History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Synthetic and Natural Phenols (Studies in Organic Chemistry)

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Synthetic and Natural Phenols (Studies in Organic Chemistry)
J.H.P. Tyman
Manufacturer: Elsevier Science
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0444881646

Book Description

The chemistry of phenols tends to be ignored in organic chemical textbooks and to be lost amongst the many classes of functional derivatives. This volume is not intended to provide a textbook approach but rather to give an account of developments in phenol chemistry in the last two decades.

Features of this book:

• Numerous phenolic systems have been covered in detail, e.g. phenolic propanoids.

• The emphasis throughout has been on synthesis, on what can be achieved by the use of phenolic intermediates and in the construction of phenolic end products.

• Many chapters enable the reader to refer to the original literature wherever possible.

• Various chapters provide a fund of tutorial material and problems for undergraduate studies and further, which will encourage perusal of the literature. Some 2000 references to applied and academic papers are given.

Phenols are ubiquitous substances and now it is more widely accepted that there are pros and cons connected with their usage. The pros for compounds are well-known and are illustrated by perennial panaceas such as aspirin, paracetamol, codeine, etc. The cons are less obvious because they are also materials deeply entrenched in our standard of living and in most cases inherent hazards have only recently come to light. The book will be of interest to postgraduate students in academic and industrial work.

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"The double face of alchemy-laboratory and library-corresponds to the two-fold nature of the individuation process:

correction

A meeting with a remarkable mind

Great introductions to a fascinating subject

A digestable introduction to a bewildering subject

Alchemy: An Introduction to the Symbolism and the Psychology (Studies in Jungian Psychology)
Marie-Louise Von Franz
Manufacturer: Inner City Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Alchemical Active Imagination: Revised Edition (C. G. Jung Foundation Books)

The Forge and the Crucible: The Origins and Structure of Alchemy

On Divination and Synchronicity: The Psychology of Meaningful Chance. Originally Presented As Lectures at the C.G. Jung Institute, Zurich (Studies in Jungian Psychology)

Archetypal Dimensions of the Psyche

Anatomy of the Psyche: Alchemical Symbolism in Psychotherapy (Reality of the Psyche Series)

ASIN: 091912304X

Customer Reviews:

"The double face of alchemy-laboratory and library-corresponds to the two-fold nature of the individuation process:.......2006-05-22

. . . the active nature of participation in outer reality and relationships, together with the process of inner reflection."

The above quote from page 83 of von Franz' book illustrates the reason that Jung and von Franz were interested in alchemy: as a symbolic portrayal of psychic processes, particularly individuation. Individuation is the goal of all psychic processes which, in a nutshell, is balance--between conscious and unconscious processes achieved in part by developing a healthy connection with the collective unconscious.

This book displays the masterly scholarship of M.L. von Franz, who wrote this book as an introduction to the more arcane and less clearly written books by Jung on the topic. The book is taken from transcriptions of a series of lectures on alchemy.

Von Franz begins with discussing some basic Jungian, mythological and alchemical concepts. She then proceeds to discuss Greek alchemy for several chapters starting with one of the oldest alchemical writings "The Prophetess Isis to her son." Isis' son is of course, Horus. In this passage, an angel comes to Isis and wants to have sex with her. She negotiates a bargain where the angel will tell her the secret of alchemy. The bargain stipulates that she cannot share her secret with anyone except her son. Hence the secret of alchemy--the philosphers stone--is known as "the secret of the widow" (Isis was the widow of Osiris).

In other chapters von Franz discusses Arabic and European alchemy, utilizing other source texts. Von Franz recounts Jung's search for a text called "Aurora Consurgens" conducted with her assistance. Von Franz subsequently translated and published this text which some sources attribrute to Thomas Aquinas.

This is an excellent introduction to Jungian alchemical concepts. The text is accompanied by black and white illustrations of alchemical symbols.

(Remember that this is a transcript of lectures so the writing is not as good as some of von Franz' other works. In particular I found some of the transcribed questions and comments from the peanut gallery to be annoying.)

correction.......2003-07-12

just a note: the review above refers to Anatomy of the Psyche by Edinger. Anatomy of the Soul is a misprint.

