1 comments about Charles Darwin: And the Evolution Revolution (Oxford Portraits in Science).

1. This is a very short book that serves as a good introcutory book about the life of Charles Darqwin and his importance to science. However, if you want to dig deep into the mand an its achievements, you'll have to read a whole lotta more...
   
   Anyway, this book completely attends its pourpose: a brief biography that will make you wanna know more.

5 comments about Iron Fist: The Lives of Carl Kiekhaefer.

1. As one who grew up on a marina in central Ky., the outboard "wars" of the 1960-70's were a major part of my life. We were Mercury fanatics in Evinrude country. Rodengen's work on the life of Carl Kiekhaefer is mandatory reading for anyone who worshipped at the Mercury altar. It confirms the genius of Kiekhaefer, and the superiority of his product, while at the same time making clear the weaknesses that ultimately led to the loss of his company to Brunswick, and with it the unique "personality" that made Kiekhaefer Mercury the beloved company of its time.

   The most amazing thing to me was the number of engineering accomplishments and the ultimate dominance of the marine industry by the men in black. For any Mercury devotee, this book will literally cause tears in your eyes. I'm glad it was written.




2. This book is full of details few imagined about Kiekhaeffer and Mercury Outboards. Many of his personal triumphs and disasters are explained. Mr. Rodengen has done a very through job of researching the story of a very secretative and often confusing character. Serendipity often followed this gentleman through his amazing career. From early on when outboard motors were not his intended focus, to when he sold Mercury to Brunswick (for what turned out to be a less than favorable deal for him, though he remained well off by average standards) to his last adventure with the rejuvenated Kiekhaeffer Aeromarine as an Offshore racing engine and outdrive maker making him another fortune in boating. The story is very interesting, but the source material for the book is Mr. Rodengen's anthology of of his own magazine articles about Mercury and Kiekhaeffer. While background information was necessary in each magazine installment a little too much remains in each chapter and story for best clarity. I recommend perservering with the writing style to learn this interesting story that is told no where else.



3. As anyone reading this review will know, Cark Kiekhaefer was one of the godfathers of the racing world. His Kiekhaefer 625 motors and Don Aronow's cigarette designs, decimated the competition for many years. The book made me appreciate just how hard he strived for success. It also brings to light a softer, more vulnerable side to Kiekhaefer that is endearing. I'm sure he probably would have been highly embarrassed. The book is a great account of a life that I believe would make a great movie. If you liked the offshore world of the 70's and 80's where monohulls and KAM power ruled - you should enjoy the book. The only drawback for me personally was that there weren't more pictures.



4. I have collected outboards for years. I have always been a collector of Scott-Atwater outboards and Evinrude's. I have always liked Mercury's, but have never really collected them. I bought this book just to learn a little about the man and the company. Of all the books I have ever read, about outboards, this is the best one. Not just a great outboard book but a great book on the early years of outboards. You would have to put Carl Kiekhaefer in the same category as a Henry Ford and a Bill Gates. He built a company and didn't settle for just being in business, he strived for perfection and dominance. When it was all over he had accomplished both



5. ... especially considering the mountain of paid-for corporate propaganda, 'legends of ...', put out by the same author.
   
   I really enjoyed this book, knowing very little about Kiekhaefer before, although my parents were a Mercury dealer 1957-'61. An unforgetable moment was when a Mark 55H was unpacked at our store, ordered by a lawyer with a Class D Speedliner. I got to take it out of mothballs and air it out once in the 1980s. Amazing motor. And the story is about an amazing man who lived and breathed: compete and win.
   
   Really interesting that the man who built the world's fastest outboards in the era 1949-'64 grew up on a farm repairing heavy machinery, had never set foot in a boat (the author points out that Robert McCulloch raced outboards in college), and whose aim was to build magnetic separators for livestock feedlots when he fell by accident into the defunct Thor outboard factory. The author apparently tells the whole tale of E.C.K. as he knows it, girlfriends, awful temper, paranoia and all, which makes for a first rate biography. That is, Kiekhaefer (whon some local yokels persisted in calling Kefauver) was a ---, but as one said of others like Patton, he was a magnificient ---.
   
   I remember the photo of my Dad standing by the first (red) Mark 75 that arrived in our store in spring, '57, and the twice around the world endurance run at Lake X with two Raveau powered Mark 75s (I also recall reading the factory bulletins). Rodengen tells the tale of cheating and manipulation, how key parts and even powerheads were illegally changed while someone took the auto club observers out to eat. However, his statement that they 'pulled the heads' to clean the carbon from the exhaust ports is technically wrong, they perhaps pulled the exhaust water jacket to clean the ports. Every inline Mercury had a 1-piece block, there was no cylinder head. I liked very much the descriptions of Strang and Rose (both MIT engineers) and Jost. I knew and liked Edgar Rose and Jim Jost during my OPC racing 1977-'85 (although Edgar Rose was widely disliked with respect, he was in charge of motor inspection for APBA), and recall how Charlie Strang appeard at APBA National Championships with his mother. Wonderful story how, while Kiekhaefer was squandering money and engineering effort on car racing, Strang secretly created the first 6 cyl. prototype by cutting and welding 2 4 cyl. blocks and 3 2-cyl. cranks! But that was anyway how Kiekhaefer made the first 4 cyl. prototype from two 2 cyl. blocks and cranks. My father, who was very active in NOA racing, complained to Kiekhaefer Corp. about the enormous size and low gearing of the Mark 75,78, and Merc 800 gearcases. The results, nearly too late in 1960, were the speedmaster and sportsmaster gearcases. The NOA unlimited record was held in 1960 by a John-Rude 75 at about 57 mph on a wooden Allison runabout. The production John-Rude had a high geared stock gearcase that resembled a Quicksilver lower unit. I held the 70-80 cu. in. record at 51 mph with a clubfoot Merc 800 on an Allison. with the sportsmaster gearcase, about the size of a 1975 Evinrude 75 shortshaft but geared higher, I ran nearly 57 mph in 70-80, and both Paul Allison and we broke 60 mph in unlimited (Paul ran over 61, I managed about 60.5). We have the NOA record certificates to prove it, but the records never went into the books because the other drivers voted to outlaw the Allison boats after the fact (this is analogous to Kiekhaefer's persistent NASCAR problems described by Rodengen). In any case Kiekhaefer coundn't stand losing, and neither could we. From 1977-1985 I won 3 APBA National Championships in EP, was US 1 twice, held 2 speed records, and won (with George Laycock driving) the NOA 40-70 Championship in 1981.
   
