2 comments about For the Love of Enzymes: The Odyssey of a Biochemist.

1. This is a nice, well-written scientific autobiography.
   It has some quite entertaining anecdotes, some social message, and a lot biology from the forefront of enzyme-research that should not be forgotten.
   It also has a couple of verbatim repetitions withing the book, which are a bit odd.
   
   On the other hand, it has managed to convince me of something that I have already suspected - that purifying and studying enzymes must be one of the most boring lines of research on the face of this planet. Kronberg makes a very valiant effort trying to show the opposite, and it's obvious that he loves his research with passion, something that I truly admire.
   I recommend this book to anyone who is thinking of entering enzymology - I believe it will give them a reasonably realistic estimate on whether they will like the work or not (in my case the answer was no, but it's personal taste).



2. I read this book when I was in graduate school working in a lab studying yeast replication proteins. Before the genes were cloned to allow overexpression of our proteins we had to purify the endogenous versions from large cultures. Reading this book really made me appreciate the enormous effort that went into designing a purification protocol that worked. Is it glamorous? No. Do you get really cold standing in the cold room? Of course. If you have ever purified proteins and wondered how long it took to develop the protocol, this book will give you an idea (and make you appreciate how good you have it).

5 comments about Life in the Treetops: Adventures of a Woman in Field Biology (Nota Bene Series).

1. Margaret Lowman's story, Life in the Treetops, is an inspiration for young women considering a life in science. She tells how she balanced a career as a field biologist, studying the forest canopy, with being a wife and mother, and eventually a single parent. Her stories of her experiences as a researcher and tree climber in such exotic locals as the Australian outback, Cameroon, Belize and Panama are intermingled with her observations about the inhabitants of these locals, the people she worked with and her sons. Her perseverance in a field dominated by men has given her an interesting perspective about science and life in general.



2. Margaret Lowman is a gifted biologist with a knack for finding ways to teach others the importance of her field and the need for conservation. Her adventures range from the humorous to the frightening and are guaranteed to hold the reader's interest. I held off a five-star rating only because I would have liked a little more information on some of the animals she's studied. Her impressions of Nature's little-known and often-overlooked creatures are valuable and fascinating, and I wish more space had been devoted to them. That's a minor quibble, though. As a writer on nature myself, I came away from reading this book with an improved understanding of how complex the "web of life" is, not to mention a determination to get my own children out into the forests more often.



3. Margaret Lowman writes candidly about her life... as though we were the closest of friends. I expected her to write about her research, the difficulties of climbing into the rainforest canopies, and her globe trotting. And she did. She also writes of the professional challenges, cultural clashes, and personal problems she encounters as a woman in field biology, and that makes this book something quite special.

   ON THE PERSONAL SIDE: Lowman married an Australian, had two children and lived in the outback, while conducting research on the Australian rain forests. On the personal side, she was expected to be a housewife, and mother. Her new Australian husband, and in-laws, did not understand her inner drive to spend time in her work. While clearly her new family did not support her in her work, Lowman persisted and achieved. She also made a decision to accept a teaching position at Williams College back in the US. She packed up the boys, and headed for home. She exchanged her marriage, and the boy's father, for a surprisingly supportive scientific community and her own supportive parents. Lowman tells of her personal life with candor, but without bitterness. While no one could accuse her of having an ordinary life, Lowman's book is also an every woman's story in that she chronicles the kind of day-to-day struggle of professional/career women faced (particularly in the 1970's and 1980's) in balancing career and family.

   ON THE PROFESSIONAL SIDE: To help understand the interdependence of the rainforests Lowman mostly studies the small things... leaves, and the insects that eat them. It sounds easier than it is. Most of the leaves to be studied are high up in the canopy of the rain forests. Early in her career, she gains access using ropes and harnesses, and even a cherry picker when she was pregnant; later she has the luxury of using a construction crane, a dirigible, and even a walkway. Lowman loves the forests, and her work. (Her book contains an illustration of her favorite tree, ficus watkinsiana.)

   Lowman ends the book telling us that it takes about the "same amount of energy to complain as it does to explain-but the results are incredibly different." Her book explains a great deal. I highly recommend it.




4. As a young woman who hopes with all her heart and works with all of her passion to be a scientist one day, I recommend this novel without a doubt. Dr. Lowman attacks every issue she faces head on, candidly describing her emotion and scientific endeavors as if the reader is a personal friend. As a female, I myself can relate to her described frustration of being a woman in a primarily male field. Even my closest male friends look at me with doubt and treat my five year love affair (ongoing, of course) with science as a joke simply because I am female (as the butt of their jokes imply). It's wondorous to read of other accounts involving similar emotion. On a scientific note, Dr. Lowman makes no adjustments for fear of the reader who does not care for biology; she writes about science just as she writes about emotion. For that, I urge parents to prod their children to read this memoir, adults to read, and all others to digest.