A meeting with a remarkable mind.......2002-01-27

I first discovered Marie-Louise Von Franz in her collaboration with Emma Jung in their extraordinary book "The Grail Legend", which is by far the most intellectually coherent book I have ever encountered regarding that material, in which they place those strange and surreal stories in the framework of a Jungian perspective on the history of consciousness. In these lectures on alchemical symbolism, Von Franz applies many of the same Jungian techniques to explore some important alchemical texts.

I especially appreciated her decision to explore three texts in depth, rather than simply presenting a survey of alchemical literature, since there are numerous other books that do that. The fact that this is a transcript of a lecture series actually adds a wonderful dramatic tension to the book, since it includes some encounters with the attendees that demonstrate both her tremendous humanity and her impressive understanding of the subject and its relevance to modern psychology.

One of the most provocative concepts presented is the danger of an individual experiencing an overload of revelation from the unconscious, with its accompanying challenge of integrating more insight than a mere mortal can manage. Von Franz explores this concept especially well in the discussion of the text by Thomas Aquinas, where we learn about his very stressful final years in a very moving lecture that continues to provide me with much to ponder.

Great introductions to a fascinating subject.......2001-12-11

If I had my time over again I would read these three books on alchemy in the following order: All of them are excellent in their own sphere to introduce a complex process.

(1) The Forge and the Crucible - Eliade
This is an excellent prehistory of alchemy showing the patterns of thought out of which Alchemy most probably arose. An easy read.

(2) Anatomy of the Soul - Edinger
Set out according to seven processes involved in alchemy Calcinatio, Solutio, Coagulatio, Sublimatio, Mortificatio, Separatio, Coniunctio, this is an accessible book that puts each process in reasonably neat boxes, (though the considerable overlap and intermingling is acknowledged). The approach is somewhat mechanical.

(3) Alchemy, an Introduction... - Von Franz.
More 'organic' than Edinger, Von Franz has a very warm and human touch. She deals with the origins of alchemy in Egypt and Greece and delves into the 'Aurora Consurgens', attributed to Aquinas. She includes relevent and interesting case material. Being a transcription of lectures, it is a little haphazard, though none the less informative for that.

A digestable introduction to a bewildering subject.......1999-04-20

This book comprises a series of lectures on Greek, Arabic and European alchemy. Since it is not written material every word is not weighed, which is a problem within the field of Jungian psychology. It's, however, quite interesting. One major surprise is that St. Thomas Aquinas is, with great likelihood, the author of the alchemical work 'Aurora Consurgens.'

Book Description

Venomous Earth is the compelling story of the worst chemical disaster in human history - unfolding now. It explores the geology, politics and biology of why tens thousands of people are dying, hundreds of thousands developing cancer and tens of millions of people are at risk in Bangladesh, India and beyond, from arsenic-contaminated well water. Andrew Meharg compares this scenario with that in other areas of the world where drinking water is tainted with arsenic, such as extensive areas of South Western USA, the Alto Plano of South America and New Zealand's volcanic regions. He details historical precedents spanning thousands of years in mining and smelting communities, and due to the widespread use of arsenic in alchemy, farming, medicine and manufacturing. His tale takes in William Morris, Paracelsus, George W Bush and a cosmetic that killed two popes. Finally Venomous Earth looks at how the current arsenic crisis is to be tackled and highlights new challenges to our ongoing struggle with the toxic element.

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New Urban Sociology
Below average, disconnected book.

Global Cities
Mark Abrahamson
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0195142047

Book Description

Global Cities examines the distinctive commercial, residential, and spatial features of the major cities of the contemporary world--cities housing the financial and cultural activities that are most consequential for everyone, regardless of where they live. The development of these influential cities is intimately related to the emergence of modern telecommunications, the growth of multinational corporations, the internationalization of economic activity, and the increased movement of cultural symbols and artifacts across national lines. Accessible to readers with little background in sociology or social science, Global Cities analyzes numerous contemporary issues to illustrate concepts and processes pertaining to the most significant global cities. These concrete examples facilitate students' general understanding and show them the contemporary relevance of the material. The book offers a detailed and multifaceted picture of such leading urban centers as London, New York, Tokyo, and Paris, but also branches out to other important cities in the world. It analyzes both the internal features of the cities and the nature of their connections with each other. Global Cities is ideal for undergraduate courses in urban sociology and other social sciences.

