Peter Atkins
Peter William Atkins | |
|---|---|
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| Born | 10 August 1940 Amersham, Buckinghamshire, England |
| Alma mater | University of Leicester |
| Known for | Academic-level chemistry textbooks |
| Spouses | Judith Kearton
(m. 1964; div. 1983)Susan Greenfield (m. 1991; div. 2005)Patricia-Jean Nobes (m. 2008) |
| Awards | Laurence Barron |
Peter William Atkins FRSC (born 10 August 1940) is an English chemist and a Fellow of Lincoln College at the University of Oxford. He retired in 2007. He is a prolific writer of popular chemistry textbooks, including Physical Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry, and Molecular Quantum Mechanics. Atkins is also the author of a number of popular science books, including Atkins' Molecules, Galileo's Finger: The Ten Great Ideas of Science and On Being.
Career
Atkins left school (Dr Challoner's Grammar School, Amersham) at fifteen and took a job at Monsanto as a laboratory assistant. He studied for A-levels by himself and gained a place, following a last-minute interview, at the University of Leicester.
Atkins studied chemistry there, obtaining a
He has honorary doctorates from the
He was a member of the Council of the
Atkins has lectured in quantum mechanics, quantum chemistry, and thermodynamics courses (up to graduate level) at the University of Oxford. He is a patron of the Oxford University Scientific Society.
In 2016 Atkins received the James T. Grady-James H. Stack Award for Interpreting Chemistry for the Public from the American Chemical Society.[3]
Views on religion
Atkins is a well-known atheist.[4] He has written and spoken on issues of humanism, atheism, and conflicts between science and religion. According to Atkins, whereas religion scorns the power of human comprehension, science respects it.[5]
He was the first Senior Member of the Oxford University Secular Society, a Distinguished Supporter of
In December 2006, Atkins was interviewed by journalist Rod Liddle in a UK television documentary on atheism called The Trouble with Atheism. In the documentary, Liddle asked Atkins: "Give me your views on the existence, or otherwise, of God." Atkins replied: "Well, it's fairly straightforward: There isn't one. And there's no evidence for one, no reason to believe that there is one, and so I don't believe that there is one. And I think that it is rather foolish that people do think that there is one."[12] In July 2016, Atkins was quoted as stating, “We are a hiccup on the way from one oblivion to another oblivion.”[13]
Atkins is known for his use of strident language in criticising religion: He appeared in the 2008 documentary-style film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, in which he told interviewer Ben Stein that religion was "a fantasy" and "completely empty of any explanatory content. It is also evil".[14]
In 2007, Atkins's position on religion was described by Colin Tudge in an article in The Guardian as being non-scientific. In the same article, Atkins was also described as being "more hardline than Richard Dawkins", and of deliberately choosing to ignore Peter Medawar's famous adage that "Science is the art of the soluble".[15]
Personal life
Atkins married Judith Kearton in 1964 and they had one daughter, Juliet (born 1970). They divorced in 1983. In 1991, he married fellow scientist
Publications
General readers
- The Creation. ISBN 0-7167-1350-0.
- The Second Law. ISBN 0-7167-5004-X
- Creation Revisited. ISBN 0-7167-4500-3.
- Second Law: Energy, Chaos, and Form. ISBN 0-7167-5005-8.
- The Periodic Kingdom: A journey into the land of the chemical elements. ISBN 0-465-07266-6.
- Atkins' Molecules. ISBN 0-521-53536-0.
- Galileo's Finger: The Ten Great Ideas of Science. ISBN 0-19-860941-8.
- Four Laws That Drive the Universe. ISBN 978-0-19-923236-9.
- The Laws of Thermodynamics: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. 2010. ISBN 978-0-19-957219-9.
- On Being: A Scientist's Exploration of the Great Questions of Existence. ISBN 978-0-19-960336-7.
- Reactions: The private life of atoms. ISBN 978-0-19-969512-6.