5. This unique book is about Margaret Lowman's life as a self-described field biologist who studies the mysteries of forest canopies, one of the last biotic frontiers on Earth. In Life in the Treetops, Lowman is a pioneer canopy scientist she describes the little known worlds of the treetops, their inhabitants, flowers and fruits, growth and mortality, patterns of diversity, and plant and animal interactions. Lowman writes about how, in order with the scientific hypothesis she was focusing on, a different canopy access technique was used. She's particularly good at exposing the life of a field biologist from a woman's perspective, what it was like to cope: with the demands of a challenging career; with marriage to an Australian sheep farmer; with housewifery; with motherhood to two young sons; with conflicting cultural differences about gender roles; and with divorce and single parenthood. Lowman's descriptions of her various arboreal ecological projects were fascinating. She emphasized the pleasures and intellectual rewards of studying the natural world without ignoring the projected vicissitudes of researching in wilderness settings. In the end Lowman is the director of research and conservation at the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens in Sarasota, Florida. This is an inspiring story for everyone, not just for women or those interested in careers in science, but for everyone.

No comments about Albert Meets America: How Journalists Treated Genius during Einstein's 1921 Travels.

5 comments about Light This Candle: The Life & Times of Alan Shepard--America's First Spaceman.

1. I missed an opportunity to go to a book-signing where Alan Shepard was signing copies of "Moon Shot". I figured I would have another chance but then before long he was gone. What a thrill it would have been to have shook the hand of the first American in space.
   
   Nostalgia aside, this book is a capsule of the life of the man. True, it is littered with inaccuracies in spots, and seems to delve far too deeply at moments on the personal life of one of the most important men in the last 50 years. But then again, how many JFK biographers have tried to delve into the hush-hush side of the man?
   
   This book will give you a clear picture of the over-achieving, success-driven, consumate test pilot who one day became an important symbol to many Americans, who were afraid their world was about to be consumed by communism. At times wistful, sometimes aggrandizing, other times pointedly candid, this biography attempt to reveal the Alan Shepard even the man himself wanted no one to see.
   
   You will be amazed at the story.



2. I had been meaning to read this long-overdue biography of Alan Shepard, and I happened to pick it up in a cruise ship library. As I read it I was surprised at the number of factual inaccuracies--there is at least one glaring non-technical error per chapter, which calls into question almost everything else between the covers. Numerous reviews here mention more problems with technical aspects of the book that I was unaware of, but which do not surprise me given the apparent lack of proofreading and fact-checking.
   
   An example: upon finding the book, I leafed through it and found the section on Apollo 14. There it mentioned that John Glenn had "almost killed himself when he lost control of the pace car at the Daytona 500 and slammed into a flatbed trailer crowded with journalists." This sentence boggled my mind, for it contained two errors: the pace car was at the Indianapolis 500, and John Glenn was a passenger while a local Dodge dealership owner was the driver. The book is just full of examples of this kind of sloppy reporting.
   
   Edit: I see that at least the paperback edition correctly says Indianapolis 500, but it still incorrectly implies that Glenn was driving the pace car.



3. I am a "space nut". I have read numerous books, seen numerous vhs and dvd stories of everything from the start of the space age to the shuttle flights. I have never had a more inspiring feeling than upon finishing "Light this candle". It started a little slow with all the early life details of Shepard but, helped later in the book with how & why he reacted to many (and I mean many) tough situations that he faced in his unbelievable life. Being a space nut, I was happy to see little details explained in the book that are lacking in other books I have read. Such things as Shepard talking about laying in the LEM following an EVA on Apollo 14. He and Mitchell were supposed to be sleeping but Shepard talked about the "eerie silence" and hearing the A/C unit click on and off. Also, feeling like they were going to tilt over and falling out of the bunk when he thought the LEM was sliding down the edge of the crater. All of these things made it a "tough to put down" book that I would HIGHLY recommend.
   I used to think of Al Shepard as an egotistical, bi-polar, spoiled fly-boy that I wanted no part in learning more about. I would have rather stuck to anyone of the other 6 Mercury astronauts. BOY WAS I WRONG! This book might have turned me to thinking that Al Shepard is the most interesting of the original 7.



4. Surprise of surprises. Amid the clutter of hastily-written self-serving memoirs from the early days of the space program, finally there appears something akin to solid history and literary proficiency. Neal Thompson was a Baltimore reporter when Alan Shepard died in 1998 of leukemia. Assigned to write an obituary, Thompson discovered that no first rate biography of the United State's first spaceman was then in print. Sensing an opportunity, Thompson, a free lance writer, began a six-year research project and produced a highly respectable treatment of a very private man. What had been known about Shepard were primarily his great successes and his notable shortcomings. Johnson tackles the great middle--and the puzzle that was Alan Shepard now begins to make sense.
   
   In truth, there is probably misunderstanding about all of the early astronaut heroes, as if each was assigned a role in a bigger cosmic drama. Scotty Carpenter will always be the house philosopher, Gordo Cooper the hotdog, Gus Grissom the curmudgeon. Shepard's role was to be first, the best, the winner of a grueling marathon to ride the Redstone rocket--tiny by today's standards--for fifteen minutes on May 5, 1961. Given the unpredictability of the rockets of that era, the greater risk to the astronaut was on the ground than in space. This fact was appreciated in 1961, and being chosen number one was a statement from his superiors about his fortitude as much as his mastery of flying and technology.
   
