First published in 1917, On Growth and Form was at once
revolutionary and conservative. Scottish
embryologist D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson (1860-1948) grew up in the newly cast shadow of Darwinism, and he took issue with some of the orthodoxies of the day-not because they were necessarily wrong, he said, but because they violated the spirit of Occam's razor, in which simple explanations are preferable to complex ones. In the case of such subjects as the growth of eggs, skeletons, and
crystals, Thompson cited mathematical authority: these were matters of "economy and transformation, " and they could be explained by laws governing surface tension and the like. (He doubtless would have enjoyed the…
A great book, to be read by all biophysicists-to-be.The modern follow-up to this book is Thom's Structural Stability, which shows that the logical conclusion of Thompson's ideas is both exciting and… On Growth and Form written by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson is a classic and should be found on the bookshelf of any well read person.This book sets our mind up for an education in physics, chemistry…
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