A fascinating look at the historical relationship between environmental issues and scientific study, social attitudes, and public policy from the 17th century to the present. The Environment and Science: Social Impact and Interaction explores the history of how science investigates nature and how those studies both shape and are shaped by the social attitudes, philosophies, and politics of their times. It follows the changes in perceptions of the natural world and humankind's place in it from the European colonization of North America through the Industrial Revolution and westward expansion, to the rise of the consumer economy and the recent hardening of the ideological battle lines over environmental policy. Coverage includes the emergence of ecology as a science and conservation as a movement, the long history of conflicts between business interests and environmentalists, and the role of scientific studies in debates over atomic and nuclear power, pesticides, toxic emissions, and other human-made sources of environmental degradation. Biographical sketches of major contributors to the study of human/environment interaction, including Carolus Linnaeus, Henry David Thoreau, Charles Darwin, Rachel Carson, and Barry Commoner Primary source documents from key environmental writers

Did humans live in Florida during the Ice Age? In 1916, to the shock of the science world, a Florida geologist discovered human remains mixed with the bones of prehistoric animals in a Vero Beach canal and proclaimed that humans had lived in North America since the Ice Age. Elias Sellards's findings flew in the face of prevailing wisdom, which held that humans first came to the continent only 6,000 years ago. His claim was snubbed by the top scientists of his day; he was laughed out of the state; and the skull he found-famously known as "Vero Man"-was lost. An Ice Age Mystery tells the story of Sellards's exciting find and the controversy it sparked. In the years that followed, other archaeological discoveries and the rise of radiocarbon dating established that humans did arrive in North America earlier than previously thought, and many people began to wonder: what exactly had Sellards found at Vero? And what else might be buried there? One hundred years after the first Vero discovery, construction plans threatened to cover up the legendary dig site and a band of citizens and archaeologists protested. Excavations were reopened. Archaeologists uncovered 14,000-year-old burnt mammal bones and charcoal, signs of a human presence, and further found evidence to indicate a continuous human occupation of the site for over several thousand years. Sellards had been right all along. As the dig continues today, questions remain. Who were these people? Where did they come from? And how did they get here? This book draws readers into the past, present, and future of one of the most historic discoveries in American archaeology.

This volume contains new editions of two books which have been available only sporadically in the decades since their publication. R.Pearson's "Pasteur: Plagiarist, Imposter" was originally published in 1942, and is a succinct introduction to both Louis Pasteur and Antoine Bechamp, and the reasons behind the troubled relationship that they shared for their entire working lives. Whereas Pearson's work is a valuable introduction to an often complex topic, it is Ethel Douglas Hume's expansive and well-documented "Bechamp or Pasteur? A Lost Chapter in the History of Biology" which provides the main body of evidence. It covers the main points of contention between Bechamp and Pasteur in depth sufficient to satisfy any degree of scientific or historical scrutiny, and it contains, wherever possible, detailed references to the source material and supporting evidence. Virtually no claim in Ms Hume's book is undocumented. The reader will soon discern that neither Mr Pearson nor Ms Hume could ever be called fans of Pasteur or his 'science'. They both declare their intentions openly; that they wish to contribute to the undoing of a massive medical and scientific fraud. "Nothing is lost, nothing is created ... all is transformed. Nothing is the prey of death. All is the prey of life." -- Antoine Bechamp This is a new edition of this title. The text has been extensively re-edited for today's reader.

This book complements available one-make books on domestic synchronous clocks. It is also a history of science book that sets British domestic synchronous clocks, their manufacturers and technology in their social context. Part I covers the historical background, British domestic synchronous clock manufacturers and brands, how synchronous clocks work, domestic synchronous clock cases, practical advice on the servicing of domestic synchronous clocks and analysis of the marketing and reliability of British domestic synchronous clocks. This analysis provides an explanation of the rise and eventual fall of their technology. Part II contains galleries of a selection of British domestic synchronous clocks and of the movements with which they are fitted. There is a front and back view of each clock, together with a brief description. Views of each movement include views with the movement partly dismantled, together with a brief technical description of the movement. This profusely illustrated book is primarily for fellow enthusiasts and is based on an extensive archive of information on domestic synchronous clocks, their movements and their manufacturers. Current electrical regulations mean that professional clockmakers are reluctant to repair synchronous clocks. In fact, provided that they have not been mistreated, synchronous clocks are usually reliable, and quite easy to maintain.

