Brilliant Blunders

By Mario Livio,

Book cover of Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein - Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe

Book description

We all make mistakes. Nobody is perfect. And that includes five of the greatest scientists in history -- Charles Darwin, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Linus Pauling, Fred Hoyle, Albert Einstein. But the mistakes that these great scientists made helped science to advance. Indeed, as Mario Livio explains in this fascinating…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Brilliant Blunders as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

David P. Barash

Author

It is both entertaining and informative to learn how some of the greatest scientists have been wrong… at least some of the time.

Because of its triumphs, many people look upon science as unerring. Those of us involved in science, however, know that its power comes from its self-correction. Livio shows how scientific mistakes happen and also how they result in ever-closer approximations to the truth.

From David's list on people making mistakes: mythic, silly, tragic.