   On the sob side of the coin, in 1961 after my Dad had gone into debt putting Mercury on the map locally and also in NOA racing, a lethargic but longer established dealer in Knoxville (who left it to Scott and the OMC dominate NOA) took him to court (we sold some motors outside our region), Kiekhaefer corp. supported the dealer and my parents lost the dealership. My Dad was not a Kiekhaefer fan after that.
   
   The book is sadly incomplete: who designed the Mark 78 and Mark 58? Who designed the Merc 800? In particular, who designed the Merc 500, the first production outboard with exhaust tuning? Was it Strang, Rose, Strang and Rose? I think that while Edgar was head of engineering at OMC, Jim Nerstrom actually designed the motors. Or, as is speculated on an outboard website, did O.F. Christner (Qunicy Welding) play a role in designing the 50 cu. in. OMC 3 cyl. looper that I raced 1977-'85?
   
   What I also liked very much: the description of the Mercury-OMC battle to set the world outboard speed record from 1957-about 1990. the last record mentioned is 176+mph on a 3-point hydro powered by an Evinrude V-8 ca. 1990 by Bob Wartinger. Our two young sons sat in the cockpit briefly last summer, the boat is alledgedly headed to a museum in Seattle.
   
   If anyone knows how to contact either Edgar Rose or Jim Jost, if they're still with us, I'd appreciate being contacted (jmccauley@uh.edu).
   
   Suggestions to Rodengen: a biography, maybe combined, of Dieter König and Robert McCulloch. McCulloch is described in Iron Fist, but not König.

No comments about E = Einstein: His Life, His Thought, and His Influence on Our Culture (Painting Class).

5 comments about My Country Versus Me: The First-Hand Account by the Los Alamos Scientist Who Was Falsely Accused.

1. In December 1999, when the threat to national security posed by Elian Gonzales had yet to be discovered and neutralized by the Reno Justice Department, another plot, equally dastardly, was uncovered by the FBI. Wen Ho Lee, a Taiwan-born American, was found to be working at the Los Alamos National Laboratory alongside America-born Americans on our nation's most sensitive nuclear secrets. With an alacrity that impressed even Reno's political opponents, the FBI clapped Lee into leg and arm shackles and an orange jumpsuit and put him into solitary confinement in a prison in Santa Fe. In so treating him *before* he had committed his crime, Reno was able to stop him from doing the sorts of things that Timothy McVeigh and Ramzi Yousef had done to get themselves the same sort of rough justice. Of course, Mr. Lee is not happy about these preventive measures, and it shows in his book, but the reader must keep in mind that he was born in Taiwan and doesn't understand our ways.
   
   It is distressing to all patriots that a judge ordered Mr. Lee's release before the Justice Dept was able to fully punish him for what they thought he might have done. Lee's lawyers cleverly played on the so-called "no evidence" loophole to get him sprung after a mere nine months in prison.
   
   Espionage and treason investigations are usually begun when there is evidence of a government employee in a sensitive post spending beyond his or her means: Clyde Conrad with his stash of gold coins; Ed Wilson with his vast Virginia real estate holdings; John Walker with his yacht. Lee's lawyers were able get him freed on the "no evidence" technicality before the FBI had time to find out what it was about Mr. Lee's lifestyle that made them understand that he was a spy. We know now that his stated hobbies of gardening and fly-fishing might well have been covers for illicit activities. Rare coins, might have been buried under the carrots. The whereabouts of an excellent trout pool in a New Mexico creek might have been only the first in a long line of secrets that Lee might have disclosed to the Chinese communists.
   
   Given that the FBI was not accorded sufficient time to uncover his crimes, the whole investigation appears to have rested on Mr. Lee's own admission of the fact that he was born in Taiwan, which has a clear link to China, which in turn is one of our nation's greatest enemies. It sends a chill down my spine to think of how many others might have used the "great scientist" guise to spy on us. Albert Einstein, to name only one, was allowed access to some of our most sensitive data on physics relating to atoms and neutrons and so forth, and no one seems to have noticed that he was born in *Germany*, one of our chief enemies in Europe during World War II. He managed to infiltrate the community of America-born scientists and might well have passed on a massive amount of vital intelligence to his erstwhile compatriots, the Nazis. In fact, it's no exaggeration to say that if he'd been properly incarcerated like Mr. Lee, the war in Europe might have ended many months sooner.



2. Mr. Lee is an amazing author and does an excellent job portraying the "all-righteous" government so many americans think that we have in this country. The truth is that corruption does exists, which is evident in all of the ways that the FBI, DOE, courts, and all of the other Federal organizations dealt with Mr. Lee. My hat is off to him for his courage, fortitude, and skill in creating a wonderful written work straight from his heart.



3. The book is an interesting account of Lee's "persecution", but anyone who reads the book without understanding that the author is writing about HIMSELF - not exactly an impartial source for the facts - will come to the conclusion that he was a victim of an insane government.
   
   If you don't have time to read the book, here's a synopsis - The US government knew that classified material was getting from Los Alamos to China, and targeted me for investigation not because of my admittedly suspicious and illegal activity but because I'm Asian.



4. This book is a self-serving woe-is-me diatribe against the US government because it dared to charge a non-white individual with the crime of espionage. Lee claims this happened to him by virtue of the fact that he is Chinese, and in spite of the fact that he is a naturalized American citizen. Hence, the title.
   
   First, I do not consider naturalized citizens to be American in the full sense of the word. It is simply amazing that people like Lee get hired to positions such as the one he held.
   
   Second, having served in the US Air Force with a top secret crypto clearance, I know from experience that people working in the intelligence community are very aware that they are not to share any sensitive data with anyone unless he/she has the appropriate clearance as well as "the need to know." Yet Lee downloaded all kinds of classified data onto his home computer, a huge no-no for anyone working with sensitive data. And why did he do so, pray tell? What was he going to do with the data he stole? Are we to assume he had no intentions of sharing this information with anyone? According to Lee, to think otherwise makes one a racist.
   