- What is Chemistry?. Oxford University Press. 2013. ISBN 978-0-19-968398-7.[16]
- Physical Chemistry: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. 2014. ISBN 978-0-19-968909-5.
- Chemistry: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. 2015. ISBN 978-0-19-968397-0.
- Conjuring the Universe: The Origins of the Laws of Nature. Oxford University Press. 2018.[17]
University textbooks
- Atkins, Peter W.; Symons, M. C. R. (1967). The Structure of Inorganic Radicals. Amsterdam, New York: Elsevier Pub. Co. OCLC 543225.
- Atkins, Peter W. (1991). Quanta: A Handbook of Concepts (2nd ed.). New York: ISBN 978-0-19-855573-5.
- Atkins, Peter W.; Beran, J. A. (1992). General Chemistry (2nd ed.). New York: Scientific American Books. ISBN 978-0716724964.
- Atkins, Peter W.; de Paula, Julio; Friedman, Ronald (2009). Quanta, Matter, and Change: A molecular approach to physical chemistry. New York: ISBN 978-0-7167-6117-4.
- Atkins, Peter W.; Shriver, D. F. (2010). Inorganic Chemistry (5th ed.). W. H. Freeman. ISBN 978-1-4292-1820-7.
- Atkins, Peter W.; Friedman, Ronald (2010). Molecular Quantum Mechanics (5th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199541423.
- Atkins, Peter W.; de Paula, Julio (2011). Physical Chemistry for the Life Sciences (2nd ed.). W.H. Freeman & Company. ISBN 978-1-4292-3114-5.
- Atkins, Peter W.; de Paula, Julio (2022). Physical Chemistry (12th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0198847816.
- Atkins, Peter W.; Jones, Loretta (2023). Chemical Principles: The Quest for Insight (8th ed.). New York: ISBN 978-1319437930.
Media appearances
- Why Are We Here (Tern TV, 2017)
- Railways: The Making of a Nation – Food and Shopping (27 October 2016)
- Order & Disorder – The Story of Energy (16 October 2012)
- What is One Degree? (10 January 2011) - Interviewed by Ben Miller
- Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (18 April 2008)
- The Trouble with Atheism (18 December 2006)
Footnotes
- ^ "Van 't Hoff Centennial Symposium". Archived from the original on 5 October 2008. Retrieved 17 August 2008.
- ^ "Beyond Belief: Enlightenment 2 – Peter Atkins". The Science Network. Retrieved 20 January 2011.
- ^ "English chemist Peter Atkins wins Grady-Stack award for science journalism".
- ^ "Video of March 2007 debate with Alister McGrath". Atheistdebate.org. 11 February 2009. Archived from the original on 4 September 2011. Retrieved 27 August 2011.
- Council for Secular Humanism. Retrieved 22 March 2008.
- ^ "National Secular Society Honorary Associates". National Secular Society. Retrieved 31 July 2019.
- YouTube
- YouTube
- YouTube
- YouTube
- ^ "Rabbi Shmuley Boteach". Archived from the original on 26 April 2008.
- ^ "The Trouble with Atheism". UK Channel 4 TV Documentary. 18 December 2006.
- ^ Smart, Simon (15 July 2016). "The Meaningful Universe". Centre for Public Christianity. Retrieved 14 November 2021.
- ^ 'Expelled' documentary explores Darwin, Intelligent Design, religion debate Archived 13 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine. Christianexaminer.com. Retrieved on 27 August 2011.
- ^ Tudge, Colin (8 December 2007). "The art of the soluble". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 22 May 2010.
- ^ The Italian translation, Che cosa è la chimica? Un viaggio nel cuore della materia, won the Asimov Prize for 2016.
- ^ Frazier, Kendrick (2018). "New and Notable". Skeptical Inquirer. 42 (4). Committee for Skeptical Inquiry: 60.
Sources
- Who's Who in the World, 21st edition.
- Debrett's PeerageLtd., 2006.
- Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2006.
External links
- Peter Atkins at IMDb
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