5 comments about The Man Who Knew Too Much: Alan Turing and the Invention of the Computer (Great Discoveries).

1. All students studying computer science are introduced to Alan Turing at one time or another. For most, this introduction takes the form of Turing as the inventor of the Turing Machine, a machine unbounded by time and memory that can solve any problem. Once the students perform some perfunctory exercises involving the use of a Turing machine to construct say, the solution to the dining philosophers problem, they promptly forget about Turing and his machine. Which is so sad. Turing can be rightly considered the father of the modern computer where data and memory are mapped to the same address space. This invention is typically attributed to John von Neumann, but the author of the book makes a point that behind von Neumann's contribution was Turing's hand. Turing went on, in his brief life spanning only 42 years, to work on cryptography (credited with decoding the German Enigma machines in World War II, albeit using the groundwork laid down by a Polish cryptographer, Martin Rejewski; see Simon Singh's Code Book reviewed in 2006), artificial intelligence (the Turing Test), and mathematics. The state saw to it that his genius would be, unfortunately, eclipsed by his sexuality. In 1952, Turing was convicted of "acts of gross indecency" after admitting sexual relations with a man. He was forced to undergo hormone therapy in the vain hope of "curing" him. Instead, what these pogroms did was to rob the scientific world of one of the greatest researchers of all times. Turing elected to end his life by biting into an apple laced with cyanide. It was apropos; his favorite fairy tale was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.



2. Not bad over all, at times goes on a bit to much about his homosexuality. Main reason for 3 and not 4 stars is the title, nothing in the book deals how he "knew too much".



3. Leavitt spent a lot of time teaching himself mathematics and learning the early science of how computers worked. The problem is that he spends half the book going over the theorems of Turning and some of his contemporaries. This is all fine and good, if math is your thing. Zeta probabilities and the function of (prime numbers at n-1 or something like that) have no interest for the average laymen; and especially for those of us who never got past algebra and think calculus is hard skin on the bottom of your foot.
   
   This makes the title sort of a double entendre, leaving all of us at the short end of the stick because if he learned it, he told it to us. Some of the explanations run eight or ten pages. This of course makes reading this short book (under 300 pages) even shorter, though it's like hitting yourself in the head, it only feels great when it's over. If your a good skimmer and know where to look it's probably an enjoyable book. In my case I kept hoping that it would get more interesting but it never did.
   
   More on Turing's life (or maybe there just wasn't any more) would have been preferable to more on his mathematical findings.



4. I considered writing a bad review of this book some time back, but I finally compelled myself to finish reading the whole thing, and I have to redact my original thoughts that this work needed some help.
   
   While it is true that unless you have taken a class in automata theory, you may get lost about half way through this book, it is well worth completing in order to come to grips with the whole story that encompasses Mr. Turing.
   
   While true, Leavitt focuses on a primarily homosexual perspective of Turing, it does provide an alternative look at the man. I do feel that at times more than ample creative license was taken in this regard and wished that more attention might have been in critical analysis of Turing's personal papers which led Leavitt to these conclusions. Given that Leavitt takes such considerable pains to explain the context within which Turing's mathematical process took place, describing those around him, professors he did not even associate with... on and on, this seemed a bit odd and out of place with the rest of the story.
   
   Anyway, I am glad I read it only for the references to other books that I have started to enjoy, including both Alan's mother's biography and the Enigma by Hodges.
   
   I would also recommend to others who enjoy Turing history to look into BBC4's video, "Dangerous Thoughts". You can find it on google videos.



5. If this book were instead a photograph of the subject, I would imagine Man Ray being the photographer, with the young Turing posed in such a manner that deep shadows are raked across his features. We have patches of pure light in this book--for instance in the author's explanation of exactly what Turing Machines do and how they do it, which I found to be one of the best sections of the book, and then we have the other parts which are handled well fact-wise, but without much of an imparting of the character of the subject. Leavitt tells us several times that Turing indeed had the ability not to impress himself upon his teachers and his colleagues, and perhaps was simply carrying over the biographical fact into the writing. These are the shadowy sections of the portrait we posit in which Turing seems to recede in favor of passages from E.M. Forster or of Leavitt's own interpretations of the possible psychological underpinnings of certain of Turing's ideas regarding intelligent machines. In these darknesses we see that Turing was close to his mother, yet this information is left tantalizingly vague. We get flashes of Turing's rather cruel sense of pedagogy, but this too is dropped into the murk. The central metaphor of "loss" in this tragedy is Turing's relationship with Christopher Morcom, the gifted young man whose early death stood as a kind of absolute in the genius' thought, yet that central experience is not delved into but remains ambiguously described, though it provides the frisson--the startling sense of closure--in the final sentence of the book. The "cracker jack prize" I was hoping to find buried in The Man Who Knew Too Much--an illumination of Wittgenstein's relationship with Turing--was missing. We see him sitting a bit like a rabbit stunned in the intense glare of the philosopher's regard, reiterating his mathematician's sense of the consequence of contradictions in closed systems, but we are left only with that. In short, this is an interesting picture to hang on the wall and contemplate, and a useful one in parts, but one that strikes this reader as being curiously incomplete, shadowy, and in many places--inert. Still, this is a good book and one that's worth a read.

5 comments about Strange Brains and Genius: The Secret Lives Of Eccentric Scientists And Madmen.

