Talk:William Gilbert (physicist)

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Electric force

"In his book, he also static electricity using amber; amber is called elektron in Greek, so Gilbert decided to call its effect the electric force."

But Gilbert wrote in Latin, so he certainly didn't say "electric force". Niels H. de V. Heathcote 1967 says:

"Incidentally , had Gilbert intended vim electricam to be taken together he would have meant by it 'the power of attracting light bodies', precisely what Sir Thomas Browne meant by the word 'electricity'. ... It is for this reason that the rendering of vim electricam as 'electric force' is undesirable, since it is too suggestive of a measurable quantity (cf. the passage from Humboldt's Kosmos quoted by Mottelay (above, p. 267 and foot-note 29))." — Omegatron 02:50, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciation

What is the pronunciation of "Gilbert"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.2.87.1 (talk) 16:39, 14 June 2009 (UTC) I use a voiced velar plosive at the beginning, as in "get". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.97.95.95 (talk) 12:21, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

See Gilbert (surname). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.144.193.108 (talk) 13:31, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Earth rotation

The article says that

...Gilbert pointed out the motion of the skies was due to earth's rotation, and not the rotation of the spheres, 20 years before Galileo...

This seems to be misleading, since it was Copernicus who pointed that out first! Top.Squark (talk) 17:31, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually, Pythagoras and others said much the same much earlier. Pythagoras spoke well before all three, Copernicus

Gilbert and Galileo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.97.95.95 (talk) 12:16, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Disambiguation

I think this article should be moved to William Gilbert (astronomer) or something like that. See William Gilbert (disambiguation): There are several notable people named William Gilbert, and I think that merely searching for "William Gilbert" should take you directly to the disambiguation page. Does anyone object? Comments, please. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:36, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

• I agree...there are several William Gilberts I can think of off the top of my head. Rename this article to include (astronomer) and set the 'William Gilbert' as a disambiguation page. Jack1956 (talk) 15:46, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

• Seems like the right answer. Marc Shepherd (talk) 16:50, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

• I concur. Tim riley (talk) 18:39, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

• William Gilbert was not an astronomer so the title of this article is false! How does one edit title?Thony C. (talk) 17:36, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

You can't just rename an article - you have to move all the links. A consensus of editors agreed on this title. Please do not change it unless you have the agreement of a large number of editors to make the change and are willing to do the work to move all the links (there are many!) -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:41, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

You can move the page to a better title - see instructions at WP:MOVE. This is entirely uncontroversial, and it will leave a redirect in place so links pointing to the old title will lead to the new location. I agree that "(astronomer)" is a poor choice of title, given that he wasn't an astronomer - I'd probably go for "(scientist)", what do you think? Djr32 (talk) 22:26, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

It's fine with me, if you follow the instructions. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:52, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

I think Gilbert (scientist) is somewhat vague and would instead suggest Gilbert (physicist) as he was one of the principle founders of that discipline. Alternatively slightly less anachronistic would be Gilbert(natural philosopher).Thony C. (talk) 14:13, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

People don't even know what a "natural philosopher" is. If someone is looking for him because of his work on electricity, mapping the moon,etc., they might not recognize "natural philosopher". I'd go with physicist. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:57, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Date of Birth

I wanted to ask if you are sure that the stated date of birth is right. I'm reading several pieces about gilbert at the moment and the only date I find is 1540, not 1544. This is stated for example in the cambridge alumni database and in Mottelays translation of De Magnete, page ix I don't see any reference for the date in the article. Pilone (talk) 19:46, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm not too happy about the 1544 date either. Reliable sources such as Cambridge Alumni and DNB (1900) say 1540. FindAGrave (notoriously unreliable) says 24 May 1544 but shows a photo of a brass plaque saying 1540! However, the up-to-date online edition of the ODNB says, annoyingly without justification, that 1544 is the most likely date, although 24 May is probably just a guess. This suggests that 1544 is the current state of knowledge although I would really like to know how they worked that out. I've added the ODNB link to the article, along with a question mark. --Heron (talk) 20:54, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Notes

added by Pilone (talk) 19:51, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

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Interesting link

This seems an intersting link that someone might like to employ here: http://rsnr.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/roynotesrec/early/2011/05/30/rsnr.2011.0014.full.pdf Nick Moyes (talk) 22:10, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Thank you! I found it quite fascinating. I especially like the last line: "The moral of this story is that if a statement is put forward by a respected authority, is accompanied by a memorable illustration, and is no longer particularly relevant, then it is unlikely to be challenged." RockMagnetist(talk) 23:44, 1 April 2018 (UTC)