Degrees of Importance

David Lindley. Degrees Kelvin: A Tale of Genius, Invention, and Tragedy. Washington , DC : Joseph Henry Press, 2004. viii + 366 pp. $27.95.

Reviewed by Michael Egan.

The legacy of Sir William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, is a bit of mystery. When he died in 1907, he was buried at Westminster Abbey beside Sir Isaac Newton, a king among scientists in a cemetery devoted to British royalty. Like his neighbor in rest, Thomson carried out work that made him one of the giants upon whose shoulders subsequent scientists would observe the physical landscape. Less than 100 years after his death, however, Thomson is the forgotten genius of 19th-century science.

Today he is most frequently associated with the absolute temperature scale that bears his name, although, as David Lindley tells us in his engaging biography, Thomson was not responsible for establishing the existence of absolute zero as a physical concept. Absolute zero, the bot tom of the Kelvin scale, is equivalent to –273.15˚ Celsius. Wrote Thomson: “infinite cold must correspond to a finite number of degrees of the air-ther mom eter below zero” (p. 100). The Kelvin scale only received its name in 1954, though Thomson’s theoretical and practical contributions to the measure of temperature and energy certainly justify recognition of his work.

Thomson’s other achievements deserve greater recognition and further historical scrutiny. As a youth in Glasgow, the son of a mathematics professor, Thomson demonstrated early promise as a mathematician, publishing his first scholarly article before he went to Cambridge to take an undergraduate degree. He showed aptitude and energy in contributing to the theories of electromagnetism and thermodynamics, two of the most significant legacies of 19th-century science. He was a prime mover in laying underwater telegraphic cables and revolutionizing global communications, and he invented a compass that provided accurate readings in the new steel ships that transported goods, people, and navies across the seas.

Whereas his youthful energy and genius catapulted him to wealth, celebrity, and a peerage, age diminished his powers. Toward the end of his life, Thomson found himself adamantly holding onto losing positions in debates against Charles Darwin and geologists. The credibility that he had earned through innovation and creative problem-solving waned. He became, as Lindley argues, a symbol of the 19th century: old, musty, bitter, and hopelessly archaic in the face of the new and challenging 20th century.

In recounting Thomson’s scientific achievements and explaining his relative disappearance from the popular imagination, Lindley is clear, accessible, interesting, and convincing. He dips into enough technical detail to satisfy his scientific reader, but he also succeeds in making difficult technical issues understandable to the lay reader. He also provides a moving account of Thomson’s family life, but the scientist’s personal and professional lives do not gel in Lindley’s treatment. He frequently interrupts narrative about Thomson’s work in physics with anecdotes about his early relationships with his father or sister.

Organizational reservations notwithstanding, Degrees Kelvin is a welcome addition to the history of 19th-century science and the literature of scientific biography.