1. There is little reason beneath the popularity of reality as it is presented or portrayed to humans except that it is the concoction of the accumulation of data that has been filtered through the conscience of other humans in a position to use it for the benefit of themselves, or the institutions for whom they work. All of current perception is subject to this filtration mechanism that results from the tunnel vision of public and private protocols that created it. Every human is the ongoing creation of the information flow surrounding him or her, and the victim of it, as well as the creator of it.
   
   There is nothing written in stone that forms the human protocol of mankind except what humans are taught to preference - for its good effects, or occasionally, for its bad effects upon societies in which they reside during their lifetime. Interpretation is 100% of that ballgame.
   
   What humans make of alternate realities is tied to their willingness to both question and evaluate alternate realities, their significance and the manner in which they appreciate the introduction of such conflict, or whether their aim is to oppress it. Spiritual and intellectual freedom to examine alternate realities is the provine of freedom, itself, and serves to protect and preserve it, or to further encroach upon its potential to compromise the physical and pscyhological mobility that is the result of such entertainment. A public unwilling to entertain alternate realities is, therefore, a captive of its own purview, and strength lies only in the ability to examine alternate realities and come to logical and beneficial conclusions for the greater good, not to be hoarded for the benefit of a few fortunate souls. Mental capture is the equivalent of physical capture, and reveals much about the predators who would use the force and perception of tradition to deny not only the existence but the potential of human freedom by molding it into a sealed box like that of Pandora's, never to be opened for view or scrutiny. If humanity depends upon that process of capture and seal, it lives only a simulation of existence, not a real existence.



2. Excellent book on the frailties of some great scientists and price paid for genius. I couldn't put this book down until its completion. This book will keep your interests from start to finish.



3. Pickover's book is "stuffed" with fascinating facts and information regarding the bizzarre personal lives of history's most prominent intellectual thinkers. Like a modern day Mesmer, Pickover leaves the reader spellbound with his unique gift of captivating the mind by illuminating THE MIND itself. This book a gem, the Mona Lisa of mental profiles. What's more, Pickover reveals that OCD isn't a disability ITS A SUPERPOWER! As a certified Obsessive Compulsive myself, I found new life and strength in Pickover's work. Knowing that OCD has plagued the greatest thinkers in history makes the burden that much easier to bear. I recommend this book to all Obsessive Compulsives. It should be recommended reading for all "MONKISH PEOPLES" everywhere. I will forever be indebted to Dr. Pickover. For he has given me an exciting new angle on this dreadful disability.



4. I liked this book in the beginning but some of the chapters were longer than others, and the facts were interesting but it was also very disturbing in some parts. I lost interest in it after awhile. Definitely a different book. I would rate it 2.5 to 3 stars. I think that each of the scientists deserved the same amount of recognition. There was only one madman in there Ted Kaczynski who shouldn't have been in there. The book would have been better if it was just about scientists.



5. This is a fun book.It is a worthy companion to the scores of books written about genius-eccentrics -- savants who listen to very different drummers. I don't recommend it as a cover-to-cover read unless your OC switch is on; it should be left somewhere like a night stand, bathroom shelf, or by the computer where one has a few free minutes. Judging from the many other books Pickover has written, this appears to be a syncretic collection of research notes assembled in a fairly logical collection of mini-biographies. And, contrary to other reviews, there are enough references and citations for further readings about a particular person. I also suspect he was researching information relating to himself -- as a multi-talented genius (and not a madman). If so, I would support that he qualifies for this distinction.
   Well worth the price.

5 comments about The Immortalists: Charles Lindbergh, Dr. Alexis Carrel, and Their Daring Quest to Live Forever.

1. Charles Lindbergh's and Alexis Carrel's views on eugenics, democracy and race don't sound so unusual when you consider how many European, British and American writers in the early 20th Century professed similar beliefs. H.G. Wells, for example, would have agreed with much of what Carrel writes in "Man, the Unknown," especially about the need for a technocratic elite to make binding decisions (including reproductive ones) for the whole world. Nobel Prize winning geneticist Hermann Joseph Muller advocated eugenics like his fellow Nobelist Carrel (an enthusiasm Muller failed to convey to his student Carl Sagan). H.P. Lovecraft's fiction, now held in higher regard than during his lifetime, expresses a disgust with non-Anglo immigrants, race mixing and racial degeneration. And many American science fiction writers during the field's "golden age" in the 1930-1960 era professed similar racist, Social-Darwinist, elitist and anti-democratic sentiments.
   
   Today's elites at least have the sense not to promote such beliefs in public, even if they express them privately. The open avowal of racism has moved down the social scale, along with fighting duels to settle disputes over matters of "honor." The individual today who expresses racist beliefs, or regularly gets into street fights, signals himself as lower class.
   
   Ironically, Lindbergh's and Carrel's other ideas, about treating the human body as a machine with potentially replaceable parts and greatly extending human life thereby, make them seem remarkably visionary even by 21st Century standards. You have to wonder how far they could have gotten if Carrel had secured funding for his own lab after the Rockefeller Institute had forcibly retired him, and trained a scientist to carry on the work with Lindbergh after his death; and if Lindbergh's crushes on Goering and Hitler hadn't distracted him from helping Carrel with their joint project. Lindbergh and Carrel's experiments anticipated today's research into regenerative medicine, engineered negligible senescence and transhumanism.
   
