The Seven Follies of Science [2nd ed.] / A popular account of the most famous scientific impossibilities and the attempts which have been made to solve them. To which is added a small budget of interesting paradoxes, illusions, and marvels

CONTENTS

	Preface
THE SEVEN FOLLIES OF SCIENCE
PAGE
	Introductory Note	1
I	Squaring the Circle	9
II	The Duplication of the Cube	30
III	The Trisection of an Angle	33
IV	Perpetual Motion	36
V	The Transmutation of Metals—Alchemy	79
VI	The Fixation of Mercury	92
VII	The Universal Medicine and the Elixir of Life	95
ADDITIONAL FOLLIES
Perpetual or Ever-burning Lamps		100
The Alkahest or Universal Solvent		104
Palingenesy		106
The Powder of Sympathy		111
A SMALL BUDGET OF PARADOXES, ILLUSIONS, AND MARVELS (WITH APOLOGIES TO PROFESSOR DE MORGAN)
The Fourth Dimension		117
How a Space may be apparently Enlarged by merely changing its Shape		126
Can a Man Lift Himself by the Straps of his Boots?		128
How a Spider Lifted a Snake		130
How the Shadow may be made to move backward on the Sun-dial		133
How a Watch may be used as a Compass		134
Micrography or Minute Writing. Writing so fine that the whole Bible, if written in characters of the same size, might be inscribed twenty-two times on a square inch		136
Illusions of the Senses		149
Taste and Smell		150
Sense of Heat		150
Sense of Hearing		150
Sense of Touch—One Thing Appearing as Two		151
How Objects may be apparently Seen through a Hole in the Hand		156
How to See (apparently) through a Solid Brick		158
CURIOUS ARITHMETICAL PROBLEMS
The Chess-board Problem		163
The Nail Problem		164
A Question of Population		165
How to Become a Millionaire		166
The Actual Cost and Present Value of the First Folio Shakespeare		168
Arithmetical Puzzles		170
Archimedes and His Fulcrum		171

Clyx.com