   Third, when the story first broke in the media, I knew it was only a matter of time until Lee or his attorneys would play the race card. If you go to Lee's website and check the names of those that have signed a petition in behalf of Mr. Lee, you will notice that the vast majority are Chinese. How many of these signatories put their names on the petition out of a knee-jerk tribalistic instinct rather than through a sincere effort to discern the truth?
   
   And now we have the case of Chi Mak, a Chinese-born engineer recently found guilty of handing over classified data on electronic propulsion systems for stealth submarines to the People's Republic of China. One wonders why Chi Mak did not play the race card as did Lee. One wonders how many signatories to a petition he could garner from fellow Chinese living in the United States. One wonders what he was doing in such a position to begin with. Maybe we'll find out when Chi writes his book.



5. 
   
   Dr Lee told his story in this book. As a naturalized American citizen, he does his professional job, raised a family with a typical middle class profile. But he was the wrong man as in the Chinese saying "The city gate fire victimized the fish in the pond" in the struggle of two parties ugly politics. Reading this book creates the following questions.
   
   1. Where is due process for Dr. Lee?
   2. What is the role of free press in democracy?
   3. Why a free press is enthusiastic to make a guilty assumption on him?
   4. Why there is silence on the spy on Crown Jewel Rocket secret afterward?
   5. Why US Court Judge Parker ended the case with an unusual apology to Dr. Lee, an alleged felon in 9-month solitary confinement with 59 charges?
   6. Why there is a plea bargain for one small charge to cover up lost face?
   7. Why this case is important relating to US Constitution and the rule of law?
   
   Dr Lee warns readers "Do not talk to FBI without your lawyer." This book gives the reality lesson of politics, humanity and justice.
   All men are created equal - some are more equal than others?

5 comments about Fulcanelli and the Alchemical Revival: The Man Behind the Mystery of the Cathedrals.

1. If we use the word "misconception", it is quite on purpose, for that word refers to "getting it wrong", which on the whole is not dishonourable. Nevertheless, within this particular misconception is also the deep and scarcely veiled contempt in which the author holds Fulcanellian alchemy. The authors listed above had undoubtedly shown respect for Fulcanelli and had considered him an Adept of hermetic philosophy, which he masterfully discussed in both of his published books. However, Genevi?ve Dubois not only appears to hold contempt for Fulcanellian alchemy, but for Fulcanelli himself, who is also disparaged, run down and betrayed in such a manner that her book would have been more appropriately entitled, "Fulcanelli d?voy? " rather than "Fulcanelli d?voil? "!
   
   "L'Affaire Fulcanelli" , another work by said author, is a fallacious and partial book full of glaring errors of logic, transcription and date. It is, as far as I know, a book that few noticed (with the exception of Jean Laplace), and one which ridicules and describes a hoax cunningly orchestrated by the duplicity of two document looters - Pierre Dujols and Ren? Schwaller - and the ingenious ideas of Eug?ne Canseliet and his mentor Julien Champagne, in the manner of a novel by Flaubert: the "Bouvard and P?cuchet " of the Belle Epoque. However, under the pretence of making amends, Genevi?ve Dubois wished to make it clear at the end of the perfidious book that she thinks that young Canseliet had been the sport of Champagne, who thoroughly manipulated him.
   
   Jean Laplace, therefore, justly expressed his indignation in the diatribe he published in La Tourbe des Philosophes , N?s 36-37:
   [...] I was still very na?ve to think that those "questers" had only in mind to put a name on a pseudonym; I realized after some time that some of them were only trying, under the cover of that so-called "quest", to destroy the hated image of Eug?ne Canseliet, whom they so detested. [...].
   
   The malevolence and intentional prejudice warned against by Eug?ne Canseliet, again produced a heap of nauseous nonsense entitled Fulcanelli d?voil?. Still, in his Alchimie expliqu?e, and on that same page 12, the philosopher foresaw that four centuries would not elapse, as in the case of Flamel, before his own life would be meticulously sifted through without any benevolence by yet another Villain.
   
   [...] The new accusatory document that appeared in November 1992 (Fulcanelli d?voil?) goes even farther, insinuating that there never was an Adept Fulcanelli, since all of that had been a hoax of which Eug?ne Canseliet was the victim, unless he was a stakeholder in it. The hatred for Eug?ne Canseliet that emanates from that distasteful book is all the more easily released as the only one able to give answers has been dead for about ten years now. Still, when one realizes that the author is not even able to correctly read the original copy of the philosopher's published letter - so enormous are the mistakes - one is allowed to seriously doubt her insight.
   
   Not content with all that, Genevi?ve Dubois, who was at that time directing a line of alchemical writings for publisher Dervy, decided in 1995 to publish an odd book under the name of "Jean-Fran?ois Gibert" entitled Propos sur la Chrysop?e, avec en annexe le Manuscrit de Pierre Dujols-Fulcanelli traitant de la pratique alchimique , in which the author expresses, without beating around the bush, her negative intentions (p. 21):
   
   Newton's case study now being almost completed, we will now talk about the case of Fulcanelli, one which is close to a hoax and represents the final form of pseudo-alchemical materialism, a blind alley in the hermetic labyrinth. To prove our statements we are going to present a still unheard of manuscript from Dujols-Fulcanelli on the Chrysopea. This will enable students of the philosophical art to get their own ideas on the Great Work considered in the manner of Le Myst?re des Cath?drales, written from the notes left by Dujols and Champagne, by the scholarly blower, the late Eug?ne Canseliet.
   
   What an edifying document, indeed, is this text which, while correctly reflecting Pierre Dujols' style, is at the perfect opposite of the alchemical path followed and recommended by Fulcanelli.
   
   The alchemist Fulcanelli was the most famous adept of the 20th century, the man who achieved the Great Work less than 100 years ago, but his true identity has always been shrouded in myth and uninformed speculation...until now.
   