   Other interesting aspects of the book: We think we have a celebrity-obsessed culture now, but Lindbergh and his family received a level of press harassment that looks extreme even by today's standards. And Carrel combined legitimate scientific accomplishments with some very crank-sounding ideas, especially about the paranormal; today he would make a plausible guest for "Coast to Coast AM."
   
   I would have given the book more stars, but Friedman really hadn't done enough homework to show how Lindbergh's and Carrel's less defensible beliefs (from our perspective) reflected the thinking of many early 20th Century intellectuals. These intellectuals' beliefs formed a continuum with what became official policy in Nazi Germany. They didn't arise in a vacuum, in other words.



2. Never having read a real biography of Lindberg, and never having heard of Alexis Carrel, this book introduced me to a new universe of thought. Friedman is empathetic and compassionate when he describes the tragic (as in Greek tragedy, a flaw that dooms greatness) shortcomings of men he obviously very much admires. Carrel and Lindberg thought of themselves, with some justification, as Olympians. Carrel didn't suffer fools gladly - or at all - but he comes across as a far more human being than the driven, dispassionate, aloof Lindberg. It's easy to understand Lindberg's fascination with Nazism - all that counts is getting the trains to run on time, no matter whose bodies lie across the tracks. Friedman paints two very complex pictures of 'great men', and great men they truly were, and their close personal and professional relationships. Friedman also portrays Ann Morrow Lindberg as a brilliant although self-doubting artist of great sensitivity. Reading of Lindberg's treatment of his wife reinforces the general portrait of a cold, humorless, obsessive tyrant. Finally, the author gives the reader enough detail to understand the what, how and why of the Carrel/Lindberg quest for immortality through organ replacement without ever losing me in a flood of technical minutia. One of the most fascinating tales I've ever read and extremely well told.



3. This book centers on the period of Charles Lindbergh's life when he was working with Dr. Alexis Carrel of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. Carrel had won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1912 for his work on suturing blood vessels. He had also been lauded for his method of disinfecting wounds with chlorine (this was decades prior to the development and use of antibiotics). They were both famous men and, when introduced, they found they had many interests and views in common. Lindbergh's sister-in-law, Elizabeth Morrow, had a very weak heart that was going to shorten her lifespan and he felt medicine should have a way of replacing worn out organs just as he replaced parts in an airplane engine. Carrel was the leading authority in that field at that time and their work together is the central story of this book.
   
   During their years of working together, Lindbergh designed and developed the world's first perfusion pump that allowed entire organs to be kept alive for extended periods without becoming infected. Both Lindbergh and Carrel were interested in pursuing an extended lifespan and rejected the inevitability of death. Of course, the popular press misunderstood what they were after and what Lindbergh had developed. It was regularly called a glass heart or an artificial heart, but it wasn't.
   
   Lindbergh and Carrel also shared similar views on the superiority of the European or White race and the necessity of preserving and defending it. They both saw the coming war in Europe as a disaster that might go far beyond the losses and devastation of the Great War (World War I, we call it). Yes, Lindbergh favored Germany over Britain, but not for the reasons usually ascribed to him. Yes, he and Carrel viewed Jews as a separate race and they talked of good and bad Jews. However, they also helped Jews including a former assistant who went on to a brilliant medical career. Carrel and his wife were also mystics and impressed the Lindberghs and many others in ways that would embarrass anyone of a scientific reputation today.
   
   While I don't want to be seen as defending Lindbergh's views at this time in his life, it does have to be noted that eugenics was in the air and various strains of it were advocated by many famous people. Many of these advocates of this now discredited movement still have a solid reputation today (even if their views on eugenics are kept hush hush in popular discussions). And one can still hear eugenics arguments made today, but it is never called by that name.
   
   Essentially, Lindbergh saw Germany's manufacturing efficiency, engineering supremacy, and military discipline as a bulwark against the Soviet Union. He did not want the United States drawn in to a war that would leave Europe vulnerable to an expansionist communist movement. Carrel shared his anti-war views. However, once war came, Carrel went back to France to help as best as he could with his medical abilities. His reputation was smeared and was called a collaborationist, but all evidence shows this was not true. Lindbergh wanted to enlist, but was blackballed by FDR, so he went to the Pacific theater and flew several dozens of combat missions as a uniformed civilian. He shot down enemy fighters, dropped bombs, engaged in air battles, and shot up Japanese military assets on the ground.
   
   After the war, Lindbergh's views on religion, science, and nature changed. He became a pioneering environmentalist and stirred up as much controversy supporting species preservation and natural habitat as he had when he was speaking against the United States entering World War II.
   
   This is a very interesting story and supplements Berg's famous biography of Lindbergh. The author, David Friedman, even quotes from Berg's "Lindbergh" a few times. This is a well-balanced book that shows the complications of these men without feeling the need to make simplistic judgments or justifications. I found it very much worth reading.
   
   Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, Michigan



4. The story is compelling and unbelievable if it were not true. History as you never knew it to be and this needs to be made into a motion picture.



