On Tue, 11 May 2010 19:05:36 +0100, Orchid XP v8 wrote:

>>> Uh... I can't actually remember the title now. Let me go check...
>>>
>>> ...OK, the copy on his website has different cover art [sigh], but I
>>> believe it was Climbing Mount Improbable.
>> 
>> OK, so that's one book.  The more important works that he wrote had to
>> do with genetics.
> 
> Yeah, this one had to do with evolution and so forth. It made multiple
> references to The Blind Watchmaker, but I haven't read that.

So then you do know what he's done. ;-)

>>>> But in my circles, Richard Dawkins is quite well know.  So's Jane
>>>> Goodall, for that matter.
>>> My point being that you don't need to be in any particular "circles"
>>> to know who Einstein or Newton is.
>> 
>> Well, you assume everyone has heard of them.  There's probably some guy
>> living in a little village in a remote part of Africa who's never heard
>> of either of them.
> 
> I meant in general Western culture. People have written books and made
> films about Einstein, Newton and the like. They're that all known that
> "almost everybody" knows of them. I doubt too many people know who, say,
> William Harvey.
> 
>>> Even very small children have heard the tale of how Newton was hit on
>>> the head by an apple. (I wonder if that myth actually happened?)
>> 
>> It didn't; there was a bit on an episode of QI this series that talked
>> about the myth.
> 
> What a surprise...
> 
> (The next question, of course, becomes "who invented this myth?")

GIYF - a hit that I got returned:

http://physics.about.com/od/classicalmechanics/a/gravity.htm

>>> Everybody has heard of Archimedies, even if they're not sure exactly
>>> what he did.
>>>
>>> Unfortunately, there's nobody alive today of quite the same stature -
>>> except perhaps Steven Hawking.
>> 
>> Again, Jane Goodall probably fits that bill.  If we counted people who
>> have lived in our lifetimes, Carl Sagan.  Vint Cerf, Sir Tim
>> Berners-Lee, both of whom I previously mentioned, are also quite well
>> known.
> 
> I would refute that... Perhaps I need to do a straw poll when I go down
> the pub tonight? (Although I can't *pronounce* most of those names,
> so...)

You might refute it, a straw poll might be a start, but a poll of 20 
people isn't a particularly statistically valid poll.

As for pronunciation, I'm guessing Vint Cerf is the one you are having 
trouble with - I gave a clue, when I said "Cerfing". ;-)

Jim

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