Servants of Nature: A History of Scientific Institutions, Enterprises and Sensibilities. Lewis Pyenson

Chinese astronomy

Innovation in instruments

       Time and prediction

       Astronomy and related disciplines

       5 Showing: Museums

       The development of modern museums

       The British Museum and the ‘new museum idea’

       Museums in Europe and the United States

       Colonial museums

       Colonial and metropolitan museums: some comparisons

       Descriptions of colonial museums

       Museums in Canada, South America, and Australasia

       6 Growing: Botanical Gardens and Zoos

       The development of botanical gardens

       Kew Gardens

       The evolution of zoological gardens

       The rise of public zoos

       PART II: ENTERPRISES

       7 Measuring: The Search for Precision

       Measurement in antiquity

       Syncretism and measuring instruments

       Newtonian measurement

       Timepieces

       Standardization

       The ideology of precision

       Measurement and industrial progress

       Absolute measurement and error analysis

       The transformation of mechanical precision

       Old programme, new effects

       Philosophy and practice

       Precision regnant

       Precision and the human spirit

       8 Reading: Books and the Spread of Ideas

       From script to print

       Facilitating the birth of modern science

       The rise of the scientific journal

       New forms for new audiences

       Showing science: the art of illustration

       9 Travelling: Discovery, Maps and Scientific Expeditions

       Who discovered whom?

       Travellers in antiquity

       Maps

       Progression of people and ideas in the Malay Archipelago

       European expansion

       A century of wonders

       The new encyclopaedia

       Classifying nature

       The scientific expeditions

       10 Counting: Statistics

       The odds

       Precision and numbers

       Surveying and statistics

       Terrestrial means

       Statistics physical and social

       Doctrine of certainty

       Twentieth-century uncertainty

       Average lives

       The popular triumph of averages