   Alan Shepard was born in 1923 in Derry, NH, to a somewhat removed, demanding father. Young Shepard inherited a fierce competitiveness and an independence that allowed him to pursue personal goals with little concern about his impression on others. This latter quality, to his advantage, is what set him apart from his archrival John Glenn, who did worry about public relations. Shepard was one of those rare men who had his cake and ate it, too: he achieved remarkable career goals while entertaining himself along the way with what can only be called oppositional defiance. In a strange twist of history, he actually pulled off the mischief that has always been attached to others like Gordon Cooper.
   
   In this regard Thompson studies Shepard's military misbehavior and his philandering. The author's account of the future astronaut's brushes with military authority is detailed and rather surprising. One comes away with a sense that the New Hampshire flyboy's skills as a naval test pilot must have been noteworthy, outweighing numerous dangerous incidents of "flat-hatting" or strafing civilians on the ground. His cheating on his virtuous and devoted wife Louise--a spouse of the Lady Bird Johnson mold--is a blotch that time will probably not erase. Thompson does observe that Shepard's amorous sorties off the reservation were adolescent in nature; the astronaut apparently never engaged in any sort of long term relationship in which Louise was displaced.
   
   Although there is in this work a lot about Shepard to dislike, the author clearly strove for a balanced presentation. Shepard appears to have made his peace with Glenn at the time of the Freedom Seven flight. After retirement he demonstrated a better than average interest in philanthropy and seems to have worked harder in his later years to enrich his marriage with Louise. Perhaps best known is his decade long battle with Meniere's Disease, and later with a form of leukemia. In some ways the Meniere's was more of a psychological jolt, coming as it did at the beginning of the Gemini, and ultimately, the Apollo Programs. Whatever his colleagues felt about him, Shepard was widely respected in the NASA management circle for outstanding cape com work in the troubled Carpenter and Cooper flights. With Glenn, his chief rival, out of the picture due to a head injury and political considerations, Shepard was the logical choice to command the maiden voyages of these new craft--and by implication become the first man to walk on the moon.
   
   But this was not to be. For nearly a decade Shepard lost his license to fly any type of aircraft due to balance impairment [and other less known medical problems brought to light by the author.] Did he take this forced grounding graciously? Admittedly not. But the author assesses this period of Shepard's career with more depth than other commentators. He notes, for example, that Shepard had burned his bridges with the Navy by joining NASA and could not return to what seemed to be a straight road to admiralty status. While the Navy was no longer an option, Shepard was proving himself to be a better than average business man and becoming independently wealthy. Freed of aviator-astronaut responsibilities, he could have lived a highly lucrative lifestyle.
   
   But he stayed with NASA, a nasty Don Quixote. Only a man in similar straits like Deke Slayton, himself medically grounded from space travel, could have understood and tolerated his subaltern's angry depression which alienated other astronauts in the program and at times rendered him a public relations nightmare. What sustained him through his bureaucratic Siberia was the desire to return to active status, but perhaps more strongly a desire to conquer his own medical problem. Shepard would admit that his selection for the first Mercury flight was the professional highlight of his career. Reinstatement to flight status for Apollo was for him a personal triumph of a different sort,
   
   Shepard was due for some luck. Experimental surgery put him on line for Apollo 13, but management bumped him to 14 to absorb training and thus he avoided the near catastrophic events of unlucky 13. Shepard seemed grateful to be back--choosing for his Apollo 14 crew Stu Roosa, who had defined the art of avoiding Shepard in company hallways. Apollo 14 survived at least three mission-threatening crises on its way to the world's most famous tee shot. What the author shares about the moon landing mission is one of its least known achievements: it brought its commander to tears.



5. Not much about Al Shepard that isn't already in other books
   and movies. And just plain wrong on obvious things like
   Grissom's pickup --which is on tape. How do you screw
   something like that up? Short on technical details
   and a lot of rehash on the Glen rivalry.
   
   The constant repetitive mentioning of Al's sexual business is a bit weird.
   Especially since only two real instances are mentioned in the book,
   and neither of them involved sex. The supposed suppressed T.J. scandal
   (John Glenn saves the day) is total horsecrap too, never happened.

1 comments about Max Perutz and the Secret of Life.

1. Max Perutz used to say that he was famous, but that few people knew what it was he was famous for. His name may not resonate with household familiarity, but he was a Nobel laureate for his work on the structure of hemoglobin and was enormously influential in organizing other scientists working in what was then a new field of molecular biology. He died in 2002, working up until his last days, and although he was an accomplished writer, he didn't get around to writing an autobiography because he consciously decided that his time was best spent researching instead. Now there is a fine biography that will help readers appreciate what he was famous for, _Max Perutz and the Secret of Life_ (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press) by Georgina Ferry. Ferry is one of our best science writers, and this admiring but unfawning biography not only tells the story of its protagonist, but also illustrates how science gets done as a cooperative and competitive enterprise.
   