   Patrick Rivi?re reveals with profuse documentary evidence the true identity of the enigmatic and prestigious author of The Mystery of the Cathedrals and The Dwellings of the Philosophers. Beginning with an overview of French alchemical life at the turn of the 20th century, Rivi?re carefully builds his case step-by-step with facts, documents, and photographs, introducing us to the well-known physicist who was known as Fulcanelli. Rivi?re also demolishes the scurrilous hypotheses that suggest Fulcanelli never existed. Rivi?re is uniquely suited to solving this mystery as his teacher was Fulcanelli's sole student, Eug?ne Canseliet. (ISBN 1-897244-21-5 Red Pill Press)



2. Who was this enigmatic being, Fulcanelli, a twentieth century alchemist who allegedly discovered the secrets of immortality, or at very least a special elixir that extended his life long beyond life expectancy? His true identity is the subject of this book.
   
   Fulcanelli is accredited with authoring two books, Le Mystère des Cathédreles (1926) and The Dwellings of the Philosophers in 1930. The former title by far is considered a masterpiece in modern alchemy, examining the sculptures in French gothic cathedrals, primarily Notre Dame of Paris, and linking them to the processes of alchemy, suggesting that these churches were used as but intended as learning centers for the ancient sciences. A curious "lost" chapter, The Cyclic Cross at Hendaye, is added to the 1957 edition of this book, a chapter which redirects Fulcanelli's work in an entirely different corner of the universe, a ten page examination of a stone cross near a parrish church in the center of a small town in the Basque country. The examination of the symbols on this cross, according to the author of this chapter, point to a prediction of the end of the world. This chapter has spawned an entire impulse based on Fulcanelli's book, that is very different than the rest of the book, and this topic (that chapter) is not the focus of this book, though the author does have some interesting remarks about it in a later chapter in her book. And being that it was added over thirty years after the original edition of this book, it is questionable whether it was even penned by the same hand that wrote the rest of the book. Le Mystère des Cathédreles is definitely about alchemy, not the end of the world.
   
   This book will introduce the reader to the thriving Parisian occult activity between the periods of about 1910 and 1930. Major personalities are named and relationships established. Interest in the occult was acute during this period, and Paris was the center of a bustling community of artists, writers, poets, and others with an intense interest in this subject matter.
   
   Dubois book presents quite a bit of compelling information suggesting exactly who was behind the Fulcanelli phenomena. She introduces the key players and presents how certain individuals were quite capable of producing this ground-breaking revival of the alchemical tradition. The clues Dubois are strong (and abundant) and the conclusion logical. The book is lavishly illustrated with portraits, fragments of handwriting samples, notes, obituaries, and even the natal charts of two of the key players (with brief analysis for both) in this drama.
   
   Geneviève Dubois has written other text on themes Alchemical and has extensively studied this period of occult history. This book is a welcomed addition to the mystery of who Fulcanelli might (probably) was plus an excellent historical survey of the thriving occult community in Paris up to around 1930.



3. Anticipating this book & finally reading it was a bit anticlimactic in that the promise did not quite meet my expectations. What I found in this book is a good overview of French alchemical occultism since the end of the 19th century through the mid-20th. A sound companion to Christopher McIntosh's "Eliphas Levi & the French Occult Revival". But as to throwing additional light onto identifying who was Fulcanelli- the usual suspects remain unchallenged. The translation appears a bit forced and choppy, and required me to go back and reread certain sections to see if I had missed something. Like Herman Hesse novels, the allure and promise of mystical insight is promised but never quite delivers.



4. After having read both 'Le mystere des cathedrales' and 'The dwellings of philosophers' (which, by the way, do NOT seem to be written by the same person), I simply cannot understand why so many people are interested in the 'true' identity of their supposed author. On the other hand, this is one of the instances when I understand perfectly the Traditionalist (like in Rene Guenon) contempt for biography. The only thing that truly matters here is whether Fulcanelli's ideas work or not. So far I have not read a reasonable discussion of this; instead, we get more and more books dealing with the utterly insignificant minutiae of the life in the occult circles in France around WW1.
   I feel like paraphrasing the old Zen adage - if you meet Fulcanelli on the road, kill him!
   
   Coming back to Mlle Dubois' book: it certainly brings to light many previously unpublished documents and obscure facts. However, their arrangement is rather haphazard, the commentary minimal and the translation of all this into English simply not very good; at times it reads almost like one of those jobs done by an online free translation engine. But it still deserves three stars, if only for a stubborn research.



5. I came across Genevieve Dubois's book after searching for more information on the great alchemist of 20th century by the name of Fulcanelli. After reading this book, I found myself in a state of confusion and disgust. What Dubois has brought forth is the notion that Fulcanelli is nothing but a simple myth, as being "spread" by a number of individuals as stated in this book (p. 77):
   
   "[Jean-Julien] Champagne devoted years to maintaining the fiction of Fulcanelli's vocation as an adept. He had launched this fiction, and it was maintained by the whole group around him, all of whom must have promoted the myth: Gaston Sauvage, the Chacornacs, Pierre Dujols, Canselist, Jules Boucher."
   
   And, Dubois branded Eugene Canseliet, a real disciple of Fulcanelli, as "the pivot in manipulations of which he remained quite unaware - a kind of hoax that would take a turn its perpetrators did not perhaps foresee" and as a "key to the tenacious spreading of the legend" (p. 60-1).
   
   Throughout the book, the author made a strong and an unchanged argument that Fulcanelli has never existed and remained only as a hoax. In sum, she attempted to hinder the reader from searching for the real truth about Fulcanelli and being indirectly encouraged to "look no further."
   
   This book was written by a mind of misconceptions and a poor logic, and it would lead the reader on the road to a distorted knowledge.
   
   For any sincere reader of the Fulcanelli subject, Dubois's book is to be avoided.

1 comments about Stephen Hawking: A Biography.

1. Kristine Larsen's STEPHEN HAWKING: A BIOGRAPHY comes from a physicist and astronomer who examines noted physicist Stephen Hawkins' personal and professional life, emphasizing his contributions, his life, and his special physical challenges. From Hawking's early lack of focus as a college student to the evolution of his groundbreaking work, this biographical coverage is key reading for any interested in correlating his science with his life.

5 comments about The Heretic in Darwin's Court: The Life of Alfred Russel Wallace.

