[MR] On the Shoulders of Eastern Giants: The Forgotten Contributions of Medieval Physicists

[Andrew Ragland]

*WEBINAR SERIES*

*On the Shoulders of Eastern Giants: The Forgotten Contributions of 
Medieval Physicists*

https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=registration.jsp&eventid=353264&sessionid=1&key=D4AAECECF9D3501315CBA0A697F8AFC6&sourcepage=register

Event Date: Thursday, October 20, 2011 at 4:00 PM BST

We learn at school that Newton is the father of modern optics, 
Copernicus heralded the birth of astronomy, and Snell deduced the law of 
refraction. But what debt do these men owe to the physicists and 
astronomers of the medieval Islamic Empire? What about Ibn al-Haytham, 
the greatest physicist in the 2000-year span between Archimedes and 
Newton, whose Book of Optics was just as influential as Newton's seven 
centuries later? Or Ibn Sahl, who came up with the correct law of 
refraction many centuries before Snell? What of the astronomers al-Tusi 
and Ibn al-Shatir, without whom Copernicus would not have been able to 
formulate his heliocentric model of the solar system? In this lecture, 
Jim Al-Khalili recounts the stories of these characters and more from 
his new book Pathfinders: The Golden Age of Arabic Science.

	Sun and Moon Studios


The webinar will run for approximately 45 minutes with time for a Q&A at 
the end.

*/Attendance is free. Registrants for this webinar should be aware that 
data that they submit as part of their participation in the webinar will 
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-- 
Andrew W. Ragland
andrew.ragland at gmail.com