Customer Reviews:

New Urban Sociology.......2005-04-28

Abrahamson's Global Cities is a welcome new book: It provides a truly global perspective on urban life, examining both the economic and cultural dimensions of globalism. It provides especially thorough examinations of immigration and the effects of foreign investment upon global inequality. It is a very well-written book, with little un-necessary jargon.

Below average, disconnected book........2005-03-19

This is a poorly written work with disconnected arguments and observations. The premise of the book is interesting: most of the works on globalization and cities either focus on economic issues or cultural issues--this book will attempt to do both. From this promising beginning, the book falls apart from poor writing that takes the reader all over the place--geographically and temporally. Within the first few pages of the book, the discussions goes from the history of London during the Roman Empire to the fate of GUM shopping mall in Moscow in light of the Asian financial crisis in 1997. All this shifting isn't done with a postmodern sense of irony (although a crude understanding of postmodernism informs some of the analysis) nor social science rigor nor insightful observerations of a keen historian. The observations on cities and their relationship with globalization is rehashing of conventional wisdom and are just simply pedestrian. After suffering through the book, I'm puzzled over how Oxford University Press could have published such a book.

A Short History of Chemistry (Science Study Series)

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After forty years, still the best short history
A longtime favorite of mine
Excellent

A Short History of Chemistry (Science Study Series)
Isaac Asimov
Manufacturer: Greenwood Press Reprint
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0313207690

Book Description

From the use of metals by prehistoric man to the alchemical experiments of medieval and renaissance man to the complex chemical skills of contemporary man, Asimov traces the development of this building block of our technological world.

Customer Reviews:

After forty years, still the best short history.......2004-07-17

Even though this book was written forty years ago and there have been many advances in chemistry since then, it remains the best introduction to chemistry available. Isaac Asimov is still the best explainer of science that has ever existed and he was never better than when writing this book. Although Asimov was capable of writing in all areas of science, he was trained as a chemist, so in this case he was writing about the subject that he knew the most about.
The understanding of the elements that led to the modern periodic table did not come easy. There were many false starts and partial truths that were presented, refuted and remodeled. Asimov takes you through all of this historical record, emphasizing that scientific "truth" is an evolutionary process. The "Aha!" moment is a very rare event in science. Most discoveries are the results of months or years of painstaking research and few are definitive. Some of the main advances started as intelligent suppositions that were not verified for decades.
Written at the level of the intelligent high school student, this is the best introduction to the intellectual struggles that forged (literally and figuratively) our current knowledge of chemistry.

A longtime favorite of mine.......2003-12-28

I've had my copy of this since high school. Most of my other books are gone, but I still have this one. It's a very excellent overview of the developments in chemistry, from the early days of discovery, from Lavoisier, to Mendleev, to the Atomic Age. A wonderful book that livens up what can be a very dry subject.

Excellent.......2001-12-17

A great accompanyment to a high school chemistry course. High school chemistry is so abstract, that one wonders how chemists ever thought to look at the things they studied to develop the field. Asimov explains what concrete problems and concerns led to the development of each important discovery, situating it in terms of what was understood at the time, and making the logic of the field's development clear. Easy enough for the non-scientist, but with lots of material I never learned in my science education. Asimov was a great popularizer!

Made to Measure: New Materials for the 21st Century

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An overview of the materials world at the atomic level
Made to enjoy
Fantastic introduction to modern material science
An excellent introduction to the coming age of materials
A fantastic overview!

Made to Measure: New Materials for the 21st Century
Philip Ball
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0691009759

Book Description

Made to Measure introduces a general audience to one of today's most exciting areas of scientific research: materials science. Philip Ball describes how scientists are currently inventing thousands of new materials, ranging from synthetic skin, blood, and bone to substances that repair themselves and adapt to their environment, that swell and flex like muscles, that repel any ink or paint, and that capture and store the energy of the Sun. He shows how all this is being accomplished precisely because, for the first time in history, materials are being "made to measure": designed for particular applications, rather than discovered in nature or by haphazard experimentation. Now scientists literally put new materials together on the drawing board in the same way that a blueprint is specified for a house or an electronic circuit. But the designers are working not with skylights and alcoves, not with transistors and capacitors, but with molecules and atoms.

