Visual Cultures in Science and Technology

What makes a good scientific image? Is science defined by its pictures? The present book offers a broad comparative survey of the history, generation, use and function of images in scientific practice based on an extensive range of historical sources in the natural sciences, technology and medicine, particularly physics, astronomy, and chemistry.

Prior to his current full professorship in the history of science and technology at the University of Stuttgart, Klaus Hentschel was a Lecturer/Researcher at the Universities of Berlin, Göttingen and Berne, a Fellow at the Dibner Institute for the History of Science & Technology at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts 1996/97 and Ernst Cassirer Guest Professor at the University of Hamburg 2003.

- 1: Introduction
- 2: Historiographic layers of visual science cultures
- 3: Formation of visual science cultures
- 4: Pioneers of visual science cultures
- 5: Transfer of visual techniques
- 6: Support by illustrators and image technicians
- 7: One image rarely comes alone
- 8: Practical training in visual skills
- 9: Mastery of pattern recognition
- 10: Visual thinking in scientic and technological practice
- 11: Recurrent color taxonomies
- 12: Aesthetic fascination as a visual culture's binding glue
- 13: Issues of visual perception
- 14: Visuality through and through