5. 
   Careful textbooks in my home state, Minnesota, portray Charles Lindbergh as an "isolationist" opponent to US participation in World War II. After all, he was a hero - OUR hero - a Swedish American from our state. Author David Friedman, with quite thorough evidence, portrays Lindbergh differently, as an admirer of Hitler and Hitler's Germany, who wrote to his American friend that Hitler "is undoubtedly a great man, and I believe he has done much for the German people. He is a fanatic in many ways, and anyone can see that there is a certain amount of fanaticism in Germany today... On the other hand, Hitler has accomplished results...which could hardly have been accomplished without some fanaticism."
   Friedman explains: 'For Lindbergh, Germany seemed everything that America was not and probably could never be: a country composed of one virile, morally and ethically pure race committed to science, and united in a vision of national greatness. That such unity came at teh cost of democratic institutions, individual rights, and a free press didn't alienate him. Democracy was anoble idea, Lindbergh believed, but the reality was quite different...in the United States, where social and political equality, together with a free press...produced a climate of degeneracy... Only a strong visionary, and yes, even fascist, leader was best equipped to restore moral order to western civilization.'
   
   In Lindbergh's own words, from an article he published in Reader's Digest in 1939: Aviation "is a tool especially shaped for Western hands, a scientific art which others copy in a mediocre fashion, another barrier between the teeming millions of Asia and the Grecian inheritance of Europe -- one of the priceless possessions which permit the White race to live at all in a pressing sea of Yellow, Black, and Brown.... We, the heirs of European culture, are on the verge of a disastrous war, a war within our own family of nations... Our civilization depends on a united strength among ourselves, on a Western Wall of race and arms which can hold back either a Genghis Khan or an infiltration of inferior blood..." Aviation, by the way, was in Lindbergh's opinion the Third Reich's strong suite; neither England nor the USA could match the Luftwaffe in technology or skill, as he consistently testified to the Congress and war departments of the USA.
   
   Friedman documents Lindbergh's enthusiasm for "social Darwinist" eugenics, his anti-Semitism and overall racism, his contempt for the rule of rules, and his indifference to dialogue and compromise. In all of this ideological extremism, however, Lindbergh had a mentor, one of the few humans he respected as his own equal or even superior, the French Nobel-winning Dr. Alexis Carrel, the WW1 discoverer of battlefield antisepsis and the first developer of techniques for suturing arteries. Through much of the 1930s, Lindbergh trained himself in biology and worked side by side with Carrel to develop instruments and methods to maintain the life of organs outside the bodies of mammals. Lindbergh's mechanical genius, in fact, enabled him to invent waht might be called the first artificial heart. The story of this collaboration is the heart of Friedman's book; he clearly sees it as a story of gigantic psychological hubris, almost a gothic horror story of Mankind striving for immortality. (I confess that the scientific aspects of this story are truly fascinating to me, as a tale of genius without a speck of rational sense!)
   
   In every way except sympathy for Germany, Carrel was more a Nazi than Lindbergh - a virulent racist, an explicit eugenicist, a visionary whose vision was the creation of a "high council of experts" who would guide humanity behind the scenes. "There is no escaping the fact that men are not created equal," he told a reporter once, "as democracy, invented in the 18th century -- when there was no scienc to refute it -- would have us believe." The human race is moved forward, he continued, "by great men... Unfortunately, we don't understand the genesis of great men. Perhaps it would be effective to kill off the worst and keep the best, as we do in the breeding of dogs."
   
   Lindbergh's strident opposition to FDR on every front, and his enthusiasm for letting Germany expand at the expense of the Soviets earned him some interesting support in the months before the die was cast at Pearl Harbor, especially from a group of young students at Yale, who called themselves The Committee to defend America First, and who inlcuded, among others, Douglas Stuart Jr., Kingman Brewster, Potter Stewart, Sargeant Shriver, and Gerald Ford.
   Once the war involved American soldiers, however, Lindbergh found himself isolated, ostracized, even despised by his previous idolators and friends. Harold Nicholson, a close family friend and the biographer of Lindbergh's father-in-law, wrote of him that "his virility and ideas became not merely inflexible but actually rigid; his self-confidence thickened into arrogance and his convictions hardened into garnite. He became impervious to anything outside his own legend," largely because of the trauma of the kidnapping of his first son. It's an assessment that reminds me a good deal of Sen. John McCain's description of General Douglas MacArthur in the book Hard Call, and strangely enough, of McCain himself, whose formative experience was the trauma of captivity.
   
   Lindbergh may have been rigid, but he was far from unchangeable. As gracefully and patiently as such a man could, he reinserted himself in the military campaign to defend America, first as an advisor and then as a comabt pilot, showing a courage in the air war against Japan that restored him almost entirely to the good graces of the American people. And then, in the aftermath of the war, when he inspected sites in Europe and encountered the evidence of Nazi brutality and genocide, Lindbergh re-invented himself once more... as an incipient pacifist and critic of war crimes committed by any country. Inspecting the ash pit into which twenty-five thousand human slaves had been shoveled, worked to death at the Nazi's V-2 factory, Lindbergh had an epiphany; he wrote: "What the German has done to the Jew in Europe, we have done to the Jap in the Pacific. As Germans defiled themselves by dumping the ashes of human beings into these pits, we have defiled ourselves bulldozing bodies into shallow, unmarked tropical graves. What is barbaric on one side of the Earth is barbaric on the other... It is not the Germans alone, or the Japs, but men of all nations to whom this war has brought shame and degradation."
   
