A propos de l'auteur
Jimena Canales is associate professor of the history of science at Harvard University.
Œuvres de Jimena Canales
The Physicist and the Philosopher: Einstein, Bergson, and the Debate That Changed Our Understanding of Time (2015) 115 exemplaires
El físico y el filósofo: Einstein, Bergson y el debate que cambió nuestra comprensión del… (2020) 4 exemplaires
Étiqueté
Partage des connaissances
- Date de naissance
- 1973-10-20
- Sexe
- female
- Lieu de naissance
- Mexico City, Mexico
- Études
- Harvard University (PhD, History of Science, 2003)
Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (BS, Engineering Physics) - Professions
- historian of science
writer - Organisations
- University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
- Prix et distinctions
- University of Chicago Press Bevington Prize (2008)
Charles A. Ryskamp Award - Courte biographie
- Jimena Canales is an expert in 19th and 20th century history of the physical sciences, working for a better understanding of science and technology in relation to the arts and humanities.
She received an M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in the History of Science and a BSc in Engineering Physics from the Tecnológico de Monterrey. Her scholarly work on the history of science has been published in Isis, Science in Context, History of Science, the British Journal for the History of Science, and the MLN, among others. Her work on visual, film and media studies has appeared in Architectural History, Journal of Visual Culture, Thresholds. She writes for general readers publishing in Aperture, Artforum, WIRED, Nautilus, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker.
Membres
Critiques
The Physicist and the Philosopher: Einstein,… par Jimena Canales
A good book that introduces, I suspect, the majority of readers to a philosopher named Bergson, a once famous contemporary of Einstein that unlike the latter had as time progressed fallen into obscurity. In this book Bergson’s ideas and convictions about the nature of time are revived and pitched against Einstein’s mechanistic interpretation of space time. This is well worth the read.
There were a few stylistic elements to the book that I did not like. The two most prominent were the repeated, iterative listing of questions used to introduce sections and chapters, and so much skipping around time-wise (I'm fine with non-linear narrative, but it needs a bit more sign-posting.)
I also found the debate itself irritating. Have you ever come across a years-old comment thread online and, reading through it, shaken your head at how groups of people could sustain for so long in completely talking past each other? Witness here the early- to mid-twentieth century version of that.
This debate also grates on me because of my own biases. I have little patience for the "philosophical" arguments here. At a deep, gut level I cannot help but consider this as just so much... BS. Like I said, my own biases :)
On the good side of this book, I found out about a whole debate --a decades long, multi-person, and still somewhat unfinished debate-- that I never knew about. And, even if I can't completely overcome my own feelings of, "Ahh-fer-christ-sake..." that is definitely worthwhile.… (plus d'informations)
I also found the debate itself irritating. Have you ever come across a years-old comment thread online and, reading through it, shaken your head at how groups of people could sustain for so long in completely talking past each other? Witness here the early- to mid-twentieth century version of that.
This debate also grates on me because of my own biases. I have little patience for the "philosophical" arguments here. At a deep, gut level I cannot help but consider this as just so much... BS. Like I said, my own biases :)
On the good side of this book, I found out about a whole debate --a decades long, multi-person, and still somewhat unfinished debate-- that I never knew about. And, even if I can't completely overcome my own feelings of, "Ahh-fer-christ-sake..." that is definitely worthwhile.… (plus d'informations)
Gets to the heart of the metaphysics of the concept of time.
The impact of Einstein's theories on philosophical conceptions of time. The challenge of relativity on metaphysics was similar to that of evolution on religion: it threatened to undermine its very raison d'être.
Is time something constructed by human minds or is it a physical dimension measurable by clocks? Einstein insisted on the latter while claiming that philosophers were speculating on a topic that belongs strictly within the domain of science.
The book focuses more on the personalities involved than it does on their ideas, making for a frustrating and occasionally tedious read. However, it is invaluable for dealing with this forgotten episode in 20th century intellectual history.… (plus d'informations)
Is time something constructed by human minds or is it a physical dimension measurable by clocks? Einstein insisted on the latter while claiming that philosophers were speculating on a topic that belongs strictly within the domain of science.
The book focuses more on the personalities involved than it does on their ideas, making for a frustrating and occasionally tedious read. However, it is invaluable for dealing with this forgotten episode in 20th century intellectual history.… (plus d'informations)
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Statistiques
- Œuvres
- 9
- Membres
- 224
- Popularité
- #100,172
- Évaluation
- 4.1
- Critiques
- 7
- ISBN
- 15
- Langues
- 1