Today, nothing is unusual about a scientific discovery’s being followed soon after by a technical application: The discovery of electrons led to electronics; fission led to nuclear energy. But before the 1880’s, science played almost...

I have been branded with folly and madness for attempting what the world calls impossibilities, and even from the great engineer, the late James Watt, who said … that I deserved hanging for bringing into...

Raphael paints wisdom, Handel sings it, Phidias carves it, Shakespeare writes it, Wren builds it, Columbus sails it, Luther preaches it, Washington arms it, Watt mechanizes it.

True greatness is when your name is like ampere, watt, and fourier—when it’s spelled with a lower case letter.