source of references—is at the sametime its weakness. The title of thebook, No Time to be Brief, probablycharacterizes it unintentionally. If theauthor, rather than striving for encyclo-pedic completeness, had concentratedon the really essential aspects, perhapson Pauli's scientific legacy, and con-tented himself with, say, one-third ofthe present size, he might have suc-ceeded in presenting a scientific biogra-phy that one would enjoy reading, andwhich would enable a nonexpert tounderstand why Pauli is regarded asone of the most important physicists ofthe 20th century. That is achieved bythe book An den Grenzen des Denkensby E. P. Fischer (Herder, Freiburg,2000), a work that deserves to be trans-lated into English.

Werner KutzelniggLehrstuhl fr Theoretische ChemieUniversit�t Bochum (Germany)

Magick, Mayhem, and Mavericks

The spirited historyof physical chemis-try. By Cathy Cobb.Prometheus Books,New York 2002.420 pp., hardcover$ 29.00.—ISBN1-57392-976-X

Cathy Cobb bubbles with enthusiasm inthe urge to share her appreciation of thehistorical development of physicalchemistry. She starts with the ancientGreeks, who dabbled with aspects ofwhat was to become physical chemistry,takes us through the emergence of themodern version of the subject with theinvestigators of the gas laws and the

atomic theory, and brings us bang up todate with modern applications of thisrichly varied subject with an account ofits applications to biological phenomenaand its elucidation, we all hope, of thenature of life.

The book starts off with an accountof very early science, although I thinkthe inclusion of Aristotle stretches thefrontiers of the subject rather severely.What we modern scientists recognizeas our subject does not really enter thediscussion until about page 133, withDalton and the growth of confidence inthe concept of the atom that occurredduring the nineteenth century. Trulymodern physical chemistry emerged inthe late nineteenth century with the for-mulation of thermodynamics, and in theearly twentieth century with the emer-gence of quantum theory. The authortreats these at reasonable length andwith lucidity, although I did find anumber of occasions where her graspof the concepts was unconvincing. Thefifth part (of about 150 pages) is aninteresting account of the struggles thatthe early physical chemists had to iden-tify the origin of chemical affinity, mis-guidedly looking for the analogue ofNewton's gravity to account for the ten-dency of substances to “gravitate”chemically towards each other and toform new compounds. The final part isa short introduction to where physicalchemistry is now heading, with signpostsurging it towards biology, nonlineardynamics, and nanotechnology.

The style throughout is enthusiastic.In some respects, although it might seemchurlish to say so, that is a problem. Ifound myself wondering who would beinterested in an engagingly light-hearted, but necessarily quite technical,account of physical chemistry. I doubtwhether the general reader would wantto know this amount of detail aboutsuch a recondite subject, and a profes-sional chemist (who would certainlyfind much to enjoy in these pages, andalso learn a lot) does not need therather low level of exposition. So, thereremains a concern that the target audi-ence is either unclear or doesn't exist.

But if it does exist, then this book willgive much pleasure.

I did, however, have some problemswith the exposition. The author is fondof analogies. These may work in a classenvironment and add sparkle to a lec-ture, but I found some of them irk-somely forced and complicated, andsometimes more confusing than the con-cept they were being used to present.The explanation of the black-body dis-tribution law in terms of a field full ofcups in a rainstorm was particularlybizarre and unhelpful (p. 231).

There are also a number of slips:Bohr was not German (p. 248), there isa confusing presentation about the com-position of probabilities (which shouldhave been expressed in terms of ampli-tudes) in the discussion of bonding(p. 257), and an erroneous statementabout exchange energy on the samepage. On page 138 it is implied thathydrogen is a component of air, andHenry's law is referred to as a truism(p. 142), which it certainly is not. Onthe following page (p. 143) readers willbe puzzled by the confusion betweenheat capacity and thermal conductivity,a mistake repeated on page 150 in a dif-ferent context. I am not at all convincedthat Newton regarded his third law as “astatement of his intuitions regarding theconservation of energy”, particularlybecause the concept of energy did notenter physics until more than a centurylater.

However, despite these slips andconfusions the book is a good, livelyread. It will give pleasure to those whoalready know some physical chemistryand who would like to know moreabout the personalities involved. Likeall books of this general kind, it willprove to be a good source of anecdotesfor presentations.

Peter AtkinsLincoln CollegeUniversity of Oxford (Great Britain)

DOI: 10.1002/anie.200385078

Books

1458 6 2004 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim www.angewandte.org Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2004, 43, 1457 – 1458