1. Ross Slotten's new biography of Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) continues where others have left off. There has now been at least one full-length biographical study of Wallace published each year since 2000, plus several anthologies and other works. Clearly, Wallace is starting to "get his due." But there is yet much to do, and this latest biography demonstrates this point well.
   
   Slotten is an amateur investigator, and this work was obviously a labor of love. But he's put a good deal of effort into his study, along the way uncovering new archival sources that shed further light on Wallace's many contacts over his long life. So, the reader will find further new things here, even if he or she has already digested the recent excellent studies by Peter Raby, Michael Shermer, and Martin Fichman. Slotten writes well, provides enough historical context to keep things interesting, and only occasionally is factually inaccurate (for example, in some of the chronology he offers for the period of Wallace's adoption of spiritualism, circa 1865-1866).
   
   On the other hand, his efforts sometimes cross over into ill-advised opinion and elaboration. One thing he plays a bit too much on is Wallace's status as an outsider to the intellectual community of his time: the "poor Wallace" line (in relation to his dealings with Darwin, and everyone else). Actually, though Wallace was in fact an outsider, the real story of his life is how little such matters seemed to affect his thought process: when it came to the world of ideas, he was just about as fearless a thinker as we have had. Slotten does a rather poor job of exposing this side--the really important one--of Wallace, and to this extent does just about nothing to expand our knowledge of his world view past the status quo.
   
   But for someone as unusual as Wallace, one cannot ask for everything at once. We should be happy for a well-written, well-researched, and admirably detailed accounting of a very interesting man's life, and continue to hope that future treatments will reach more and more into just what made Wallace tic, and how we in our time can make use of that information.



2. The place of Wallace in the rise of modern evolutionary theory and its confusions is always a contentious one, and the record shows the persistent, but let us hope, not permament distortion of the facts of the case. The record should show that Wallace produced the first version of what Darwin later got credit for. It's that simple, and any honest profession would move to correct the injustice. But not here, the stakes are too high, and the agenda too ambitious to allow that to happen.
   
   The facts speak for themselves and all biographers tend to 'fumble' the ball here. No fumble at all, it is a fixed necessity of compromise with the Darwin propaganda machine. Let us grant the excesses of some claims that Darwin plagiarized Wallace. Even so the sleight of hand pulled off by Darwin and his gang as to the Ternate paper should be a minimum charge against the paradigm dogmatists here.
   This useful and always interesting new biography of Wallace, in a recent slew of such, manages reasonably well to navigate the fudge that occurs here in all cases except those in the wake of Brackman's A Delicate Arrangement which attempted an expose of the great cover story here.
   In many ways, this issue of Darwin's rigged priority apart, this is one of the best of the genre and fills in a lot of gaps, especially as to the later Wallace with his ventures into spiritualism. Current scientism finds spiritualism silly superstition. No doubt this is the case, but the false reductionism of Darwinism in action is no less silly and totally fails to grapple with the far greater complexity of man known for millennia. It dawned on Wallace that the methodology emerging couldn't possibly constitute a theory of man's evolution and the way it has totally amputated its subject matter in the regime of brainwashing that has taken over the subject. In a context where to even mention a Buddhist sutra is to be called an irrationalist the true 'evolutionary psychology' of man has become almost a taboo subject. These tactics will come to a bad end sooner or later, and at that point the dissent of Wallace on the evolutionary emergence of man will come into its own again against the false reputation of that iconic imposter, Charles Darwin frantic for his priority at the receipt of the Ternate letter.



3. The story of Darwin's voyage around the world in the Beagle is well known. He used his observations and the time (you have a lot of time on a sailing ship) to develop the basics of the theory of evolution. After his return to England, he wrote up his findings but did not publish them.
   
   Wallace spent a long time making similar observations, but was haunted by ill fortune. For instance his collection of specimens laboriously collected was being shipped to England when the ship they were on caught fire, and the specimens were lost.
   
   Wallace's thoughts though were running along similar lines with that of Darwin. When he was getting ready to publish people told Darwin that his theories were about to be published by Wallace. Darwin then rushed his theory into print and now the theory is Darwin's theory rather than Wallace's theory.
   
   What isn't very well known is that Darwin and Wallace were able to then work together for many years to further develop the theory. Perhaps a better name would be the Darwin-Wallace theory.
   
   This is a very well written addition to the literature and Dr. Slotten's obvious dedication comes through.



4. This is by far the best of several recent biographies of Wallace. As a biographer myself, it is hard for me to grasp how Dr. Totten, as a physician, ever found the time to do the meticulous research for this book. While it contains a wealth of end notes, the narrative does not make difficult reading. The author does not insert his own biases in his treatment of the portion of the book that deals in Wallace's spiritualiam.



5. An artfully written, rigorously researched, deeply compelling exposition of a most remarkable human life. It is a travesty that the modern world has nearly forgotten Mr. Wallace. Mr. Slotten has done a great service to history with this important book.

3 comments about James Van Allen: The First Eight Billion Miles.

1. Ask young people today who James A. Van Allen was, and they probably don't even know that he was a discoverer of the Van Allen Radiation Belts surrounding our earth, and was the guiding force behind the rocket and saellite instrument packages that have explored Earth's near environment and later, our solar system and beyond. But his story far is more than that. From his humble beginnings in a small town in Iowa to international acclaim his story is that of a scientist whose motto was "It's a good day when you learn somemthing new." I was one of his physics advisees during the 1950s at the University of Iowa, and one of his teaching and research assistants. I remember him to be as good a role model as any physics student could want. He had not a trace of ego, was always supportive of students and diplomatinc in negotiating the minefields of his dealings with government agencies, as required for sustaining his research goals. Under the pressure of cold war politics and launch deadlines, he seemed to be an island of calm. His office door was always open, where he'd be found smoking his tradmark pipe (burning walnut-scented tobacco). Perhaps that pipe was a calming influence. When reminded of health effects of smoking, he replied that he had never heard of a pipe smoker who was convicted of murder.
   
