Lapses, Sources, and Acknowledgments.

I. THE DOMAIN OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY.

1. The Mafia Invents the Barometer.

2. The Riddle of the Sphinx: Thomas Young’s Experiment.

3. Joseph Henry and the (Near) Discovery of (Nearly) Everything.

4. Neptune: The Greatest Triumph in the History of Astronomy, or the Greatest Fluke?

5. Invisible Light: The Discovery of Radioactivity.

6. Light, Ether, Corpuscles, and Charge: The Electron.

7. Einstein’s Miraculous Year (and a Few Others).

8. What Did the Eclipse Expedition Really Show? And Other Tales of General Relativity.

9. Two Quantum Tales: Bohr and Hydrogen, Dirac and the Positron.

10. A Third Quantum Tale: Southpaw Electrons and Discounted Luncheons.

II. THE DOMAIN OF TECHNOLOGY.

11. What Hath God Wrought? Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, Samuel Morse, and the Telegraph.

12. Fiat Lux: Edison, the Incandescent Bulb, and a Few Other Matters.

13. “Magna Est Veritas et Praevalet”: The Telephone.

14. A Babble of Incoherence: The Wireless Telegraph, a.k.a. Radio.

15. Mind-Destroying Rays: Television.

16. Plausibility: The Invention of Secret Electronic Communication.

III. THE DOMAIN OF CHEMISTRY AND BIOLOGY.

17. The Evolution of Evolution: Erasmus, Charles, Gregor, and Ronald.

18. Dreams with Open Eyes: Kekulé, Benzene, and Loschmidt.

19. Chance, Good and Bad: Penicillin.

IV. THE DOMAIN OF MATHEMATICS: CLOSED FOR RENOVATION.

References and Notes.

Index.