   One might think that Lindbergh had traveled as far and as fast as a lone eagle ever could, but there came still a later epiphany, in the 1950s, when Lindbergh turned against the technological, mechanical values he'd so ardently championed, and became a fierce crusader for conservation of Africa and of pre-modern cultures! This time, he wrote: "..the African framework of life contains ideas and values which may seem backward... but who is to say that the record of future evolutionary ages will prove the black to be less progressive than the white?...If civilization is progress in the basic sense of life, then why have past civilizations fallen -- sixteen of them in the last few thousand years, according to arnold Toynbee?" Is civilization progress, Lindbergh asked. "The final answer will be given not by the discoveries of our science, but by the effect our civilized activities as a whole have upon the quality of our planet's life."
   
   Wow! I couldn't say it better myself! My childhood hero was quite a man!

No comments about Journal of My Life.

No comments about King of the Road. From Bergen-Belsen to the Olympic Games.

5 comments about Five Quarts: A Personal and Natural History of Blood.

1. This is a very well written book. If you are looking for an intelligent, but entertainng read...This is the book.



2. Author Hayes mixes science, philosophy and a lot of personal intimacy in this interesting book on blood. A strange subject (though not the strangest around--a recent bestseller is about cadavers.) We have five quarts of the red stuff--hence the title.
   
   The book starts with Bill getting a cut. But then we go on a journey about hemophila and history (the royal house of Great Britain) and we learn about bloodletting, blood banks, and ultimately the AIDS epidemic.
   
   While I would prefer more science and less personal information in a treatise on a scientific subject, that's just me (I studied biology and immunology for quite some years.) But for a non-science-steeped reader, this is a fascinating look at the stuff of life. Recommended, though not for the squeamish.



3. We could be corny and tout this as the kind of book you'll sink your teeth into, but that seems so bloody obvious. Instead we'll say that Five Quarts is a damn good read. Author Bill Hayes uses his HIV-positive status to springboard into a pulsating exploration --- as fascinating as it is frightening, as humorous as it is harrowing --- of the cultural, historical, spiritual and medical myths, misconceptions and marvels of blood. From the legend of Dracula to the scared saga of the Eucharist, from a heart-warming bedside visit with a woman suffering from hemophilia to a look inside a blood bank ... there's lots of interesting and informative on this plate(let).



4. Rarely have I encountered so unflinchingly honest a book. Mr. Hayes has an exceptionally complex relationship with blood; his partner of fourteen years is HIV positive while Mr. Hayes remains HIV free. Therefore, the book falls squarely into its own unique category--it is a journal of discoveries both personal and scientific. Its power is found in the author's candor as he shares his journey of discovery.
   
   The personal dimension of this book is surprisingly vast. Though it does treat the science to the degree one would expect, the scientific and historical discussion is but the lesser portion. The true context lies in the author's expressed need to know what blood is all about and his discovery of how blood-related knowledge has shaped his life. The intensely personal nature of the work gives a depth to the discussion not present in the expected general science genre.
   
   Though the author's frank treatment of his sexual orientation and personal history were startling, it can safely be said that Five Quarts is much more than a memoir and certainly more than the typical general science/history offering. Five Quarts was truly a rare and welcome find.



5. Bill Hayes does a wonderful job of exploring our concepts of blood and sharing his experiences. I feel this book should be required reading for phlebotomists - I am one and found the book on my own and loved it!

5 comments about Black Stars: African American Women Scientists and Inventors.

1. This book is about African American women scientists and inventors, a rarity indeed.Reportedly African Americans in general comprise 4.5% of all science and engineering professionals today.So to read about the significant contributions of these pioneering women is both revealing and uplifting.Some of those profiled are somewhat well known;such as Madame C. J. Walker.She is known for her million dollar hair care business. Others are not so well known, such as Dr. Angela Furguson who joined with Dr. Ronald Scott in researching sickle cell anemia at Howard University.
   Unfortunately the African American women scientists and inventors have been left out of mainstream history even as some African American men scientists have been included. Most of us are familiar with the contributions of George Washington Carver, who is credited with discovering 100 uses for the sweet potato and more than 300 uses for the common peanut in his lab at Tuskegee Institute. Also we are equally aware of Benjamin Banneker, who is widely hailed as inventing the first clock and assisting in the laying out of the design for the Nation's Capital, Washington, DC with Charles L'Enfant.
   The author makes a laudable contribution for filling in existing historical omissions regarding African American women scientists. He brings to our attention warm inspiring stories along with factual historical information.
   Teachers, other educators, parents and anyone else involved in the unending search to supplement traditional textbooks in order to ensure broader inclusion, will welcome this book. In doing so they too will expand their own knowledge and understanding of the subject. One does not need to be in the fields of science, engineering nor medicine to appreciate the message in African American Women Inventors. For the message transcends traditional borders or disciplines of study. The biographical descriptions of the featured women are of tremendous courage, high intellect and a lot of hard work. The stories in this book are exciting and geared to fostering a sense of empowerment to studenta and adults alike who read it. Students at all grade levels, genders and ethnic groups can readily relate to thses stories of personal triumph and achievement. However the author has written it to target ages 9 through 12 year olds.



2. So little is known about African American women pioneers in the sciences. Otha Sullivan has written an illuminating book for young readers that will fill in the gaps. Every parent concerned with teaching their children more about pioneering women in American history should purchase this book. It is also a good resource for science, social studies, and history teachers.



