Contents:
Preface to the Johns Hopkins Edition
Preface to the Original Edition
A Note of Mathematics
A Note of References
A Note on Money
Acknowledgements 1 The Origins of Heaviside
( A Description of mid-19th century Victorian England.)
The Man
The Nature of His Work
The Grim World of Heaviside's Youth
Notes and References 2 The Early Years
(The young Heaviside, his family circumstances, and his education.)
The Beginning
A Lucky Marriage
First (and Last) Job
A Lifetime Decision
Tech Note: Where Is the Fault?
Notes and References 3 The First Theory of the Electric Telegraph
(Historical discussion of Professor William Thomson's 1854 diffusion theory, the starting point of Heaviside's work.)
Thomson and Stokes
The Law of Squares
The Atlantic Cable
The Speed of the Current
Phase Distortion
Tech Note: How Thomson Thought Electricity ""Soaks"" into an Infinitely Long Cable
Notes and References 4 Heaviside's Early Telegraphy Work
(An account of the introduction effects into cable analysis, and the nature of Heaviside's mode of working.)
A Full-Time Student
The Telegraph Papers
The Problem of Signal Rate Assymmetry
A ""Mathematical Monster""
Arithmatic Drudgery
Tech Note: Why a Cable Is Slower in One Direction than in the Other
Notes and References 5 The Scienticulist
(An introduction to William Henry Preece, Engineer-in-Chief of the British Post Offics and Heaviside's great nemesis.)
Heaviside's Nemesis
Subdividing the Electric Light
The Age of the ""Practical Man""
A Public Debate
Why Preece Prevailed (for a While)
A Clash of Personalities
Preece's Ability
The Telephone Affair
Heavisides Refuses to Be Shackled
Tech Note: Preece's Analysis of the Electric Light
Notes and References 6 Maxwell's Electricity
(The state of knowledge at Maxwell's death om 1879.)
Introduction
The Men before Maxwell
Action-at-a-Distance
The Luminiferous Ether
Faraday and Lines of Force
William Thomson
Maxwell
The Displacement Current
Post-script: Just What Is Electricity, Anyway?
Tech Note 1: A Technically Nice, Often Taught, but Historically False ""Explanantion"" of the Displacement Current
Tech Note 2: Action-at-a-Distance, Fields, and Faraday's Electronic State
Notes and References 7 Heaviside's Electrodynamics
(How Heaviside formulated the field equations and what he did with them.)
The Conversion of a Skeptic
The Electrician
The Importance of Mr. Biggs
Getting Off to a Bad Start
Reformulating Maxwell's Equations
A Friend in Germany
More Germans: Föppl, Boltzmann, and Planck
Energy and Its Flux
Moving Charges
A Friend at Cambridge
Faster-than-Light
Dr. Heaviside, F.R.S.
Tech Note 1: The Duplex Equations
Tech Note 2: The Localization of Electromagnetic Field Energy
Tech Note 3: Heaviside's Derivation of hte Electromagnetic Energy Flow Vector in Space
Tech Note 4: Poynting;s Physics (and Oliver's Objection)
Notes and References 8 The Battle With Preece
(The story of the "" KR-Law"" and Preece's efforts to suppress Heaviside's influence.)
High-Tech Hardware, Low-Tech Theory
Early Mathematical Analysis
The Peculiar Experiments of David Hughes
Preece's "" KR-Law"" and Heaviside's Attack
Oliver Lodge's Oscillating Leyden Jar
""Experience"" versus ""Theory""
Heaviside's Vindication
A Change of Sceneand Fame
Back in Printin Style!
His Friends Try to Help
More Battles
Tech Note1: The Skin Effect
Tech Note 2: The "" KR-Law""
Tech Note 3: Preece and Lodge on Lightning
Tech Note 4: Heaviside and S. P. Thompson on the Distortionless Circuit
Notes and References 9 The Great Quarterionic War
(The development of vectors by Heaviside and by Gibbs, and the debate with Tait.)
More Debates
Peter Tait, the Warrior of Victorian Science
William Hamilton and Quarterions
Before 1890The Calm Before the Storm
The Vector Analysis of Josiah Willard Gibbs
Tait Throws Down the Gauntlet
The Battle
The Aftermath
Off to WarAgain
Tech Note 1: Numbers and VecotrsReal, Complex and Hypercomplex
Tech Note 2: Hamilton's Insight at the Brougham Bridge
Tech Note 3: Quarterions Are Complex!
Notes and References Strange Mathematics
(Operational calculus.)
""Rigorous Mathematics In Narrow, Physical Mathematics Bold and Broad""
The Operator Concept
Heaviside's Operators
The Expansion Theorem
The Royal Society Affair
The Aftermath of the Rejection
A New Friend at Cambridge
Tech Note 1: Heaviside's Resistance Operators
Tech Note 2: The Problem with the p and 1/ p Operators
Tech Note 3: The Meaning of Heaviside's Fractional Operator, and Impulses
Tech Note 4: Heaviside and Divergent Series
Notes and References 11 The Age-of-the-Earth Controversy
(The debate between Perry and Kelvin, and Heaviside's support of Perry via his operational methods.)
Historical Origin of the Debate
The Problem of Fossils
Kelvin's Theory
perry's Rebuttal of Kelvin's Theory
Perry's Theory of Discontinuous Diffusivity
Kelvin's Defense and Perry's Reply
The End of the Debate
An Assessment of the Debate
A Final Word
Tech Note 1: Heaviside's Operator Solution of Kelvin's Original One-Dimensional Problem
Tech Note 2: Heaviside's Operator Solution of Perry's Problem of Discontinuous Diffusivity
Notes and References 12 The Final Years of the Hermit
(The Personal life of Heaviside after 1900, when essentially all his scientific work was done.)
A ""Gentleman"" with a Pension
Life in the Country
Another Change at The Electrician
The Passing of the Centuryand of a Friend and a Foe
The Catches up t Heavisideand Leaves Him Behind
Oliver Puts His Name on the Atmosphere
Increasing Trouble with Life
Life at Homefield
Death Takes and Pastand the Present
The End of the Hermit
A Last Look
Notes and References 13 Epilogue
(An evaluation of Heaviside's impact since his death.)
The Legend Grows
Heaviside Profiled in TimeMagazine!
Formulas Under the Floor
Last Words
Notes and References
Index
Credits
""A good book by a careful, historically minded engineer... A lively, informative narrative of Heaviside's life and work. Nahin has exhaustively resurveyed archives and contemporary sources and is very much at home in historical discussions of Victorian physics.""