Providing a historical overview of healthcare in Italy from its unification in 1861 to the present COVID-19 pandemic, this book analyses the political, social and cultural impact of Italian healthcare policy and medicine. The author examines the development of public health, hospitals, and primary care, and the building of healthcare systems across three political regimes in Italy: the liberal period (1861-1914), Fascism (1922-43), and the Italian Republic (1948 to the present day). By emphasising the embeddedness of health-related legislation in Italy's political and social background, this book offers a comparative account of Italian health policy, and contrasts this with developments in neighbouring European countries, Canada and the United States. The book focuses on the Italian government's reaction to the social and political impact of several diseases: pellagra; cholera; malaria; and tuberculosis, and explores the present-day response to the current COVID-19 pandemic. A timely and comprehensive read, this book will appeal to those teaching and researching Italian history and the history of medicine and healthcare more widely.

No rational mind - given the evidence of buttons and buttonholes in an article of clothing - would deny that both "intelligence" and "design" played roles in the fabrication of such a garment, but - mystery of mysteries - the brightest and most educated in our culture, reject such considerations for all the infinitely more complex living organisms, insisting (dogmatically) that they somehow "evolved" by haphazard, sequential, random mutations. A challenge is therefore, proposed - to anyone anti-"Intelligent Designer," who believes he has not been "brain-washed," but who has at least a "hair-line crack" to open-mindedness - to refute the material herein - the non-factuality and astronomical improbabilities of pure random-chance-mutations of individual elements (among the multi-billions in the DNA helix) as a credible belief system in explaining: the spider, butterfly, or bacterium flagellum (Pajaro Dunes Micro-Biology Conference - scientists challenging Darwinism); male-female sexuality feelings: irresistible sex-drive before; gratification after - evoking propagation and proliferation of mammalian species; the (simple, yet ever so complex) umbilical cord concept for mammals - from kittens to humans? This book is a scholarly review (in layman terms) of all pertinent aspects of Science versus Bible in all applicable fields: Archaeology, Astronomy, Biology, Cosmology, Egyptology, Paleontology, Physics, etc., with over 300 references to the arcane writings of world-class scientists, historians, mathematicians and adventurers.

Distillation is an art. And even an ancient one. It is strange to find that the history of this oldest and still most important method of producing chemically pure substances has ever been written. The reader looking at the bibliography appended to this book might object that many data existed. This may be true but the proper history of the art from the origin up to the present time was lacking.

This book presents, for the first time in English, a comprehensive anthology of essays on Christian Wolff's psychology written by leading international scholars. Christian Wolff is one of the towering figures in 18th-century Western thought. In the last decades, the publication of Wolff's Gesammelte Werke by Jean Ecole and collaborators has aroused new interest in his ideas, but the meaning, scope, and impact of his psychological program have remained open to close and comprehensive analysis and discussion. That is what this volume aims to do. This is the first volume in English completely devoted to Wolff's efforts to systematize empirical and rational psychology, against the background of his understanding of scientific method in metaphysics. Wolff thereby paved the way to the very idea of a scientific psychology. The book is divided into two parts. The first one covers the theoretical and historical meaning and scope of Wolff's psychology, both in its internal structure and in its relation to other parts of his philosophical system, such as logic, cosmology, aesthetics, or practical philosophy. The second part deals with the reception and impact of Wolff's psychology, starting with early reactions from his disciples and opponents, and moving on to Kant, Hegel, and Wundt. The Force of an Idea: New Essays on Christian Wolff's Psychology shows not only that Wolff's psychological ideas have been misinterpreted, but also that they are historically more significant than traditional wisdom has it. The book, therefore, will be of interest to historians and philosophers of science, historians of philosophy and psychology, as well as to philosophers and psychologists interested in understanding the roots of scientific psychology in 18th and 19th century German philosophy.

This innovative collection of original essays focuses on the ways in which geography, gender, race, and religion influenced the reception of Darwinism in the English-speaking world of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The contributions to this volume collectively illustrate the importance of local social, physical, and religious arrangements, while revealing that neither distance from Darwin's home at Down nor size of community greatly influenced how various regions responded to Darwinism. Essays spanning the world from Great Britain and North America to Australia and New Zealand explore the various meanings for Darwinism in these widely separated locales, while other chapters focus on the difference it made in the debates over evolution.

The continent for science is also a continent for the humanities. Despite having no indigenous human population, Antarctica has been imagined in powerful, innovative, and sometimes disturbing ways that reflect politics and culture much further north. Antarctica has become an important source of data for natural scientists working to understand global climate change. As this book shows, the tools of literary studies, history, archaeology, and more, can likewise produce important insights into the nature of the modern world and humanity more broadly.