3. So little is known about African American women pioneers in the sciences. Otha Sullivan has written an illuminating book for young readers that will fill in the gaps. Every parent concerned with teaching their children more about pioneering women in American history should purchase this book. It is also a good resource for science, social studies, and history teachers.



4. This is a wonderful book. Not only is it packed with interesting facts, but the interviews and writing style are so personal and intimate that one feels as if, for example, Mae Jemison is right in the room sharing her life story. The women are candid about the obstacles they met and overcame. I think a young adult of any race will find this book very inspiring...I know if it had been around when I was a kid, science and math would have been much more relevent to me!



5. My 8 year old daughter had a project on African American Women who have contributed in science; however, the Internet did not provided anything on Dr. Green who I truly admire. After we purchased this book which came righ on time (it took 3 days!!!!) we read it from end to end and found more information on Dr. Green then anywhere else. This book really helped us.
   
   Jose

5 comments about Thread Of The Silkworm.

1. I must admit a bias - HS Tsien is my grandfather's cousin. As such, this book is for me the family history that noone would tell me. For other readers, I would say that most history books concentrate on the rise of the USSR as a power, and then *poof!* there's China...how did that happen? Chang's book reveals how China's emergence on the world stage as a military power resulted from the US's own stupidity and xenophobia. My one real complaint about the book is that Chang's writing seems to drive the book to a climax at the point of Tsien's return to China, and then peeters out while she recounts China's race to the ICBM. This inconsistancy makes one feel that Chang herself had lost interest in the story, which is unfortunate. This story is fascinating enough (for anyone interested in history, not just me) to wish that the entire book had been treated with the care that Chang shows Tsien's US phase. Anyways, one leaves the story with feelings of respect and regret for what could have been. Please note that HS Tsien is still a bogeyman for the US intelligence community - he was mentioned, as Qian Xuesen, in the 1999 Cox report during the Los Alamos spy scandal. As far as I know, HS Tsien is still alive.



2. I bought this book many years ago before Wen Ho Lee and James Yee and even though I found it difficult to read, I kept it as a reminder that being of Chinese origin adversely affects your comfort level and safety in this country. This book was very hard to read because the writing style was not the best for my style of reading so I didn't get her Nanking book which I know was also criticized for the writing style. If you didn't like the Nanking book, buy this book anyway because unlike the Nanking book, there aren't a lot of books about him out there and it's about a Chinese man who was not confused about what was happening. Regardless of whether he was right or wrong, smart or stupid, he was himself undiluted. I use the past tense but he's still alive though bedridden. He was on Chinese tv when China sent their first man into space. He watched a video of it and smiled.



3. Thread of the Silkworm was not quite what I expected in terms of a biography about Tsien Hsue-shen. It is a simple and attractive narrative that may have been targeted toward readers that like their reading without overstocked footnotes. It appears that Chang took her research from Tsien's surviving friends, colleagues, and Tsien himself. In addition, her style of writing is somewhat intimate and personal, and she appears to write in a way where she really put much effort in getting to know her subject. Througout the book she made Tsien looked like a hard-nosed and self-centered professor that could careless about his students. But at other times, there are passages in the book where his work overtook him. In addition, it appeared like Chang empathized with what Tsien was going through when he was forced to abandon his research and duties at CalTech.
   
   Nevertheless, Chang does a good job at capturing the period in which Tsien studied, worked, and lived. She attempts to provide detail during World War II, and how Tsien contributed to US rocket technology. However, it appears disturbing of how his life took a turn during the Communist-feared 1950s, and how he became blacklisted and excluded from a society that welcomed his knowledge and participation in the world of science and technology. Indeed, he became a US citizen, but because of unfortunate circumstances at time when ideology knew no boundaries, his talents were transfered overseas.
   
   Thread of the Silkworm was an easy read that will enhance your knowledge about immigration and what occurred during the 1950s. I recommend this book for those interested in biographies, a dab of science, and as Chinese/Asian-American history as well.



4. It is sad to note that Iris Chang has ended her life in a tragic self-inflicted bipolar conflict recently. This explains her unique writing style in several of her books. I am not a direct student or fan of Prof. Tsien. However, I am acquinted with surviving classmates and relatives of him. His early technical work has flaws in some classical work and did not get challenged or corrected. When someone who is not perfect speaks with authority at such young age he is likely to put himself above others as he has done. This is mentioned in the book several times by Iris during WW2 and later. He did so so in practical matters at MIT, or as a practicing railroad engineer in China. Had he returned to China after his studies in the US, he would be remembered as a scholar at most. As for his contribution with the red missile program it is hard to say what he was directly put in charge but people gave him credit for organizing a Russian trained team and obtained the necessary funding. Yes, he went through a lot during FBI investigation. One must not forget many scholars, ordinary citizens whether born in the US or Europe went through the identical ordeal. I find it is interesting that Chang mentioned Prof. Tsien was indirectly involved in the Great Leap forward resulting in 20 million deaths. Only someone controversial like him would chase birds and promote the destruction of a balanced eco-system in the name of Mao's wish (p238). All in all, Iris did a wonderful job talking and researching sources in a well done book.