   When he was 22 in 1936, Perutz and his family left his native Austria, but in Cambridge during the war he was arrested and shipped with Nazis to Canada merely because of his national origin. His work resumed upon his release and oath of allegiance to the King. It was ever after would based on x-ray crystallography, a field drawing from mathematics, chemistry, biology, and physics. The crystals Perutz used were not geologic samples, but crystallized versions of proteins, and he latched on to hemoglobin because it really was involved in the secrets of life; it was known that it carried oxygen throughout the body (he called it the "molecular lung"), but no one knew how it did so. Over decades of research he showed not only the structure, but how it flexed and turned in order to take on oxygen or give it off. Perutz was not the sort of brilliant scientist who had flashes of eureka moments. He got to his lab and worked hard until answers came. His answers were often wrong, shot down by others, and it is perhaps because he understood the nature of scientific research as a group endeavor that Perutz was brilliant in organizing others. He established the research unit in which Watson and Crick found DNA's structure, and as chairman of the Laboratory for Molecular Biology, he fostered an environment that on its own has produced more Nobel prizes than many developed countries.
   
   Perutz had more than his share of foibles. He had a passion for climbing mountains and skiing that could eclipse his interest in research or even in his family. Nonetheless, he was sickly most of his life, and had a peculiar diet that required him to eat bananas that had ripened to black. He had a naïve belief that scientific reasoning would overcome the flaws within politics and religion. His life as Ferry tells it, however, is full of wonderful lessons, like the one that a good brain is a boon, but hard work and perseverance are what make success. Another one is that scientific researchers work best in a chaotic environment with only partial controls upon it. Another one is that the best way to understand any physical object is to understand its internal structure. And finally, a maxim that was one of Perutz's favorites, "In science, truth always wins." Perutz left a legacy of his own research, and more importantly of effective organization of scientific teams, that will continue to foster the scientific victories he knew were coming.

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 Killing Time: The Autobiography of Paul Feyerabend.

1. This is one of the most touching autobiography I have read. Paul Feyerabend was not only an important thinker or philosopher, I was also an interesting human being. It is not, however, so much his story that is intriguing as it is the moral we can draw from his experiences that is illuminating. Perhaps the most valuable counsel he gives us in this book is the following:"If you want to achieve something, if you want to write a book, paint a picture, be sure that the center of your existence is somewhere else and that it's solidly grounded; only then will you be able to keep your cool and laugh at the attacks that are bound to come"(147). I think any student of philosophy, literature and the arts should take this advice to heart. Feyerabend is one of the rare philosophers who realized that, after all, a worthwile life is not one devoted to abstract thinking but one devoted to love. As he says," There are strong inclinations after all;...they are not about abstract things such as solitude or intellectual achievements but about a live human being"(169). I cannot but recommend you to read this very enlightening autobiography. Vladimir Pintro, student of philosophy at S.U.N.Y.



2. Typical Feyerabend arrogance, spiced with unbearable charm. Brimming with intimate details of his sexual experiences, fighting with the Nazi Army on the Western Front, his lifelong (almost) apathy toward academic philosophy, and his real passion: opera singing. Philosophy, it turns out, was "just a job." I had *no* idea that Paul Feyerabend once possessed a "world voice" for opera. It was opera he loved. About 1/3 of the story is about operas he'd seen worldwide, who sang the roles, his critical opinion of the singing!

   Also includes his bookish, only-child upbringing; his horribly depressed mother and her suicide in his teens; his adult depressions; his affairs and marriages; and finally, his mature love for the beautiful Graziana, which allowed him some actual truth in this life. It ends with Graziana's reminder that most of Feyerabend's life was spent in chronic pain, the result of a gunshot to his groin during the Nazi retreat from Russia. That was the injury which rendered him sexually impotent at 20 - a recurring theme in the story.

   By the last page, I was in tears. Imagine tears of compassion after reading the words of that anarchist maniac who wrote "Against Method"!! But tears there were. It's a very good book.




3. This is a slim volume, barely 200 pages, but it charts an awesome spiritual odyssee. Paul Feyerabend - enfant terrible of late 20th century philosophy - looked ruthlessly in the mirror and painted an unadorned picture of himself. At the end of his life, he painfully recognised that its course had been shaped by absences, rather than by specific events or, for that matter, ideas: absence of purpose, of content, of a focused interest, absence of moral character, absence of warmth and of social relationships.

   Only when Feyerabend approached the final fifteen years of his life and settled as a professor in the philosophy of science in Zürich - after having lectured four decades at Anglo-American universities - he started to relax. And eventually, a woman came and set things right. In 1983 he met the Italian physicist Grazia Borrini for the first time. Five years later they married. His relationship with Mrs. Borrini must have been the single most important event in Feyerabend's life. Reading his autobiography is an experience akin to listening to Sibelius' tone-poem 'Nightride and Sunrise': after 1983 the colours change dramatically and his prose is infused with warmth and immense gratefulness. It is a delight to read his rapt eulogies on the companion of the last decade of his life, on his most fortunate discovery of true love and friendship. Indeed, although Feyerabend is not interested in 'spoiling' his autobiography with an extensive reiteration of his philosophical positions, there are a few messages he clearly wants to drive home. The central role in life of love and friendship is one of them. Without these "even the noblest achievements and the most fundamental principles remain pale, empty and dangerous" (p. 173). Yet, Feyerabend clearly wants us to see that this love "is a gift, not an achievement" (p. 173). It is something which is subjected neither to the intellect, nor to the will, but is the result of a fortunate constellation of circumstances.

