Preface.
Lapses, Sources, and Acknowledgments.
I. THE DOMAIN OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY.
1. The Mafia Invents the Barometer.
2. The Riddle of the Sphinx: Thomas Young's Experiment.
3. Joseph Henry and the (Near) Discovery of (Nearly) Everything.
4. Neptune: The Greatest Triumph in the History of Astronomy, or the Greatest Fluke?
5. Invisible Light: The Discovery of Radioactivity.
6. Light, Ether, Corpuscles, and Charge: The Electron.
7. Einstein's Miraculous Year (and a Few Others).
8. What Did the Eclipse Expedition Really Show? And Other Tales of General Relativity.
9. Two Quantum Tales: Bohr and Hydrogen, Dirac and the Positron.
10. A Third Quantum Tale: Southpaw Electrons and Discounted Luncheons.
II. THE DOMAIN OF TECHNOLOGY.
11. What Hath God Wrought? Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, Samuel Morse, and the Telegraph.
12. Fiat Lux: Edison, the Incandescent Bulb, and a Few Other Matters.
13. "Magna Est Veritas et Praevalet": The Telephone.
14. A Babble of Incoherence: The Wireless Telegraph, a.k.a. Radio.
15. Mind-Destroying Rays: Television.
16. Plausibility: The Invention of Secret Electronic Communication.
III. THE DOMAIN OF CHEMISTRY AND BIOLOGY.
17. The Evolution of Evolution: Erasmus, Charles, Gregor, and Ronald.
18. Dreams with Open Eyes: Kekulé, Benzene, and Loschmidt.
19. Chance, Good and Bad: Penicillin.
IV. THE DOMAIN OF MATHEMATICS: CLOSED FOR RENOVATION.
References and Notes.
Index.