   This excelent, thorough, biography draws together a wealth of detail from Van Allen's notebooks, interviews with his associates, and media accounts to tell his story in an engaging manner, yet, I can attest, one that is true to the facts and details. We learn of his early work in developing proximity fuses during the WWII, which greatly increased the effectiveness of naval guns, his early "shoestring budget" high altitude studies of cosmic rays and the aurorae using military surplus rockets and instrumentation built by students at the University of Iowa. Throughought his research he emphasized getting the job done in the most direct and cost effective way. It will probably surprise most readers to learn that the payloads of Explorer I, IV and subsequent satellites and space probes were designed, built and tested by students working at minimum wage in the sub basement of the physics building, with no security. And all the data from them was analyzed by a small army of students (grateful for employment and experience) using mechanical calculators, graph paper, and slide rules. Many of these students went on to research jobs in the space program. He was an outspoken champion of robotic-instrumented space missions, considering manned spaceflight a collosal waste of money with little return on the investment. The results of the past 50 years, in my opinion, justify that position, when we compare the wealth of information instrumented space probes have yielded about the earth, solar system and (thanks to the Hubble Space Telescope) the rest of the universe. While the maned space programs have yielded--hardly anything of scientific value.
   
   The author of this book, Abigail Foerstner, has managed the tricky task of telling a personal story and at the same time explaining the science clearly enough to give the reader an understanding and sense of its significance. This book is far more engrossing than one might expect from a scientific biography, and I suspect that it will appeal even to those who previously knew nothing about space science.



2. It was good timing for this book to be published near the 50th anniversary of the launching of Sputnik. It was Sputnik and the resulting American inferiority complex that made James Van Allen an instant, Time-cover celebrity. Van Allen was the physicist behind Explorer 1, America's first spacecraft, which discovered the Van Allen radiation belts. Of course it may be a measure of how distorted our perceptions were that even a radiation belt could become a symbol of national pride. To this day the only image that the public has of James Van Allen may be one photo of him and Wernher von Braun triumphantly holding up a model of Explorer 1 as if it was a football.
   
   This book offers a wider historical perspective on James Van Allen and his scientific accomplishments. It shows him to be a quintessential Iowan, a friendly and modest man. It shows his Explorer 1 fame to be one chapter of a long and productive career as a pioneering astrophysicist, in the first generation of scientists to have use of the tools of the space age. Van Allen spent decades building satellites and instruments for spacecraft, most notably the Pioneers that were the first spacecraft to visit Jupiter and Saturn.
   
   The greatest value of this book is that it adds to a seriously underpopulated shelf of books about 20th-century astronomers. It's almost a scandal how many important 20th-century astronomers have never had biographies written about them. Many of the biographies that do exist were written by fellow scientists who had little sense of storytelling or interpreting science. While there are plenty of biographies of space pioneers, most of them are astronauts and rocket builders. The scientists behind the space missions are much less visible. Fortunately the University of Iowa has respect for both physics and storytelling.



3. I had Van Allen as a professor for General Astronomy in 70s. He was soft-spoken. He always had a friendly smile. He wore a lab coat so that he wouldn't get chalk dust on his suit. His freshman class was one of the best attended classes on campus. I didn't realize how good the class was at the time. He was not a dynamic speaker, but he was interesting. The exercises and experiments were great. He made science fun and interesting. He was voted by People's magazine that year to be one of the best professors in the United States.
   
   What the book does is brings out what a very decent, very nice, very intelligent, very shrewd, extremely diligent and persistent guy can do in science. It wasn't by luck that one of Van Allen's experiments was on the first satellite put up by the US. There were basically two factions in the United States who were building rockets at that time. Van Allen made sure his experiment would fit either rocket. Van Allen was persistent. Once he earned his rep, he wielded his niceness and reputation like a tool to get his agenda done. He needed to do that because Apollo was taking over the space program and unmanned projects were falling by the wayside. Without Van Allen our knowledge of the planets and the solarsphere would be much poorer. Van Allen is the quintessential Iowan: nice and hard working.
   
   The book writing style was okay. Some sections were dry. The section on the politics of getting the first satellite launched went on for pages. Another problem is a slight lack of drama. Van Allen was so successful at what he did because he planned so well. There was no failure from which to recover. Another problem was chronology. Sometimes the author followed the track of experiment through a decade and then jumped back. It was hard to keep with the flow some times. She used month and day for the date reference. With these experiments that went on for years, adding the year sometimes would have helped. In the later years, I wished she spent more time on his abilities as a teacher, mentor and administrator. I know it was difficult to keep notched physicists in Iowa. She does a good job of adding humorous little stories along the way.
   
   Overall, the book is fascinating. The story of the his time in the navy, the rockoons and the experiments were stories I heard alluded too, but never in such good detail. The man is fascinating. Good guys sometimes do finish first. Anyone who is interested in the space program, the history of planetary physics, or even the state of Iowa, should read this book.

2 comments about American Genesis: A Century of Invention and Technological Enthusiasm.

1. From the Independent innovators, to the beginning of research groups, to military research, to systems creators of Taylor and Ford, to military industrial complex systems of production. The first few and last chapters are the best. Edison had over 1000 patents, I have none. :-(



2. The title indicates his thesis. "Americans," Hughes writes, "created the modern technological nation; this was the American genesis."(3) The problem he faces is this: Americans see "themselves primarily as democratic people dedicated to the doctrine of free enterprise" rather than, as he does, as builders.(1) Hughes' challenge therefore is to redirect the focus on Americans and their culture as inventors and systems builders. He makes a good case. Hughes articulates a chronology that logically follows the growth of systems. First he discusses the invention of systems, then the spread of large systems, and finally "the emergence of a technological culture, of mammoth government systems, and counterculture reactions to systems."(6-7)
   
   American inventiveness and technological enthusiasm characterize the period from 1870 until 1970. In its aftermath there remained a legacy, which Hughes labels as "the burden" of nuclear destruction, environmental concerns, and the wastefulness of wars (he specifically mentions the Vietnam War). Hughes hopes that "those who know the history and [understand] the burden may be able to rid themselves of it or turn it to their ends."(12) In his eyes history has a humanitarian message and he is the oracle. While his focus is on technology, his philosophy is humanistic. Government has a role, but people make the difference. This is how history is valuable. The American experience was unique and his purpose is to elevate people's understanding of their role; indeed, their responsibility.
   