This book is written in the same engaging manner as Ball's popular book on chemistry, Designing the Molecular World, and it links insights from chemistry, biology, and physics with those from engineering as it outlines the various areas in which new materials will transform our lives in the twenty-first century. The chapters provide vignettes from a broad range of selected areas of materials science and can be read as separate essays. The subjects include photonic materials, materials for information storage, smart materials, biomaterials, biomedical materials, materials for clean energy, porous materials, diamond and hard materials, new polymers, and surfaces and interfaces.

Customer Reviews:

An overview of the materials world at the atomic level.......2005-04-10

Although materials science is a fast-evolving discipline, and even though this book was written 10 years ago, it is still an important and useful contribution. Philip Ball has taken a diverse and interdisciplinary science and created a book that is both readable, interesting, and informative, no matter what your level of scientific literacy.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am a materials scientist, so I may not be the best person to comment on the book's readability to the layman. There is some technical vocabulary. It is always explained, but someone without a clear idea of the basic building blocks of matter (atoms, molecules, electrons, etc.) a reader will find this book a heavy slog. However, there is nothing in the book above the scientific literacy level of high-school chemistry and physics. Anything more advanced is explained in a conversational and coherent manner, without ever resorting to distorting approximations that riddle newspaper accounts of science.

What makes this book especially valuable is that the breadth of topics is so large that even a practicing materials scientist will learn a lot from reading the book. There are discussions of inorganic and biological polymers, mineral films, magnetism, imaging, etc. Even better, especially for the average reader, is the constant referal to actual devices (both current technology and speculation about future technology). This is not an esoteric book - Ball includes issues such as solar power and its feasibility (it's still more expensive to generate solar lectricity than oil-fired or hydro). There is also extensive discussions on such diverse issues as wear in machines, the operation of computer magnetic hard drives, and medical prosthetic devices such as artificial hearts.

This is not a quick read - there is some technical jargon and the text is quite dense. However, there are many diagrams and the writing is quite accessible, so I would not hesitate to recommend this book as a wide-reaching and honest overview of the broadly amorphous field called materials science.

Made to enjoy.......2003-04-30

This is a well done book.
Its not a technical book (but good pointers) yet not non-technical popular-mechanics type work. This book describes what science is pretty much all about! Its easy to get bogged down in your own world of work so a book such as this helps get your eyes open to the possibilities of the opportunites that come from hard, hard work. :)

This book talks about whats going on at the molecular level of things (my version is 1997). For the non-specialist this book is just great though I suppose if you work in micro-optics or semi/super conductors you might find that research is moving on a bit.

things discussed:
Optics (photonic material), superconductors, medicine & applications: biomaerials (chapt 4 - my fav), biomedical materials (cool), polymers, smart materials. energy, and more.

there is also a rather extensive bibliography so you can look for more info with Google.com(r) or other site.

Fantastic introduction to modern material science.......2003-01-24

A unique book that presents a comprehensive and modern overview of new materials in both scientific and popular ways at the same time. It is so nicely written that you can read it as a novel. Philip Ball managed to put a truly encyclopedic knowledge in a single book. A "must have" book for every person who is dealing with new materials.

An excellent introduction to the coming age of materials.......2001-08-17

Just as the 20th century has been often described as the information age, it might also be described as the age of materials. At the beginning of the 20th century, our technology was based mostly on materials harvested and refined from nature. Milled lumber, iron, copper, and alloys of common metals. Fabrics were all derived from plans and animals with very little processing.

Early in the past century a revoution started to develop in materials technology, as scientists and engineers began to experiment with creating molecules and structures not found in naturally occuring materials. At the molecular lever, chemists created long-chain polymers that had some of the characteristics of natural materials, but greatly improved resistence to wear and temperature. At the macroscopic level, materials were combined into composites like plywood and epoxy reinforced fiberglass. New structures unseen in nature, like matrixes of carbon and boron fibers embedded in metals, became possible. By the end of the century, it was possible to start moving around individual atoms to create entirely new materials with designer properties.

Ball's narrative covers both the history of materials science, and the future and its possibilities. He's particularly good at the historical story, and at drawing parallels betwene natural and artifial structures. As in Ball's other popular works on science, "Made to Measure" is approachable without being trivial, and rigorous in its attention to detail without becoming numbingly pedantic. This is a book that would serve admiribly as either an introduction for the educated reader or a supplimentary text in an introductory materials engineer course.