   The same applies to the acquisition of 'moral character'. This too "cannot be created by argument, 'education' or an act of will." (p.174). Yet, it is only in the context of a moral character - something which Feyerabend confesses to having only acquired a trace of after a long life and the good fortune of having met Grazia - that ethical categories such as guilt, responsibility and obligation acquire a meaning. "They are empty words, even obstacles, when it is lacking." (p.174) (Consequently, he did not think himself responsible for his behavior during the Nazi period).

   Contrary to someone like Karl Kraus, Feyerabend seems to think that men, at least as long as they have not acquired moral character, are morally neutral, whilst ideas are not. A question which remains, of course, is who is to be held responsible for intellectual aberrations and intentional obfuscation if this character is only to be acquired by an act of grace, an accidental constellation of circumstances.

   There is an enigmatic passage in the autobiography which may shed light on this important problem. After having seen a performance of Shakespeare's Richard II, in which the protagonist undoes himself of all his royal insigna, thereby relinquishing not just "a social role but his very individuality, those features of his character that separated him from other", Feyerabend notes that the "dark, unwieldy, clumsy, helpless creature that appeared seemed freer and safer, despite prison and death, than what he had left behind." (p. 172) It prompts him to the insight that "the sum of our works and/or deeds does not constitute a life. These . . . are like debris on an ocean . . . They may even form a solid platform, thus creating an illusion of universality, security, and permanence. Yet the security and the permanence can be swept away by the powers that permitted them to arise." (p. 172) These ideas do not exactly solve the question about moral responsibility, but they do suggest a tragic 'Lebensgefühl' - an acknowledgment of the fact that the spheres of reason, order and justice are terribly limited and that no progress in our science and technical resources will change their relevance - which seems to underpin Feyerabends very earthbound philosophy.




4. One of the most moving, insightful, and honest autobiographies I've ever read. Unduly influenced by the standard ignorant rap on Against Method, I was also very surprised. Get it, especially if you have a background in math, physics, philosophy, or even music.



5. In his book `Reason and Culture', Ernest Gellner points his finger at certain philosophers of science for undermining reason. One of the culprits is Paul Feyerabend.
   This autobiography is very revealing indeed. It gives an in depth view of Feyerabend's eventful life, his difficult character, his fierce philosophical battles, his profound (physical and intellectual) loves and his (self-) inflicted deceptions.
   As young soldier, he was physically heavily marked by World War II, but astonishingly his fighting spirit was enhanced. On the other hand, was this experience not a main reason for his deep pessimism: `Me? A family? Children? Not on this planet!' He called himself an `icy egotist'. All his life he had violent outburst of inner rage: `We shall act in a barbaric way. We shall punish, kill, meet violence with violence.'
   During the war, he was lived, as Nietzsche said: `the aims of Nazism - I hardly knew what they were.' Already then for him, `a clean moral vision implies simplifications and acts of cruelty and injustice.'
   After the war, he had to choose between a career as a professional singer (he had a beautiful voice and loved opera) or as a scientist. He became a philosopher of science.
   But now the intellectual caste became the target of his violent attacks: `intellectuals prepare a New Age of ignorance, darkness and slavery.' His main foe was the man he saw as the new POP(p)E(r) of philosophy.
   Overreactions and exaggerations made him even return to animism: `two types of tumors to be removed - philosophy of science and general philosophy (ethics, epistemology etc.) ... Nor is there one way of knowing, science. There are many such ways, and before they were ruined by Western civilization, they were effective in the sense that they kept people alive and made their existence comprehensible.'??
   His anger culminated in his best known book `Against Method', called by his caste `anything goes'. Already the title is a provocation. It provoked an avalanche of devastating reviews which traumatized him deeply. He defends himself: `I never denigrated reason, only some petrified and tyrannical versions of it.'
   After meeting the love of his life, the rebel (sometimes without a cause) became less caustic, and even wanted children.
   
   All in all, this book is a fascinating read.

4 comments about Sakharov: A Biography.