5. This is about the review that a guy named "S.Shueh" wrote below. As an example of ridiculous expressions, his sentence: "When someone who is not perfect speaks with authority at such young age...he is bound to place himself above others" is absolutely dumb. That's because no one is perfect, and anyone who speaks with authority regardless of age is always placing himself above others because that's the nature of speaking with authority, duh! If this guy believes that there exists someone who is perfect and can speak with authority without placing himself above others, then he would not be the first such fool speaking such nonsense.
   
   Secondly, this S.Shueh guy also says that others have gone through "identical ordeals" as what Tsien went through. So this person doesn't realize that individual experiences are unique and the simple fact that no two persons can have identical experiences because experience is a subjective manifestation of seemingly external events. So it seems that the speaker is someone who grew up in a regimented family and society that cannot tolerate the uniqueness of individuals. Thus, his is only capable of rigid and naive thoughts. This is just my observation of a simpleton of a specific type that I have encountered many many times. So I felt the need to mention it here.

5 comments about The Devil's Doctor: Paracelsus and the World of Renaissance Magic and Science.

1. The Devil's Doctor is a remarkably well written biography of Paracelsus as well as social history of his life time, that period in European History when the Scholastic mindset of the Medieval was being challenged by the coming Enlightenment. Ball, who writes with great clarity and skillful organization shows Paracelsus as a unique individual in the middle of this social revolution, not seeing the whole picture, but living on both sides of the split.
   
   An alchemist who grew up in a mining region of Switzerland where the manipulation of metals was prevelant he received a scolastic education in medicine. He left early because he realized that the medicine of the Greeks no longer served. He sought out the best teachers and herbalists to educate himself and was recognized as one of the best doctors of his time. He grew up in the Roman church, but thought, wrote, and preached independently his own brand of spirituality barely escaping condemnation for heresy.
   
   I had read bits and pieces about Paracelsus over the years, but gathered almost nothing about the man. By putting Paracelsus in his time and many places (the man traveled a get deal for the times), Ball has made him real and his significance to European, and so world, history understandable.
   
   I can't say I disliked anything about this book. Except, maybe, the fact that Paracelsus was associated with so many interesting characters who deserved books of their own, which I'll probably never find. I highly recommend this book to those interested in this period of history even if they scoff at alchemy. If they scoff, Ball will give them a better understanding of its significance to the period.



2. The voluminous study written by P. Ball bears evident mark of his profession, that is of his being physicist. One has to appreciat how many historical topics he was able to cover in his book, less impressive is, nevertheless, his ability to discover the most important ones and to explain Paracelsus thought on the ground of the historical context so carefully described. Author's basic despise -- at least that's what I feel in his book -- for questions of theology and religion that, according to him, have at best a historical importance seems to prevent him from better understanding of real problems of Paracelsus, and even of real meaning of his "magic". Well, according to the title, Ball wanted to describe Paracelsus in the context of the "renaissance magic and science", yet this picture would be, and is, distorted if the effort is not made to understand the complex of his thought from his perspective, to find out what for him is important.
   Another thing is that Ball works only with english anthologies and even, if I'm not mistaken, only with english written sources in general. Sure, it's not very easy to read Paracelsus in the original Swiss German dialect, yet to me it seems inevitable if one wants to get out of beaten tracks of long rooted, sometimes superficial opinions, and to get inside the text and thoughts.
   So, if you want to read a reliable and better balanced study on Paracelsus' natural philosophy as well as on his theology (and you are not craving for an "esoteric" interpretation) read rather Andrew Weeks' nicely short monograph on Paracelsus and keep reservation about Ball's book: historically he seems to have found the proper sources to use, but systematically he's then not going deep enough to discover the "real" Paracelsus. If you read in German check the brand new and very valuable, although a little difficult-to-read, book by M. Bergengruen (Meiner 2007). Or just reach for the old, eventhough also partly one-sided "Introduction" by W. Pagel to add some more insights in the paracelsian thought.



3. I very much looked forward to reading this book, as I have been interested in Paracelsus for many years. But it does not strike me that Ball is interested in Paracelsus. Quite the contrary--throughout the book, he evidences his disdain for Paracelsus. As I read along, I found myself wondering why he had chosen to write the book at all.
   
   Important ideas that Paracelsus is credited with developing or originating are missing in Ball's treatment. For example, the Doctrine of Signatures, which Paracelsus developed and which was taken up by later medical Paracelsians and became widespread, gets hardly any attention. In fact, I learned more about Paracelsian ideas from Principe's recent book on Boyle as alchemist, which I happened to read at the same time. Principe did not feel obliged to sneer at Paracelsus at every turn.
   
   I also found that the organization of the book was problematic. For instance, a chapter might be named for the time Paracelsus spent in Ingolstadt, but that chapter does not actually discuss it.
   
   If you are interested in Paracelsus, this is not the book for you. If, in contrast, you are interested in snickering at the past from what you imagine to be the exalted heights of scientific rationalism, this book will very much gratify your sense of self-importance.



4. My interest in this book was predicated more on the World of Renaissance Magic and Science than an interest in Paracelsus, who I had no awareness of prior to reading The Devil's Doctor. I wasn't at all disappointed. Philip Ball recreates the exotic beliefs of the medieval world in depth and with great precision. It was much more this social exploration of common beliefs and mystical influences that I was interested in than our esoteric subject. For me, the details on Paracelsus and the early steps toward modernization of medical doctrine were more of peripheral interest. I've read Demon Haunted World, A World Lit Only By Firelight, and Sleepwalkers, among others, but found richer detail and a more visceral illustration in the mindset of individuals presented here. My fascination with the Renaissance is the process by which humankind emerged from the world of supernatural mysticism to the discovery of rational thought and critical observation. Ball does a wonderful job of detailing the all-encompassing and powerful grip of mysticism in an era evolving toward rational explanations of nature. Readers interested in Paracelsus may find this material intrusive, but I found it of primary interest. As for Paracelsus himself, I came away with mixed feelings.
   