A fantastic overview!.......2000-08-26

Philip Ball argues for the increasing importance of materials in the future and does so eloquently and clearly. He invites the layman into the complexities of material science and sparks great interest in this field without burdening the audience with superfluous technical detail. This is a must-read for those curious about the future of engineering as a whole!

War and Nature: Fighting Humans and Insects with Chemicals from World War I to Silent Spring (Studies in Environment and History)

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creative synthesis
angels and insects

War and Nature: Fighting Humans and Insects with Chemicals from World War I to Silent Spring (Studies in Environment and History)
Edmund Russell
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0521790034

Book Description

While cultural and scholarly traditions have led us to believe that war and control of nature are separate, there are many more similarities than most people might suspect. Tracing the history of chemical warfare and pest control, Edmund Russell shows how war and control of nature coevolved. Ideologically, institutionally, and technologically, the paths of chemical warfare and pest control intersected repeatedly in the twentieth century. War and Nature helps us to understand the impact of war on nature and vice versa, as well as the development of total war, and the rise of the modern environmental movement. Edmund Russell is an assistant professor in the Division of Technology, Culture, and Communication in the School of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Virginia. This is his first book.

Customer Reviews:

creative synthesis.......2003-05-01

In War and Nature Edmund Russell, Associate Professor of Technology, Culture, and Communication at the University of Virginia, cleverly traces the interaction between chemical warfare and pest control from World War I to the Vietnam War. His central thesis is that war and control of nature have coevolved: "the control of nature expanded the scale of war, and war expanded the scale on which people controlled nature" (p. 2). Following up on his dissertation (University of Michigan, 1993), which won the Rachel Carson Prize from the American Society for Environmental History, Russell culled a wide variety of recently declassified U.S. government documents, business publications, and contemporary books and articles. Russell finds that World Wars I and II and the Cold War forged close ties between military and scientific institutions, and efforts to maintain such links became hallmarks of the post-World War II era. Scientifically and technologically, pest control and chemical warfare each created knowledge and tools that reinforced the other (p. 4) For example, on the eve of World War I, there were few U.S. chemical companies. They manufactured primarily low-profit bulk chemicals. In contrast, Germany had the best chemical factories and schools and had the largest output of sophisticated products. Eight German companies made up almost 80 percent of the world's dyes (p. 18). However, the increased use of mustard and chlorine gas in the war boosted the demand by European allies for these chemicals from the United States. The "Chemical Warfare Service" was created within the U.S. Army to employ civilian chemists to conduct research on war gases. This research also stimulated the invention of new insecticides to deal with such menaces as the boll weevil (attacking cotton crops), house fly (spreading typhus), the San Jose scale (damaging fruit trees), and mosquitoes (spreading malaria).
The use of chemicals in warfare is not new. Interestingly, Russell points out that the first recorded use of poison gas was in 428 BC, when Spartans besieging Plataea attempted to kill its defenders by burning wood soaked in pitch and sulfur under city walls (p. 4). However, chemical warfare increased throughout the twentieth century. According to Russell, at least 90,000 people were killed in World War I by gas, and estimated 350,000 were killed by gas in World War II, not including all the victims in Hitler's gas chambers. Even these figures seem low. Russell skillfully shows through cartoons how federal entomologists and chemists used insects in their propaganda as metaphors for human enemies. One cartoon depicts a conversation between two worms, one of them exclaiming: "What! Me sabotage that guy's victory garden? What do you take me for-a Jap? (p. 100)."
The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 sought to exclude gas from warfare and define the rights of combatants. Public outrage at the use of chemicals as weapons of war continued to mount. After World War II, the Chemical Warfare Service and other chemical companies lobbied Congress vigorously, stressing the need to develop war gases as insecticides, for which increased funding was required. Noted chemists testified before Congress, claiming also that chemical and biological warfare was "more humane" than conventional warfare. According to Russell, who interviewed several of these chemists, Chief Chemical Officer William Creasy inanely argued in 1958 that 25,000 American casualties on Iwo Jima could have been avoided had the U.S. military employed chemical weapons (p. 208). Miracle "psychochemicals" were promoted, such as LSD-25 that could temporarily incapacitate troops but not permanently harm them. Russell cites a US Army propaganda film produced in 1958 in which a cat chased and caught a mouse, inhaled an unnamed gas, and then cowered from another mouse (p. 208). This publicity campaign persuaded Pentagon authorities to increase the U.S. Army's budget to $80,000,000 for chemical research.
Research to fight insects increased simultaneously with the development of chemicals to fight humans. As thousands of families moved to the suburbs in the 1950s, gardening became a popular hobby and stimulated the desire for pest control. Pesticide manufacturers such as Du Pont and Dow increased their marketing to this group of consumers, while federal crop dusting programs using DDT were initiated.
Russell shows how Rachel Carson's publication of Silent Spring in 1962 galvanized the American environmental movement, leading eventually to the ban on DDT in 1972. This immediate bestseller detailed the noxious effects of DDT on plants and animals and characterized pest control as a self-defeating form of warfare (p. 229).
Reading this book, one is struck by the immense irony of the twentieth century and the causal interaction of peace and war. Never before have so many human lives been saved (thanks to pesticides killing disease-carrying insects and increasing crop yields) and so many destroyed (mostly due to incendiaries, but also chemical weapons). Americans got better at saving lives partly because they got better at taking them, and vice versa. While War and Nature is almost too dazzling in its rich detail and sometimes a bit careless in its logic (e.g. implying that human beings should not be considered part of nature), the book breaks new ground in its connection of two traditionally disparate fields of inquiry, environmental and military history. It should be required reading in college courses in both security studies and environmental science.---Johanna Granville, Ph.D. (Stanford University)