1. I read this book slowly. The author has gathered a lot of details and his interest in Russia is the main context in which the subject is considered. With the emphasis in this book on how extraordinary the Communist regime of the Soviet Union had been in ruthlessness even before it had the opportunity to acquire atomic weapons, I was afraid that its approach to what I was really interested in would be too tame and toothless for my taste. More than most nuclear scientists, Andrei Sakharov has been recognized as a great dissident. Many thought that this was some kind of folly. "In a joke of the time a dog explains glasnost: `The chain is longer, the food is still far away, but you can bark all you want.'" (p. 373). Jokes were a major feature of the situation. There is a paragraph early in the book, about a mannerism of a great Russian poet, who announced his appreciation for the best of his own work with the words, "`O Pushkin, you . . . !' At moments of insight, rubbing his hands in delight, Sakharov would repeat those words aloud." (p. 48) The big joke about Pushkin was most appropriate a hundred years after his death, after the official Pushkin Year of 1937, when a few people still had the nerve to say: "If Pushkin had lived in our times, he still would have died in '37." (p. 46). Sakharov grew up in tough times, but his sense of reality grew in proportion to the responsibilities which he assumed. When he was picked on in a personal manner, and he felt that the Soviet system reacted in a way that seemed inappropriate to him personally, he was capable of exhibiting his own toughness. When Tatiana, Bonner's daughter, was expelled from Moscow University, he was capable of losing the restraint with which people are expected to submit to those who sit in positions of authority. Poor Ivan Petrovsky, rector of Moscow University. "Sakharov lost his temper and pounded the table twice with his fist. Later that day Petrovsky dropped dead from a heart attack, and in some quarters, including the Academy, Sakharov was considered complicit in Petrovsky's death." (p. 248). Joseph Shklovsky, author of FIVE BILLION VODKA BOTTLES TO THE MOON, considered himself a leader "because of his mastery of cursing, an art he had learned as a construction foreman." (p. 59). Reporting on a month which Sakharov and Shklovsky spent on a train fleeing Moscow as students during World War II, Shklovsky reported, "One day he asked me a preposterous favor: `Do you have anything I can read on physics?' . . . My first impulse was to send this mama's boy and his ridiculous request straight to hell." (p. 59). Years later, concerning Petrovsky, Shklovsky said, "I can't forgive Andrei Sakharov for the sharp rebuke he delivered to the poor rector." (p. 248).

   Since Sakharov was seeking convergence with the rest of the world more than anything else, it made sense for him to go see everyone "From Margaret Thatcher to Daniel Ellsberg" (p. 360) when he had the chance. He even "had half an hour alone with Edward Teller before a formal banquet honoring Teller on his birthday." (p. 375) Later he convinced Solzhenitsyn's wife to call Solzhenitsyn to a phone in Cavendish, Vermont so that "there should be nothing left unsaid between us." (p. 376). With Elena, he met "both the head of the Italian Socialist Party and the pope. And, in an event that captures the flavor of that year of wonders, Sakharov and the pope discussed perestroika in the Vatican." (p. 379).

   He finally met Gorbachev on January 15, 1988, (p. 366) and the two found themselves in an interesting political situation. After elections on March 26, 1989, Sakharov was to represent the Academy of Sciences in the First Congress of People's Deputies on May 25. "Yeltsin won Sakharov's admiration when he demanded live television coverage of the congress." (p. 381). Gorbachev had a committee to draft a new constitution approved "when someone noticed all its members were communists." (p. 384). Sakharov was added to the committee and became the major opponent of Article 6 of the constitution, which gave the Communist Party a monopoly on power. Open debate was new to those who had been involved in officially secret proceedings, and Sakharov found himself involved in arguments in which Gorbachev said, "I'm against running around like a chicken with its head cut off." (p. 385). When the fight turned to Afghanistan, Sakharov had said things which rankled the usual superpower thinking on the Soviet side, and continued to insist, "The real issue is that the war in Afghanistan was itself a crime, an illegal adventure, and we don't know who was responsible for it." (p. 386). There were shouts in opposition to his views, but polls for the best deputy "showed Sakharov number one, Yeltsin two, and Gorbachev seventeenth." (p. 386). When he died, a "crowd of fifty thousand" came to his funeral. (p. 401).




2. Sakharov was the father of the Russian atomic program; he was Oppenheimer, Teller, and Feynman, all rolled into one. The book traces Russia from before his birth to his death, as it rises against Germany and sinks into the depths of Stalin's Terror and Kuruschev's reign. Sakharov, given immense importance under Stalin and Kuruschev, finds himself at odd with what he created. He wants so much to redeem himself that he devotes the remaining of his life to the Russian resistance. And he suffers for this - all the perks and medals he earned for his work on Russia's atomic program are summarily taken back by the state. He is exiled to Gorky and is spied on by KGB. His memoirs are stolen on two occassions by the KGB; depressed, almost suicidal, he rewrites them from memory. This was an excellent look into a very interesting country in the context of an equally interesting protagonist. It is said that mathematicians (and probably theoritical physicists) have a short career; their inventions and discoveries are made when they are young, and they whittle away in their middle- and old ages. Could be that Sakharov, having contributed to many such inventions and discoveries, figured that joining the resistance is a far better legacy. Being considered the father of the atomic program of a country is a big burden to bear; I am reminded of Oppenheimer's words when he witnessed what he had created. All he could think about was Lord Krishna's words in the Bhagavad Gita: "I am death, shatterer of worlds, annhilating all things." I would recommend this book for a great insight into Russia through the eyes of one of its best known (and loved) citizens.



