Electrodynamics from Ampère to Einstein , Olivier Darrigol , Oxford U. Press, New York, 2000. $130.00 (532 pp.). ISBN 0-19-850594-9
One might hope that historical scholarship would be cumulative, resulting in progressively richer, more coherent, and more truly informative historical narratives and interpretations. In the real world, however, this ideal seems rarely to be realized; historians spend a lot of time and effort arguing back and forth in a noncumulative manner.
Especially regarding the material covered by Olivier Darrigol’s Electrodynamics from Ampère to Einstein, disputes among historians have often generated more heat than light. This is the case, for example, with such topics of perennial concern as the origin of Michael Faraday’s radical ideas concerning the electromagnetic field, the emergence of James Clerk Maxwell’s signal innovations in electromagnetic theory, and the development of Albert Einstein’s special theory of relativity in the context of...
