The Royal Society

April 1, 2019
A simple, delightful book on the Royal Society of London, its members, and accomplishments. As respected historian Tinniswood (History/Univ. of Buckingham; Behind the Throne: A Domestic History of the British Royal Household, 2018, etc.) recounts, in 1660, a group of friends from Wadham College Oxford met with other academics at Gresham College, London, to form a society fostering experimentation and observation rather than merely refining existing Aristotelian and Ptolemaic thought. By 1662, they were called the Royal Society, with a charter from the king. The Silver Mace presented to the group by Charles II still is exhibited at each meeting. The makeup of the society included physicians, professors of mathematics, physics, and natural philosophy, and some members of the aristocracy (in order to ensure not only proximity to power, but the hope of financial help). The society received its charter thanks to Sir Robert Moray, but it was Robert Hooke, as curator of monthly experiments, who kept the group in the vanguard of experimentation. Just a few of those exhibitions included demonstrations about poison, respiration, and blood transfusions. In 1665, Henry Oldenburg produced the first edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, a first-of-its-kind scientific journal that provided a public forum for an international culture of knowledge exchange that continues today. The society's repository was eventually combined with the holdings of Sir Hans Sloane to form the basis of the British Museum. Its most important move was sending botanist Joseph Banks, who became the longest-serving president of the society, on the expedition to record the transit of Venus in 1768, a voyage led by James Cook. For more than 350 years, the society has been an independent voice in the scientific community devoid of vested interests and the influence of government, private parties, and universities. Tinniswood's writing is scientifically clear, organized, and crisp, making this short book a wealth of information as well as a pleasant read. A welcome, concise addition to the literature on the history of science.

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April 8, 2019
Tinniswood (The Long Weekend), a University of Buckingham history research fellow, devotes this modest, accessible chronicle to the Royal Society of London and its role in developing modern scientific study. Writing in a conversational tone, he follows the Society’s successes and struggles since its 1660 formation, revisiting famous early members—including, in addition to Isaac Newton, natural philosopher Robert Boyle; Robert Hooke, discoverer of the cell; and architect Christopher Wren—and early experiments in which, he admits to squeamish modern readers, puppies and kittens routinely lost their lives. Tinniswood discusses, perhaps in excessive detail, the Society’s governance, including such missteps as its reluctance, up to the 1940s, to allow women admission. However, he takes care to note the Society’s many accomplishments, among them the 1665 publication of the first (and still publishing) scientific journal, Philosophical Transactions, and the Society’s sponsorship of Captain James Cook’s 1768 expedition, which resulted in the mapping of New Zealand and Australia’s coastlines. Tinniswood also touches on the Society’s involvement in contemporary issues; for example, climate change, cybersecurity, and genetically modified organisms. Science buffs will find Tinniswood’s account professionally written if nothing extraordinary, but it does present a credible case for the Royal Society’s historic and continuing importance.