   On one hand, his beliefs represent very much the spiritual environment in which Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Leibniz, Newton and all those who broke the shackles of mysticism were immersed as they tried to understand the workings of the supernatural. Rationalism seems to have been an unintended derivative of this effort. On the other, I found Paracelsus to be something less than a significant character in this evolutionary process. The subsequent challenges to the primitive and brutal medical practices of antiquity carried out under his banner seem expunged of his irrational ranting and alchemical nonsense. I don't believe, for example, that a procedure for incubating horse manure with human blood and sperm while supplicating the spiritus mundi to create life while in a drunken stupor was a powerful prescience to in vitro laboratory experimentation or modern biochemistry. It is more a case that if you throw enough at a wall, something is bound to stick. Yet, we know the early founders of science who discovered the laws of nature we understand today operated within this same cloud of mysticism. That's what makes their achievements all the more impressive.



5. The world that Paracelsus knew is thankfully long gone. In its place is a world that takes its lead from modern science which is based largely on experience, experiment, criticism and empiricism and science itself moves forward upon the basis of the scientific method. But it was not always like that and this book does a remarkably good job of trying to bring to life a time in the late middle ages that modern science has forgotten, or perhaps more accurately, would like to forget.
   
   Modern science has its roots in ancient Greek philosophy, 4th century writings, Roman theories, natural magic, Christian theology, astrology, folk tales, alchemy and all manner of mediaeval claptrap and mumbo-jumbo that mostly would have us in hysterics today. When Paracelsus was alive though it was believed and largely taken as true. To stand up and say such and such was not true, or worse still to write it down and publish it was not generally taken as excepted modes of behaviour. In fact it would often put your well being in jeopardy as Paracelsus found out all too often. Rather confirming what was already understood underpinned the thinking of the time. Modern science emerged over several centuries from this mishmash and Ball manages to give a real flavour of what Paracelsus must have encountered. This is a book that should be enjoyed as much as it informs.
   
   Paracelsus himself was a remarkable character of contradictions who can best be described as a failure. Paracelsus' writings are not particularly important either to the history of medicine or to science but it is the spirit in which they were written, the rants as well as the more lucid bits. It is not hard to see Paracelsus as a Till Eulenspeigel type figure or even as a Pierrot, and a good deal of this comes over in Ball's portrait. But it was as a failure who managed to ignite in those who came after him the wish to enquire and not be put off by those who would suppress enquiry that Paracelsus deserves to be remembered.
   
   The life and work of Paracelsus could be written and appraised in a book one quarter the size of this, but that is not what makes this book worth the effort. The background to modern science is in short supply and it is worth getting to know more about it. In the process you will realise that our modern comforts should not be taken for granted and it is not hard to find areas of the world even today some things are not much further advanced than those encountered in this book.
   
   A good read on what could be a difficult subject.

5 comments about The Man Who Fed the World: Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Norman Borlaug and His Battle to End World Hunger.

1. The Man Who Fed The World an authorized biography by Leon Hesser
   
   Norman Borlaug's life, written by Leon Hesser, is more than magnanimous. It is impressively humble.
   Hesser's remarkable, well-written book, is a wonderful story of the simple life of an Iowa farm boy whose extraordinary determination led him on a lifelong journey to feed a starving world. A young Norman Borlaug, scarred by the effects of the Great Depression witnessed, first hand, how food changes peoples lives.
   
   The Man Who Fed The World is an inspiring book of one man's hope, vision, and the intestinal fortitude to relentlessly pursue his goal to relieve human suffering. And for the millions of the world's starving who were unable to personally express their gratitude Norma Borlaug, on October 20, 1970, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
   
   A huge thank you to Leon Hesser for bringing the world this book!
   
   
   Marsha is a writer, speaker, and author of Emerald's Garden How to grieve, mourn and recover from loss. See [...]



2. Just by reading the jacket copy, one can glean that Norman Borlaug was an amazing man. In this biographical tome by Borlaug's friend and colleague, we follow Borlaug's life.
   
   We are pulled into the story by an unassuming man toiling in the fields being ambushed by a pickup truck full of reporters and photographers, eager to talk to the latest Nobel Prize recipient, and carried by Hesser's exceptional writing through an uplifting story of how a man who flunked a college entrance exam made huge strides in ending world hunger.
   
   I recommend this book to those interested in the life of Norman Borlaug, those studying world hunger and the efforts to end it, and to those looking to learn how to write an exemplary biography.



3. This is an account of a Man who WORKED in the field to end world hunger.
   He did not just talk about it.



4. Norman Borlaug was a man ahead of his time. This book should inspire other people to do something about world hunger. On a scale of 1-5 this book is a 10. It as a fantabulous book to read.



5. Not the best biography -- drags a little in the second half -- still, basically standard reading re: the Green Revolution -- I was unaware how worried some were that the world couldn't feed itself -- things we take for granted now...