   Beginning in 1870, about the time when Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, independent inventors were responsible for a "Gigantic Tidal Wave of Human Ingenuity."(13) The number of patents doubled and, between 1866 and 1896, the number issued to each person nearly doubled. Hughes feels existing historical accounts create an unfair image of inventors, as "one-dimensional heroes."(19) To Hughes this is an inaccurate characterization and he proceeds to redefine them as the cornerstones of technological systems.
   
   To make his point he tries to uncover the source of inventor's creativity and motives. They relied on experimentation and their work was characterized by long hours of drudgery punctuated infrequently by "eureka moments."(20) The independent inventors acted on their own free will and followed their own inspirations. They "could not depend on science and abstract theory as guides into the future because they were exploring beyond the front edge of technology and knowledge."(48-49)
   
   Hughes tries to understand why independent inventors chose to solve the problems they did and how they went about solving them. He also tried to get into their heads. Based on their work his analysis disclosed two types of inventions. "The system-originating inventions can be labeled radical, the system-improving ones conservative."(53) Examples of the radical inventors are the Wright Brothers, the airplane; Lee De Forest and Reginald Fessenden, wireless communication; and Nikola Tesla, power transmission. More conservative professional inventor-entrepreneurs include Thomas Edison, Elmer Sperry, and Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim because of "their years of full-time dedication to invention and their establishment of companies to exploit their inventions."(67) This proves insightful and represents original thinking. It becomes a useful reference as Hughes proceeds to discuss the growth of systems.
   
   Furthermore, in delving into the inventor's minds, Hughes observes a unique thought process in problem solving. A "problem-identification technique that suggest[ed] the image, or metaphor, of a reverse salient in an expanding military front. ...A military front line has salients and reentrants (reverse salients) all along its length."(71)"The reverse salient in an advancing military front proves an apt metaphor for a technological system, because the system, like a military advance develops unevenly. Some components in a technological system, like some units in the military front, fall behind other. In the case of the military, ahead and behind can be determined by physical distance. Some components in technological systems can be said to be behind others, if the former function less efficiently and act as a drag on the system."(72)
   
   This is interesting. Hughes realizes he is using a metaphor which might be confusing to the reader so he proceeds with an explanation in order to make it work. It is an apt metaphor, he observes, because "`reverse salient' suggests the fluidity of the course of technological-system development; other metaphors suggesting rigidity and simplicity, such as `bottleneck,' do not work as well."(72-73)
   
   Metaphors must be used skillfully in order to be affective however they can be misleading. Hughes understands this. "[N]ot only poets, but schizophrenics...[can] make such metaphors."(76) There has to be some similarity or, rather than fostering clarity, just the opposite will occur. In explaining the metaphor Hughes not only educates the reader with a deeper understanding of the technological system, but of the military as well. However this is an appropriate technique if used only sparingly. If each metaphor has to be accompanied by an explanation its usefulness as a literary device is negated.
   
   The "reverse salient" metaphor is important to Hughes as a continuing metaphor fundamental to his thesis. The advance of systems technology is not linear; there are advances and retreats along a wide front. This is evident when technological development shifted from independent inventors to a "system must be first"(184) approach that occurred when the radical attitude of system-originating inventions clashed with the conservative system-improving ones.
   
   A case in point is the experience of inventor-entrepreneur Edwin Armstrong and his investigation of frequency modulation (FM) to counter static interference, a "major reverse salient on the expanding [AM] radio front."(146) "Here was a classic case of the independent inventor's radical attitude toward invention and development clashing with the conservative approach of the large corporation."(148) Armstrong was snubbed by RCA and NBC, both heavily invested in existing technology. A protracted legal struggle ultimately led to Armstrong's vindication in court but only after his death by suicide from the stress. In this example Hughes' previous explanation of the salient was essential to the subsequent use of the metaphor and its understanding.
   
   Utilizing another metaphor Hughes describes the Ford Motor Company Highland Park Plant in Detroit as a "great flowing tide of production" and offers alternative ideas which may have inspired Henry Ford's idea for the assembly line. The evocative images of the "flow of production" in the moving lines of the Chicago meatpackers, in tin can manufacture, and in moving conveyors in flour mills might have influence Ford. Hughes also sees a comparison between auto production and the demand for constant flow, mass demand, and mass supply of electric utility production which Ford learned while an engineer at the Edison Illuminating Company of Detroit. Hughes admires the uniqueness of Ford and Edison "who understood that there were no experts about the unknown; no theories, only hypotheses or metaphorical insights, about the uninvented."(215) The idea of mental images as the source of Ford's inspiration is a logical conclusion of Hughes' reasoning.
   
   To make his books more appealing and in deference to his audience, Hughes includes captioned photographs. But there is another, more analytic, reason for the pictures. On the one hand the images help the reader visualize history. On the other hand the pictures are symbolic of the verbal and visual metaphors imagined by inventors to understand their "moment of inventive insight."(75) A metaphor aids interpretive history and also, according to Hughes, in understanding the mystery of an inventor's creativeness. Pictures, whether in the mind or in print, help to clarify history. This is revealing. Hughes, from his literary understanding of the use for metaphors, ingeniously points to their usefulness also as a mental tool of inventors. Historians and inventors have something in common.
   
   Hughes argues the history of technology is critical to understanding America's development but he is not a technological determinist. He does not see American technology as socially constructed, nor is America's development driven by technology because, he writes, "the makers of the modern world...[were expressing] long-held human values and aspirations."(5)

4 comments about Newton: Ackroyd's Brief Lives.

1. This is the third in the series of "Brief Lives" written by Peter Ackroyd, the distinguished author of "London: The Biography" and "Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination." It is one of the new compact but thorough book treatments that have recently become popular (it runs a mere 170 small pages, not including index). I have marveled in past Amazon reviews at these concise books how much information a skilled and knowledgeable author can pack into a brief space, and this book is no exception. Ackroyd covers all of Newton's life (1642-1727). It is the perfect book for folks like me that have heard a lot about Newton, but are not inclined to want to read one of the longer biographies now available (e.g., that by James Gleick). The author wisely chooses not to probe too deeply into Sir Isaac's mathematical and scientific accomplishments, which is perfect for the general reader, but he offers enough insight so that the reader is aware generally of what Newton is up to and why he is such a giant in the history of science and enlightenment. His invention of calculus, study of optics, celestial mechanics, gravity and so much more are all concisely covered. One learns all sorts of interesting things about Newton, who certainly was not a conventional academic: his interests in alchemy; astrology; and arcane religious concepts to name just a few. Interestingly, Newton spent the bulk of his career not as an academic but as Warden of the Mint, which allowed him to amass quite an estate. If this be an example of "knowledge in a nutshell," let it be: it accomplishes it purpose superbly.