angels and insects.......2002-10-01

World War I was just the beginning of an ongoing cultural and scientific process in which chemical based weapons were created and marketed for use against human and insect enemies. Russell reminds us that the cultural, institutional, and political evolution of twentieth century science and warfare in the United States began not with the J. Robert Oppenheimer and the physicists of Los Alamos but with chemists like James B. Conant and his colleagues at Harvard and American University, emergent corporations like Dupont and the Hooker Company, and government agencies such as the Department of Agriculture and the United States Chemical Warfare Service. With an eye for detail and a witty and readable narrative style, the author assembles scientific papers, declassified governmental and military planning documents, trade journals, and propaganda and advertising literature to reshape our understanding not only of the role of chemistry in warfare, but more importantly the reflexive nature of our understanding and relation to both technology and nature during times of peace.

The Jewish Alchemists: A History and Source Book

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Ian Myles Slater on An Interesting Experiment
An Essential Resource

The Jewish Alchemists: A History and Source Book
Raphael Patai
Manufacturer: Princeton Univ Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Social History | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

General | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

General | Judaism | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

General & Reference | Chemistry | Science | Subjects | Books

History of Science | History & Philosophy | Science | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0691032904

Book Description

In this monumental work, Raphael Patai opens up an entirely new field of cultural history by tracing Jewish alchemy from antiquity to the nineteenth century. Until now there has been little attention given to the significant role that Jews played in the field of alchemy. Here, drawing on an enormous range of previously unexplored sources, Patai reveals that Jews were major players in what was for centuries one of humanity's most compelling intellectual obsessions. In this monumental work, Raphael Patai opens up an entirely new field of cultural history by tracing Jewish alchemy from antiquity to the nineteenth century. Until now there has been little attention given to the significant role that Jews played in the field of alchemy. Here, drawing on an enormous range of previously unexplored sources, Patai reveals that Jews were major players in what was for centuries one of humanity's most compelling intellectual obsessions.

Customer Reviews:

Ian Myles Slater on An Interesting Experiment.......2003-09-23

The "Kirkus Review" description (quoted as part of the Amazon listing) seems to miss the point. Although historians of both Alchemy and Judaism have been in agreement that the Jewish role in the development and spread of alchemy was either non-existent or tiny, the alchemical texts themselves insist otherwise. The main lines of development have been traced from Hellenistic Egypt, through the Islamic world, and into Christian Europe, with little or no need for Jewish sources or transmitters, and most Jewish historians have been satisfied (or delighted) to agree.

