These great discoveries made by a man (who today would not be able to pass science examinations) have enabled us to generate and use electric current for our benefit.

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Who risked being struck by lightning to make a great discovery?

The famous American scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin who lived in 1752. He carried out a dangerous experiment which has helped save thousands of lives today.

In order to prove that lightning is electricity, he flew a kite, the string of which was connected to an electricity detector, up into a thunderstorm. Soon the electricity started to follow down the string to the ground.

Based on this discovery, he went on to invent the lightning conductor, which is so useful especially when there is stormy weather with heavy lightning.

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Who predicted that radio, other waves and rays exist?

Before 1800, only light was known, as all other rays and waves are invisible. It was in 1800 and 1801 that infrared and ultraviolet rays were discovered.

No one was aware of the existence of any other waves and rays until the British physicist, James Clerk Maxwell worked out the nature of light rays in the 1860s. He showed that they consist of electric and magnetic fields. He called light an electromagnetic radiation.

Maxwell predicted that other kinds of electromagnetic radiation must exist based on what was discovered so far. He was proved right. Inspired by his teachings, the German scientist, Heinrich Hertz, first generated radio waves in 1881. Other waves and rays were discovered later.

Radio and radar waves, microwaves, ultraviolet rays, light rays, infrared rays, X-rays and gamma rays all form what is called the electromagnetic spectrum. They are all various kinds of radiant energy; they only differ in their wavelength and frequency.

Those with long wavelengths are generally called waves and the shorter ones are known as rays. All electromagnetic rays travel through space at the speed of light, but differ in frequency and wavelength.

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Who made a famous discovery in his bath?

Archimedes, the renowned Greek scientist who lived from about 287 to about 212 BC.

The story goes that he was asked to find out whether the king's crown was made of pure gold or of gold mixed with other valuable metal. It seemed an impossible task, but one day, preoccupied with the task entrusted to him, he filled his bath too full, and the water overflowed the moment he got into the bath.

Immediately, Archimedes realised the solution to determine if the crown was pure gold or not, and rushed out into the streets, naked, shouting, 'Eureka' which in Greek means 'I've got it'.

We still use this word to signify an astounding discovery. What Archimedes discovered was comparative densities. When the water in the bath overflowed as he got in, he realised the same thing would happen if the crown was put in the water.

He measured how much water the crown displaced and then checked to see if a piece of pure gold having the same weight as the crown displaced the same amount of water. In fact, the king's crown displaced more water, proving that it was mixed with a less dense metal.

It was a triumph for the Greek scientists, but tragedy for the goldsmith who ended up being executed for cheating the king.