SOAPSTone
Speaker: In this story the speaker and author (George Johnson) felt that science in the twenty-first century has become industrialized. As he states in the prologue experiments so often now cost millions of dollars. They generate terabytes of data to be analyzed by super computers calculating factories spewing so much heat that they are equipped with cooling stacks that consume the energy of small towns. But the real experiments, the ones not real heard of today came from that of one or two pair of hands. Men confronting the unknown of reasoning, questions answers and usually conducted on a table top. All computation, if any, was done on paper, it sound like to me George Johnson feels some kind of way about this.
Occasion: What prompted this to be written, I feel is the opinion that the author has on experiments. And how he judged one experiment to be better than another and pick the ten most beautiful experiments. I think that he thought that after all the articles and years he should show some credit to the ones who came be for him and made it now possible for him to do what he does.
Audience: I believe that the audience intended to read this book was his fellow colleagues. Or other scientists of his caliber and students that show interest in the subject. And for those who was forced to read this book by their school as a summer reading project.
Purpose: I feel the author wanted the audience to know the hard work behind the discoveries of many things through experiments. And in turn give his opinion of his top ten. Or just show off the experiments and not just the experimenter.
Subject: The subject was the ten most beautiful experiments between the 1600s and the late 1900s. Now he chose he’s top ten but his may be different from mine or yours. There were so many great experiments but it makes you think why he chose theses ten.
Tone: The author’s tone I felt was like exciting and interested in what he was telling the reader.