Human Intelligence

Episode
Teachers: Mary Somerville
Broadcast Info
2025 (13 mins)
Description
Mary Somerville was a brilliant polymath who found time to correct the work of Isaac Newton whilst looking after her infant children. Naomi Alderman investigates her extraordinary work ethic and expansive interests. Somerville’s writings, across a range of disciplines - maths, astronomy, botany, geography - became essential reading for those learning science, and helped to define what a scientist was in the early 19th century.
Genre
History

How to cite this record

The Open University, "Human Intelligence". https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ou/search/index.php/prog/251867 (Accessed 06 Nov 2025)