3. This is a superb book that takes the reader through all of the major episodes in Sakharov's life while adding enough personal details (i.e., why Sakharov fried his salad) to make the man human. Sakharov was one of the key figures of the last half of the twentieth century and this book may stand as the authoriative work on the man both as a physicist and as a dissident. The book is surprisingly easy to read and is an excellent introduction to the Soviet system under Brezhnev for the novice. The book also goes over some of Sakharov's main writings, which in retrospect seem a bit off the wall.



4. Nadezhda Mandelstam once wrote that "a person with inner freedom, memory, and fear is that reed, that twig that changes the direction of a rushing river." Andrei Sakharov, scientist and father of the Soviet H-bomb, was such a twig, a twig that helped changed the course of Soviet and Russian history.
   
   How does a man evolve from being a relatively apolitical nuclear physicist in the 1940s to being the moral conscience of a nation striving for democracy by the time of his death in 1989? How does a man who was offered and provided all the material comforts available to the preeminent scientist in the USSR turn away from those temptations and choose, instead, to stand a lonely vigil outside kangaroo courts intent on hounding dissidents who dared to speak out against the Soviet regime?
   
   Lourie's marvelous biography of Sakharov does a fine job of setting out both how and why Sakharov evolved from a hero of the USSR with direct telephone access to the Kremlin into a pariah who was hounded, slandered, and finally sent into internal exile in the closed city of Gorky. Yet, by the end of his life, Sakharov, this mere twig, managed to face down and indeed outlast those that set the political might of a nation against him.
   
   Lourie comes to Sakharov with an impressive background in Russian and Soviet history and literature. He has translated numerous works of fiction, including works by Vladimir Voinovich, and also translated Sakharov's Memoirs. (The tragic story of the destruction of numerous drafts of Sakharov's Memoirs by the KGB is set out in detail in Lourie's biography.)
   
   Sakharov is set out in a straightforward, chronological fashion. It begins with Sakharov's family background and his childhood and early adult years. Lourie moves relatively quickly through Sakharov's birth in 1921 and his childhood and teen years. Sakharov , along with his families supported the Soviet regime. Dissent was not an issue for them. Sakharov always considered himself a loyal patriot devoted to the Soviet Union. Lourie sets out in detail Sakharov's early interest in math and the sciences and his academic development. By the time World War II had started it was clear that Sakharov would have a career in the sciences.
   
   After the German invasion of Russia, Sakharov quickly found work in the area of munitions. It was here that Sakharov had his first run-ins with authority. Unlike many of his colleagues who was willing to brook interference from unknowing Commissars. Fortunately for Sakharov his suggestions and mechanical innovations were critical in aiding the Soviet war effort and he was allowed far greater flexibility in his approach to work and science than many of his peers.
   
   Lourie then traces the path that took Sakharov from improving the quality of tank shells and munitions to being the lead scientist in charge of the development of the Soviet atomic and H-bombs. Here Sakharov crossed paths with Stalin, Beria, and most of the other leaders of his time. It is clear that Sakharov would not have survived a failure. Sakharov was committed to the project and believed developing these weapons were in the best interests of Russia. The projects were successful and Sakharov became something of a national hero. It is here that Sakharov's life began to change.
   
   He was provided almost unheard of access to the Soviet leadership. He had direct phone lines to the Kremlin. Gradually, Lourie shows Sakharov repeatedly refusing membership in the Communist Party. He also began taking up the causes of his fellow scientists who were treated unfairly by the apparatchiks that dominated all areas of life. He didn't hesitate to pick up the phone and complain to Khrushchev
   
   As Sakharov grew increasingly distanced from the Soviet regime, the regime grew increasingly intolerant of Sakharov's actions. Sakharov's dissidence evolved from one focusing on small issues to issues of internal democracy and global peace. It is clear that if Sakharov did not possess a vast array of nuclear secrets he would have been subject to the exile in the same manner as Alexandr Solzhenitsyn and Vladimir Voinovich. At the same time, Sakharov was awarded the Nobel Peace Price. The Soviet authorities were as put off by this award as the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature to Boris Pasternak. The authorities finally did exile, but to the closed city of Gorky. There he was harassed and harried on a daily basis.
   
   It should be pointed out that Sakharov became famous throughout the world for his dissident activities. However, Lourie's examination of Sakharov focuses almost exclusively on Sakharov from an internal, domestic view point. I believe this was a wise choice as the West actually knew very little of what Sakharov actually was going through during those years.
   
   Lourie's Sakharov is not an exercise in pure idolatry however. Lourie does not fail to note the lack of warmth, in fact the animosity, between Sakharov and his children from his first marriage (his first wife died after over 20 years of marriage) once he met and married Elena Bonner.
   
   Sakharov was, of course, a scientist and Lourie had to address certain scientific concepts and issues throughout the course of the book. His treatment was precise yet understandable to the lay reader.
   
   Lourie's writing is precise and to the point. He lets Sakharov's actions speak for themselves and does not engage in an excessive amount of self-indulgent psycho-analysis of Sakharov. Lourie treats his readers as adults and he allows the reader the opportunity to read the story of Sakharov's life in a manner that allows us to ponder exactly how any man can become a twig that changes the course of history.
   
   This is a book worth reading.

5 comments about Sky Walking: An Astronaut's Memoir.