Indeed, in influential writings on the psychological meanings of alchemical symbolism, C. G. Jung went so far as to reclassify the several Jewish alchemists cited and quoted in Alexandrian Greek documents as really Jewish Christians. (He had a theory that transmutation was a material metaphor for transubstantiation, which required a Christian origin before alchemy reached Islam.)

The late Raphael Patai amassed a huge amount of information, including alchemical manuscripts in Hebrew (translated with commentaries herein), and set about to consider the cases of supposed alchemists described as Jewish, and real alchemists supposed by someone to be Jewish, in detail. While many particular instances are unconvincing, the interplay he demonstrates between medicine and alchemy on the one hand, and alchemical and mystical circles on the other, does suggest that at least a minor theme in Jewish intellectual life has been ignored by modern scholarship.

The main problem with the book is that it really requires backgrounds in both Jewish and alchemical studies to follow and judge Patai's arguments. However, to be fair, it does not offer itself as a primer in either subject. You will have to look elsewhere, and there is ample bibliographic information.

A few examples of what it offers:

Harry Potter fans will here encounter the real Nicholas Flamel of Paris (a real man, if not necessarily really an alchemist), and his supposed Jewish source-book for the philosopher's stone. Patai does not seem to me to advance the argument much, but he does demonstrate that the legend is part of a larger body of material about Jewish books falling into Christian hands. He also has some useful comments on the obliviousness of English and European scholars to each other's writings on Flamel, and some deeply embedded errors of translation in English-language treatments.

Patai's argument for a genuine Hebrew original of the "autobiography" of the magician and alchemist "Abramelin" is interesting, but he manages to misrepresent Gershom Scholem's changes of mind on the subject. Scholem, in a note in "On the Mystical Shape of the Godhead" (German edition 1962, English translation 1991; pages 314-315, note 24 to "Tselem: The Concept of the Astral Body"), which Patai does not cite, explains that since first treating it as Jewish in 1925 he had found Renaissance Christian sources for the book's Jewish concepts and post-biblical Hebrew and Aramaic. However, it is worthwhile to have Patai's citations of the German version, in addition to that translated from French into English by MacGregor Mathers in 1898 (reprinted some years ago by Dover). (Also, some of A.E. Waite's reasons for rejecting the Jewish origin of the text, in his "Ceremonial Magic," such as the paternal blessing of children and the concept of guardian angels, are actually minor evidences for it!)

There is an interesting, and to my mind inconclusive, reconsideration of some the works formerly attributed to the Christian mystic Ramon Lull (various spellings), and their possible Jewish background.

Working notes of actual alchemists, including a multi-lingual dictionary of instruments and materials which is valuable evidence of cross-cultural influences in several directions.

All in all, a useful book for anyone already familiar with basic works on the history of alchemy, or with an interest in Jewish studies, and a good addition to a library with at least basic collections in both these subjects.

An Essential Resource.......2000-07-14

I was very pleased to find that, like Patai's HEBREW GODDESS, this book combines thorough and excellent scholarship with translations of rare sources that are otherwise impossible to find. Patai does not claim the Jewish Patriarchs were alchemists, but in his broad chronological exploration of the topic begins with the historical development of later attributions of the Alexandrian alchemist Miriam by Arabic and other alchemists to one of the biblical Miriams of the New Testament or to Miriam, wife of Moses. The Alexandrian alchemist Mirian, like Cleopatra, was considered by Zosimos and others to be one of the great founders. As one would expect, her identity was eventually attributed to legendary times by medieval practitioners. Her Jewish name implies to Patai and other scholars that the earliest historical Jewish practice of alchemy developed in the heterodox Hermetic and Gnostic schools of Alexandria during the second to fourth centuries of the Common Era. Patai's voluminous research thoroughly explores the Jewish-Islamic stream of alchemy through early and late medieval periods. It provides, for the first time, a basis for students of the Western mystery tradition to understand the Jewish-Egyptian-Spanish esoteric stream that derived from the Pythagorean and Gnostic school of Akhmim near Nag Hammadi and Thebes in Upper Egypt, which indirectly produced such mysterious literary figures as "Abramelim the Mage." A good supplement for Patai's absolutely essential work would be Peter Kingsley's research on the survival of Neo-Pythagroean and Hermetic tradition in Akhmim, from which the Arabic Hermetic scientists, philosophers, and alchemists derived their knowledge.

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