Summary of Frances Ashcroft's The Spark of Life

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 The idea that electricity was used to waken the monster is a misconception that probably originated with the famous 1931 film in which Boris Karloff played the monster. Shelley herself was more circumspect and only used the term instruments of life.

#2 Static electricity is the buildup of electrical charges on our bodies, which can be caused by the atmosphere being dry or humid. It can also be caused by metal objects close to us, or another person.

#3 The term static electricity refers only to the fact that the positive and negative electric charges are physically separated. As soon as a positively charged material comes close enough to a negatively charged one, current will flow from one to the other.

#4 The first machine capable of generating static electricity was invented by the German Otto von Guericke around 1663. It consisted of a ball of brimstone, about the size of a child’s head, with a wooden rod through its centre. The rod rested in a cradle, enabling the ball to be rotated on its axis by cranking the handle. When a dry hand or a pad of material was held against the whirling ball, static electricity was generated.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Jun 13, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822540057

IRB Media

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Insights on Frances Ashcroft's The Spark of Life

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 10

Insights from Chapter 11

Insights from Chapter 12

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The idea that electricity was used to waken the monster is a misconception that probably originated with the famous 1931 film in which Boris Karloff played the monster. Shelley herself was more circumspect and only used the term instruments of life.

#2

Static electricity is the buildup of electrical charges on our bodies, which can be caused by the atmosphere being dry or humid. It can also be caused by metal objects close to us, or another person.

#3

The term static electricity refers only to the fact that the positive and negative electric charges are physically separated. As soon as a positively charged material comes close enough to a negatively charged one, current will flow from one to the other.

#4

The first machine capable of generating static electricity was invented by the German Otto von Guericke around 1663. It consisted of a ball of brimstone, about the size of a child’s head, with a wooden rod through its centre. The rod rested in a cradle, enabling the ball to be rotated on its axis by cranking the handle. When a dry hand or a pad of material was held against the whirling ball, static electricity was generated.

#5

The Leyden jar was a device that could store static electricity. It was invented in 1745 by a German cleric, Ewald Jürgen von Kleist. The charge stored in a Leyden jar can be considerable, and extremely dangerous, as van Musschenbroek discovered.

#6

The Leyden jar was the first capacitor, and it was used to store and release electricity. It was later replaced by the capacitor, which operates on the same principle. It consists of two parallel metal plates separated by a thin layer of a non-conductive material such as mica, glass or air.

#7

The effects of electricity on the human body were demonstrated in 1746 by the French Abbé Nollet, who ordered 200 of his monks to form a circle and connect the two ends to a Leyden jar. The discharge of the jar sent a shock wave through the circle, which caused all the monks to jump in turn.

#8

Electricity was initially viewed as a manifestation of the force of life, and to tamper with it was blasphemy. But Benjamin Franklin changed that view forever, and electricity became the province of science.

#9

Franklin was the first to show that lightning is a form of electricity. He conducted an experiment in June 1752, when he flew a kite as a thunderstorm approached to prove that lightning is a stream of electrified air.

#10

In England, there was a dispute between those who preferred a pointed tip to a lightning conductor and those who preferred a round knob, because a sharpened point was dangerously effective and attracted the lightning to it. The latter idea was championed by Benjamin Wilson.

#11

Franklin advised that it was not wise to shelter under an isolated tree in a