Scientists and the Cambridge Companions

Today we veer a little from our usual terrain.  The Cambridge Companions book series consists of anthologies of articles meant to introduce and provide context for major writers and thinkers, topics, and historical periods.  The subjects covered are primarily in the humanities.  The major areas listed include American Studies, Ancient Worlds, Culture, Classical Literature, Law, Linguistics, Literature and Drama, Management, Music, Philosophy, and Religion.  The list of subtopics is quite detailed, with Philosophy of Science being the only one remotely related to science, engineering, and medicine.  Yet, I've noticed a few scientists end up having volumes dedicated to them.  It is interesting to dwell on those scientists whose work has had ripple effects on the humanities.

First, to dispose of the obvious, what crops up under "Philosophy of Science"?  Four volumes, on the following subjects:  Einstein, Piaget, Darwin's Origin of Species, and Philosophy of Biology.  Not mentioned there is that there is also a Cambridge Companion to Darwin, now in its second edition, as well as volumes for Bacon and Carnap.  When you click on the subject "General Science", the volumes for Darwin and Newton (also in second edition) join Philosophy of Biology.   As far as I know, Darwin is the only biologist with a volume dedicated to him, and I can't think of a single chemist who has one.

Let's turn to mathematics.  Clicking on this subject yields two volumes, Einstein and Frege.  However, we know that others to whom volumes are dedicated have done important work in mathematics:  Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, and Bertrand Russell, for instance.  It is safe to say their mathematical work is probably not the principle reason they have volumes dedicated to them, however.

Let's sidestep a little and consider economics.  Two volumes pop up when you click on that subject:  Keynes and Hayek.  However, we know that there are also volumes on Adam Smith and Karl Marx.  There are also volumes dedicated to other thinkers who wrote about economics, but who might not primarily be considered "economists", such as John Locke, David Hume, and John Stuart Mill.

What I mainly wanted to write about here though is physics.  There are 3 volumes dedicated to physicists:  Galileo, Newton, and Einstein.  Obviously, some of the individuals mentioned above (Descartes, Pascal) and others (Thomas Hobbes) with Companions of their own, did work in physics as well, but Galileo, Newton, and Einstein are the ones that can be considered primarily physicists.  It is true that these three are revolutionary figures in the history of physics, and that their work did ripple out and influence philosophy and culture more broadly.  Each of them also worked in multiple areas of physics.

So, this raises an amusing question:  what other physicists might deserve a Cambridge Companion?  One hint is a set of books, not formally part of a series, published by Oxford University Press with a very similar format.  Three 19th century British physicists have such volumes dedicated to them:  Maxwell, Kelvin, and Stokes.  They are certainly deserving and were pivotal figures in the history of physics; however it might be argued that their impact on the humanities has not been as large as Galileo, Newton, and Einstein.  (Two obvious missing physicists from that 19th-century British set include Michael Faraday and Lord Rayleigh.)  Perhaps Niels Bohr might come closer to a good candidate.  At the more popular culture level, Nikola Tesla and Richard Feynman are obvious candidates (and such volumes would probably sell well), and Steven Weinberg certainly wrote prolifically for a general audience.  I will have to say though, the selection of Galileo, Newton, and Einstein are the most obvious choices to start with, and thus the series chose wisely.

The same parlor game could be played for biology, chemistry, and mathematics.  I don't know the history of these fields well enough to suggest candidates.  However, in logic (a field that overlaps with philosophy) an obvious and deserving figure would be Kurt Godel.  In economics, perhaps Herbert Simon or James M. Buchanan might be considered.  Among the geosciences, perhaps Alfred Wegener (of continental drift) and Edward N. Lorenz (of the butterfly effect) might be considered.

Of course, with Philosophy of Biology in the series, one could easily add volumes on the other major scientific disciplines, though these are frequently well served by other publishers (like the much more expensive Oxford Handbooks series, which generally has wider coverage than the Cambridge Companions).