1. This is a highly readable and expertly written account by Tom Jones about his astronaut career.
   He writes from his heart, and has clearly thought a lot about how to effectively communicate his experiences.
   His use of imagery puts this book in the realm of literature, though it is definitely non-fiction.
   A must for your Christmas list if you are or once were an aspiring astronaut, an aspiring writer of topics related to space and technology or just interested in knowing what it is like up there. It is a great read; I laughed, I cried, learned something about space, space policy and history, and was amazed by it all!



2. Sky Walking is the best account of the experience of space that I have ever read. It takes you deep into the physical and emotional sensations of space travel where you the reader experience what astronauts experience right down to the mundane task trying to locate an item that has floated away in the cabin or trying to use an exercise bike with zero gravity. Tom Jones is an articulate writer capable of constructing wonderful imagery and some choice metaphors about every aspect of space travel from training to launch to rentry. His descriptions of his space walks and working aboard the International Space Station are particularly memorable. Jones is also not afraid to render an opinion about this America's commitment to space what can and should be done to maintain NASA as a shining symbol of American capability. I highly recommend this book to anyone with a curiosity about what space travel is really like.
   -- Jerry Burton, author of Zora Arkus-Duntov the Legend Behind Corvette and Corvette, America's Sports Car, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.



3. There are many excellent books written by and about the Right Stuff astronauts who flew during the earlier days of the space program. However, until recently, there has been a nearly total lack of books by and about the shuttle astronauts who fly now. For better or worse, today's space program is as different from the program of the early days as the shuttle is different from the Apollo capsules. And today's astronauts are different, too.
   
   Mike Mullane was the first of the shuttle astronauts to write about his experiences in his book Riding Rockets. However, Mullane was a member of the group that made the transition from the Apollo program to the shuttle program, and the tone of his book is almost wistful; he clearly wanted to be one of the Right Stuff guys-- and he means guys-- but he ended up being a shuttle technician.
   
   Sky Walking is a memoir by a very different sort of astronaut. Tom Jones was very young during the "glory days" of the space program, so he has no Right Stuff preconceptions about astronauts as death-defying heroes. Rather, he is an Air Force Academy graduate who flew B-52s, earned a PhD in planetary sciences, and became a dedicated, professional shuttle program technician. That could have made for a dull, technical book if it weren't for his intellect and, more importantly, his powers of observation and ability to reflect on what he experienced.
   
   Jones flew four shuttle missions and took three space walks on his final mission, which was dedicated to construction on the International Space Station. His accounts of what space walks are like-- and of the hundreds of hours of training that precedes each one-- are first rate. His descriptions of the ISS and of the issues surrounding its planning, funding, and construction are excellent. I don't know of any other insider's book that deals with the ISS in such detail or with such authority. This is because Jones was an administrator in the ISS program between his third and fourth shuttle flights.
   
   The subtitle says that this is "an astronaut's memoir," and that's exactly what it is. Jones takes us trough his selection as an astronaut, his general training, his years of waiting for flights, his training for those flights, and the flights themselves. There is considerable technical information in the book, but Jones does an excellent job of clarifying it for non-experts. The real focus is on Jones himself-- what he sees, thinks, and feels about what's happening to him.
   
   This is an outstanding book. It answers the two basic questions many of us have always had: "What's it REALLY like to fly in space?" and "What are those people REALLY like?" I thoroughly enjoyed Sky Walking, and I recommend it most highly.



4. Not the Right Stuff for me.
   The writing is wordy, attempts to be profound and "educated" at every turn, and fails.
   
   His single most dramatic story, the stuck hatch, is anti-climatic.
   
   His second most dramatic story: too much air getting into the food packets.
   
   There is very little "inside scoop" here, as NASA is portrayed as all glorious, and almost perfect. Yet we know, and see demonstrated on a regular basis, that the opposite is true.
   
   Find this locally if you can, and browse through it first to see if its the right stuff for you.



5. This is a beautifully written account of one astronaut's experiences going through the NASA space program. If you are curious about what it takes to become an astronaut, the inner-workers of the organization, and what its like to truly live in space, this is a terrific book. And, the writer has a wonderful way of translating complex information into easily digestible bites. Truly a wonderful read!

1 comments about The Book of My Life (New York Review Books Classics).

1. Girolamo Cardano's THE BOOK OF MY LIFE is a very typical entry into the lists of the New York Review of Books Classics: fairly obscure except to Renaissance historians, Cardano was an enormously important Italian mathemetician, scientist, and astrologer who also wrote an account of himself, his nature, and his life. Cardano's experiences in 16th-century Italy are extremely complex and colorful, and he recounts not only his problems with his children and his many enemies, but also his birthsign, his experiments, and his encounters with supernatural beings. The book isn't quite as enthralling as you hope it might be, and in the foreword Anthony Grafton comments on the limitations of this translation (which hearkens back to the 1920s)--given this, you wonder why NYRB didn't commission a new and more faithful translation. The book is intriguing enough but doesn't exactly pass the time quite in the enjoyable way the NYRB Classics seem to be intended to do.