Hermann Haken (born 1927) is one of the "fathers" of the quantum-mechanical laser theory, formulated between 1962 and 1966, in strong competition with American researchers. Later on, he created Synergetics, the science of cooperation in multicomponent systems. The book concentrates on the development of his scientific work during the first thirty-five years of his career. In 1970 he and his doctoral student Robert Graham were able to show that the laser is an example of a nonlinear system far from thermal equilibrium that shows a phase-transition like behavior. Subsequently, this insight opened the way for the formulation of Synergetics. Synergetics is able to explain, how very large systems show the phenomenon of self-organization that can be mathematically described by only very few order parameters. The results of Haken's research were published in two seminal books Synergetics (1977) and Advanced Synergetics (1983). After the year 1985 Haken concentrated his research on the macroscopic foundation of Synergetics. This led him towards the application of synergetic principles in medicine, cognitive research and, finally, in psychology. A comprehensive bibliography of Hermann Haken's publications (nearly 600 numbers) is included in the book.

In the Foreword to Culture and Agriculture, distinguished anthropologist John W. Bennett writes Dr. Schusky's book is welcome. It marks a point of maturity for anthropology's interest in agriculture, a distillation of decades of research and thought on the most important survival task facing humankind, the production of food. Although applauded by a specialist in the field, Schusky's book is specifically written for the general reader who is interested in agriculture. It offers a historical overview of the two major periods of agriculture--the Neolithic Revolution, which occurred when humans initally domesticated plants and animals, and the Neoclaric Revolution, which began the introduction of fossil fuel into agriculture in the twentieth century. Culture and Agriculture dramatizes the extensive changes that are occurring in modern agriculture due to the intensified use of fossil energy. The book details how the overdependence on fossil energy, with its looming exhaustion, is a major cause of pessimism about food production. The book also addresses the possible solutions to this scenario--conservation steps, an increase in the mix of solar energy, and an emphasis on human labor--which hold out hope for the future. Part I introduces the discovery or domestication of plants and animals (the Neolithic), along with the later use of irrigation, in order to show that most agricultural development, until the twentieth century, occurred between 5,000 and 10,000 years ago. Part II presents a brief survey of agricultural history which demonstrates that hunger had more to do with inequity in the social system than in the amounts of food produced. Agricultural history also emphasizes how little change occurred in agriculture from 5,000 years ago until the twentieth century, when the use of fossil energy revolutionized food production. In assessing the future of agricultural development, Schusky underscores the importance of economic and political policies that emphasize equity in distribution of wealth and government services. This book should appeal to the general reader interested in agriculture, rural sociology, or anthropology.

Written by one of the astronomers who 'lived the dream' of working there this book is a restrospectively expanded diary featuring the 'birth and long life' of what was a truely innovative telescope. Based on input received from people involved in its planning, building, operation, and many scientists who observed with it, the author tells this success story of The United Kingdom Infrared Telescope (UKIRT). Conceived in the mid 1970's as a cheap and cheerful light-bucket for the newly emerging field of infrared astronomy it has re-invented itself once a decade to remain at the forefront of infrared astronomy for more than 30 years. Even in 2012 / 2013, when ironically it faced almost certain closure, it remained one of the most scientifically productive telescopes in the world. Everybody, including amateur and professional astronomers, interested in real astronomy projects will enjoy reading that story and meet (again) the persons who lived it.

The Nineteenth Century was a period of tremendous change in the daily lives of the average Americans. Never before had such change occurred so rapidly or and had affected such a broad range of people. And these changes were primarily a result of tremendous advances in science and technology. Many of the technologies that play such an central role in our daily life today were first invented during this great period of innovation--everything from the railroad to the telephone. These inventions were instrumental in the social and cultural developments of the time. The Civil War, Westward Expansion, the expansion and fall of slave culture, the rise of the working and middle classes and changes in gender roles--none of these would have occurred as they did had it not been for the science and technology of the time. Science and Technology in Nineteenth-Century America chronicles this relationship between science and technology and the revolutions in the lives of everyday Americans. The volume includes a discussion of:

• Transportation--from the railroad and steamship to the first automobiles appearing near the end of the century.
• Communication--including the telegraph, the telephone, and the photograph
• Industrialization-- how the growing factory system impacted the lives of working men and women
• Agriculture--how mechanical devices such as the McCormick reaper and applications of science forever altered how farming was done in the United States
• Exploration and navigations--the science and technology of the age was crucial to the expansion of the country that took place in the century, and

This book uses the spiral shape as a key to a multitude of strange and seemingly disparate stories about art, nature, science, mathematics, and the human endeavour. In a way, the book is itself organized as a spiral, with almost disconnected chapters circling around and closing in on the common theme. A particular strength of the book is its extremely cross-disciplinary nature - everything is fun, and everything is connected! At the same time, the author puts great emphasis on mathematical and scientific correctness, in contrast, perhaps, with some earlier books on spirals. Subjects include the mathematical properties of spirals, sea shells, sun flowers, Greek architecture, air ships, the history of mathematics, spiral galaxies, the anatomy of the human hand, the art of prehistoric Europe, Alfred Hitchcock, and spider webs, to name a few.

