SKY SCIENTIST

DOI: 10.4324/9781003239284-7

H enry Cavendish loved his books. He adored his science laboratory. He hated people.

Born in 1731, Cavendish was a member of the English nobility. Both of his grandfathers were dukes, and Cavendish, as the oldest son, was expected to study at university to practice law. But Cavendish was so shy that he had trouble talking to his family. Arguing law in front of strangers was more frightening than he could imagine.

Cavendish left school without getting a degree and set up a laboratory at his father’s estate where he spent most of his time. For the next 40 years, Cavendish did research on an amazing number of scientific principles. With primitive tools and no calculator, he accurately estimated that the Earth weighed 6 billion trillion metric tons. Today’s scientists have used space-age technology and hyperfast computers to calculate that the weight of the Earth is 5.9725 billion trillion metric tons. Cavendish’s caleolations were amazing.

He also experimented with chemistry and became the first scientist to ever isolate the element hydrogen. After that, he combined hydrogen and oxygen to form water in the laboratory. His research was nearly 100 years ahead of other scientists', but many of his discoveries were not credited to him until nearly 60 years after his death. He was so shy that he didn't want to publish his work. He took decades of meticulous scientific notes and never shared his discoveries with any other scientists.

The bulk of his work was published by James Clerk Maxwell. In the 1870s, Maxwell went through Cavendish’s volumes of notes and discovered that the shy scientist had discovered the principles of electrical conductivity, the law of partial pressures, and the science of thermodynamics. If his work had been shared with the world, science could have made greater strides at an earlier age.

His research was nearly 100 years ahead of other scientists', but many of his discoveries were not credited to him until nearly 60 years after his death. He was so shy that he didn't want to ^ publish his work.

But Cavendish was so shy that he rarely spoke to other people. His only social outings were to attend the weekly scientific dinner of the Royal Society. But if anyone wanted to ask him a question, they were told that they should not talk to him directly. To try to get an answer from him, people were advised to quietly walk over to where he was standing and talk to the air. Never address him to his face. If Cavendish was in a good mood, he might mumble a scientific answer. If not, he would just walk away.

Cavendish was quite wealthy and could afford to hire staff to take care of his household needs, so he did not have to talk to shop people or repairmen. He even built a private staircase in his house so he could avoid running into his housekeeper. He was especially scared of women and would leave instructions for his housekeeper on a piece of paper.

He never got over his extreme shyness. When he died in 1810 at the age of 78, Henry left the world a wealth of scientific knowledge and a fortune that today would be worth more than $730 million.

ANOTHER SHY GUY

Gregor Mendel was another inventor who was quiet and shy. Known as the father of genetics, Mendel was a monk who enjoyed working in his garden. He was so shy that he twice failed his oral exams at school. Explaining answers out loud made him nervous. But he loved to write and took meticulous notes on his observations on plant breeding. He coined the phrases recessive and dominant genes, and in 1865, published a paper about his work. But nobody took a serious look at the quiet scientist's work.

Mendel died just 3 years later and his work was largely ignored for 30 years. In 1900, four scientists rediscovered Mendel's work, and the invention of modern-day genetics was finally brought to light.