2. This is a marvelous book. It both explains Newton's development as a human being and as one of the greatest scientific thinkers and experimenters of his or any era. Carefully and clearly written, it is a total success. I enjoyed it far more than James Gleick's NEWTON, perhaps because Ackroyd is so good at explaining what he knows how to explain and avoiding what he does not know how to explain. As he notes, neither Newton nor anyone else in his era could explain gravity -- but Newton was able to explain the laws governing gravity and thus provide a foundation for later scientists, notably Einstein, to go further and explain gravity. Ackroyd is also wonderfully skilled at explaining links between Newton's occult studies and his scientific studies. All in all, a must read for anyone who wants to understand a pivotal thinker.



3. Isaac Newton is someone I've been curious about since grade school when some teacher gave me the impression that he discovered gravity when an apple fell on his head. Even then, that didn't make much sense to me--people must have been aware of gravity since the first caveman dropped a rock on his foot--and I was pleased to learn through Peter Ackroyd's wonderful book that the apple incident probably never happened. What Newton did do through careful observation and applied mathematics was to prove the existence of universal gravity and show the laws which governed it. There is much more that Newton accomplished of course: His work on optics was seminal. His three laws of motion are still quoted in physics' classes. And his great book on the principles of mathematics was a wonder of his age.
   
   All of this, Ackroyd explains in a conversational style that even someone like myself who has trouble adding up a supermarket bill can understand. But Ackroyd does not neglect Newton's human side. He was not, in many ways, a very nice person: A control freak who was always ready to take disagreement personally, he had few real friends and often broke up with those he did have. His life-long passion for alchemy and his belief in the Arian heresy made this already secretive man even more secretive.
   
   Ackroyd's book is short, sweet and not annotated. It is surely not for scholars. But for those who want to pay a brief visit to a scientific genius in the company of a wise and entertaining guide could do far worse than to read this book.



4. Eventually humans understood that there were physical laws that governed the universe, and that these laws could be made mathematically precise and could be verified. No one person enabled this understanding more than Isaac Newton, who obsessively tracked down laws of motion, gravity, optics, and pure mathematics. Since his death almost three hundred years ago, there have been many biographies attempting the impossible task of explaining Newton's unparalleled genius. In _Newton_ (Nan A. Talese), Peter Ackroyd has made no such attempt. For one thing, his book is part of his "Brief Lives" series (Chaucer and Turner have gone before), and it is a small volume. For another, Ackroyd has not described many of Newton's scientific achievements in detail; the account of his _Principia Mathematica_ is almost cursory. But the brevity of the volume is actually one of its strengths. We aren't going to understand genius, but we can understand some of the personality, and Ackroyd has done a wonderful job in describing what sort of a person Newton was. Of necessity, the portrait is unpleasant. Newton was among the most unlikeable of geniuses, but it might well be that if he had been less arrogant and selfish, he might have accomplished less.
   
   An uncle saved Newton from being a farmer, enabling him to continue schooling and go to Cambridge. Ironically, he became a professor at Trinity College, while his religious studies led him to abhor the concept of the Trinity. He was certain that the priests and bishops who preached a Trinity were practicing idolatry. He was particularly interested in biblical chronology and prophecy, working out a date for creation half a century later than the famous 2004 BC of Bishop Ussher, and attempting precise calculation of the date of Jesus's return to Earth. He knew from his studies of the Book of Revelation that the Catholic Church was the Antichrist therein. Newton's other secret study, also outlasting his physics and mathematics, was his alchemy. He had a huge library of occult alchemical texts and he spent days and nights in his lab, forgetting to sleep or eat as he fired up experiments that had to go for weeks at a time. Ackroyd is surely right, however, when he explains that in his obsessive digging into alchemical or scriptural matters, Newton was using the same frame of mind that stood him in good stead in the research that made him famous. The enormous idea that there were three laws of motion, for instance, and that they were universal and applied, as he wrote in 1687, "everywhere to immense distances" is still breathtaking. Likewise, the idea that an apple falls and that the Moon goes around the Earth, and both are expressions of one universal force, is so counterintuitive that it compels admiration for the mind that could unite the two. By the way, distrust the legend that an apple bonked him on the head and he had an immediate epiphany of how gravity worked. Newton himself instigated the story, but no one knows if it is true, because he told four separate versions to four separate people. It is clear, however, that whatever inspiration the apple gave him, there was a long period of contemplation and calculation before he established the universality of gravity.
   
   It was in only a few years of his mid-twenties that he explained gravity, demonstrated that white light was a blend of rainbow colors, invented the calculus, and made one of the first reflecting telescopes. The rest of his years he was doing his alchemy and scriptural researches, and more practically, he was Warden of the Royal Mint. He was in all his capacities an almost thoroughly dislikeable man. He was uninterested in art, literature, music, or women, and because of our times it must be specified that his sexual interest in men is mere undocumented speculation. As a founder of science, he knew the value of experimentation and was a genius at it, but he was furious if someone implied that another experiment had shown a contrary result. He was petty, ruthless, and vindictive. His famous catfight with Leibnitz over who invented calculus was childish (matched, it must be said, by childishness on Leibnitz's side), but it was representative of how he got along with anyone who crossed him. He had few friends, and when he presided over meetings of the Royal Society, anyone who attempted a witticism or who laughed was asked to leave the room. He seldom laughed himself; an assistant of years said Newton laughed exactly once, when he was asked what the use was of studying Euclid. Perhaps you just had to be there; Ackroyd writes, "The exact meaning of this laugh is not exactly clear." Newton was an astonishing figure, gigantic in his accomplishments and his follies, and Ackroyd's model biography shows both sides well.