William Whiston succeeded Sir Isaac Newton as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge in 1703. Like his predecessor, Whiston presents an interesting combination of the scientific and the theological mind, but whereas Newton carefully concealed the true nature of his religious beliefs, Whiston, a well-known preacher, did not. This is the first modern full-length study of Whiston's Newtonian rapprochement between science and religion. Professor Force examines the writings in which Whiston applies his Newtonian Biblical interpretation to social, political, and theological issues in the context of the Newtonian movement at the turn of the eighteenth century. The book revises the conventional view of Whiston as a figure peripheral to the Newtonian movement and reveals the nature of Whiston's 'Newtonianism' and his individual eccentricities. It also offers valuable insights into Newton himself and the religious beliefs he so often concealed. Professor Force's work will be a significant addition to our historical knowledge of this controversial Newtonian and the Newtonian movement as a whole.

Despite the rapidly expanding ambit of physical research and the continual appearance of new branches of physics, the main thrust in its development has been the attempt at a theoretical synthesis of the entire body of physical knowledge. Vladimir Vizgin's work presents perhaps the first systematic historico-scientific study of the formation and development of the unified field theories in the general context of 20th century physics. Concentrating on the first three decades of the century and drawing extensively on Russian sources, the author analyses the first successes, failures and paths of further development of the unified field theories. He presents the evolution of these theories as a process of interaction/competition between the geometric field and quantum research programs, and ascertains the relevance of these theories for fundamental concepts in modern field theory.

This volume explores problems in the history of science at the intersection of life sciences and agriculture, from the mid-eighteenth to the mid-twentieth century. Taking a comparative national perspective, the book examines agricultural practices in a broad sense, including the practices and disciplines devoted to land management, forestry, soil science, and the improvement and management of crops and livestock. The life sciences considered include genetics, microbiology, ecology, entomology, forestry, and deal with US, European, Russian, Japanese, Indonesian, Chinese contexts. The book shows that the investigation of the border zone of life sciences and agriculture raises many interesting questions about how science develops. In particular it challenges one to re-examine and take seriously the intimate connection between scientific development and the practical goals of managing and improving - perhaps even recreating - the living world to serve human ends. Without close attention to this zone it is not possible to understand the emergence of new disciplines and transformation of old disciplines, to evaluate the role and impact of such major figures of science as Humboldt and Mendel, or to appreciate how much of the history of modern biology has been driven by national ambitions and imperialist expansion in competition with rival nations.

This book considers the historical and cultural origins of the gut-brain relationship now evidenced in numerous scientific research fields. Bringing together eleven scholars with wide interdisciplinary expertise, the volume examines literal and metaphorical digestion in different spheres of nineteenth-century life. Digestive health is examined in three sections in relation to science, politics and literature during the period, focusing on Northern America, Europe and Australia. Using diverse methodologies, the essays demonstrate that the long nineteenth century was an important moment in the Western understanding and perception of the gastroenterological system and its relation to the mind in the sense of cognition, mental wellbeing, and the emotions. This collection explores how medical breakthroughs are often historically preceded by intuitive models imagined throughout a range of cultural productions.

This book explores the importance of bodily fluids to the development of medical knowledge in the eighteenth century. While the historiography has focused on the role of anatomy, this study shows that the chemical analyses of bodily fluids in the Dutch Republic radically altered perceptions of the body, propelling forwards a new system of medicine. It examines the new research methods and scientific instruments available at the turn of the eighteenth century that allowed for these developments, taken forward by Herman Boerhaave and his students. Each chapter focuses on a different bodily fluid - saliva, blood, urine, milk, sweat, semen - to investigate how doctors gained new insights into physiological processes through chemical experimentation on these bodily fluids. The book reveals how physicians moved from a humoral theory of medicine to new chemical and mechanical models for understanding the body in the early modern period. In doing so, it uncovers the lives and works of an important group of scientists which grew to become a European-wide community of physicians and chemists.

In 1962, the publication of Thomas Kuhn's Structure 'revolutionized' the way one conducts philosophical and historical studies of science. Through the introduction of both memorable and controversial notions, such as paradigms, scientific revolutions, and incommensurability, Kuhn argued against the traditionally accepted notion of scientific change as a progression towards the truth about nature, and instead substituted the idea that science is a puzzle solving activity, operating under paradigms, which become discarded after it fails to respond accordingly to anomalous challenges and a rival paradigm. Kuhn's Structure has sold over 1.4 million copies and the Times Literary Supplement named it one of the "Hundred Most Influential Books since the Second World War." Now, fifty years after this groundbreaking work was published, this volume offers a timely reappraisal of the legacy of Kuhn's book and an investigation into what Structure offers philosophical, historical, and sociological studies of science in the future.