European Jewry in a thoroughly researched introductory chapter. He
also reminds us just how important
Jews once were to the intellectual life
of Europe. Before the Second World
War, some European cities were as
much as one-quarter Jewish. Many
Jews were doctors, lawyers, business-people or professors. In Germany,
well-educated Jewish families established salons in the capital. “Poised
precariously between the nobility and
the bourgeoisie,” James writes, “they
succeeded in transforming Berlin into
a major cultural centre.” He also adds
that, in Vienna “Jews began first to
enter and then dominate intellectual
cultural life”.
In the early decades of the 20th cen-
Between the lines
No crossed wires
Oliver Heaviside’s
discoveries led to
better sound quality
on long-distance
telephone lines.
An awkward genius
The name of Oliver Heaviside would
not feature prominently on most
lists of great scientists. Yet
Heaviside’s influence on the major
scientific questions of the late
19th century was considerable.
His contributions to practical
telegraphy and telephony arguably
make him the founding father of
modern electrical engineering, and
when physicists talk of Maxwell’s
equations today, it is Heaviside’s tidy
vector formulation they mean, not
Maxwell’s ponderous 20-variable
original. Heaviside is also credited
with coining terms like impedance,
inductance and permeability
to describe the electrical
phenomena he and others
observed in the early days of
transcontinental communications.
In Oliver Heaviside: Maverick
Mastermind of Electricity, Basil
Mahon offers an engaging account
of this heady, confusing period when
electromagnetism was a young
science and Heaviside was one of its
greatest – and most eccentric –
exponents. For Heaviside’s relative
obscurity was at least partly his own
fault. Although he could be witty
and even charming to his friends, he
was also a thoroughly awkward
individual who bore grudges like a
champion, speckled his scientific
articles with thinly veiled attacks on
his enemies and repeatedly rejected
pleas to make his papers more
understandable. Mahon is clearly
sympathetic to his subject, but he
does not shrink from the more
challenging aspects of either
Heaviside’s character or his science.
This slim volume is an excellent
tury, many Jews left Europe for the
US, and their influence on culture and
society came with them. Their role
was felt particularly during the Second World War, when Jewish scientists played a significant role in the
Allied war effort. And it continues
today. As James points out, currently
more than 40% of the members of the
physics division of the National Academy of Sciences are Jewish.
One thing is clear: when barriers to
their success are removed, Jews do
very well indeed, particularly in the
sciences. In a thoughtful analysis that
runs for about a dozen pages, James
attempts – bravely, perhaps – to address the question of why this is the
case. In this section (which would
introduction to both.
● 2009 Institute of Engineering and
Technology £ 30.00/$50.00pb 224pp
A call for communication
Readers who pick up Unscientific
America: How Scientific Illiteracy
Threatens Our Future expecting a
polemic on public stupidity are in for
a surprise. True, Chris Mooney and
Sheril Kirshenbaum’s book does
contain some grim statistics (see
page 22) on how little many in the
US know about science. But their
main focus is not on the ill-educated
citizenry, but on the scientists whose
aloof, hyperspecialized culture, they
argue, is making the problem worse.
They are particularly keen to
criticize the so-called New Atheists,
who believe that religion is both
inherently bad and incompatible
with science. Such attitudes could
actually harm the cause of science;
if forced to choose between religion
and science, the authors point out,
“vast numbers of Americans will
select the former”. The pair also
decry the low regard some scientists
have for colleagues who devote time
to writing popular-science books;
even Carl Sagan was denied tenure
at Harvard in part because senior
scientists felt his outreach efforts
were inappropriate. Like many calls
to arms, Unscientific America is
better at identifying problems than
at suggesting solutions. However,
Mooney, a science journalist, and
Kirshenbaum, a marine biologist, do
offer a few. Both were involved in
ScienceDebate2008, which
campaigned for more scientific
coverage in the recent US
presidential race, and they are right
Reviews
make a compelling essay in its own
right), James, who is not Jewish,
points to a variety of factors. “[It is]
reasonable to suppose that there may
be genetic factors,” he concludes.
However, cultural factors along with
“certain traditions and values which
are distinctively Jewish” may also play
a role. No wonder people are squeamish about such matters. After all, one
might argue that it is the notion of
“being different” that has fed so much
hatred over the years.
Dan Falk is a science journalist based in
Toronto, Canada. His latest book, In Search of
Time: Journeys along a Curious Dimension,
was published earlier this year by the National
Maritime Museum, e-mail dan@danfalk.ca
to highlight its success in persuading
the candidates to issue formal
science-policy statements. But
compared with the task at hand, such
efforts seem like a drop in the ocean.
● 2009 Basic Books £ 15.99/$24.00hb
224pp
Snapshots of UK astronomy
When photographer Lucinda
Douglas-Menzies read a newspaper
article about the famed amateur
astronomer Sir Patrick Moore, she
was intrigued. Despite having little
previous astronomy experience, she
nevertheless embarked on a quest to
capture images of people who study
the stars and other heavenly objects.
The resulting book, titled simply
Portraits of Astronomers, contains
38 photographs of noted UK
astronomers, from Mark Bailey of
the Armagh Observatory to
John Zarnecki at the Open
University in Milton Keynes.
Alongside each portrait is a short
paragraph in which each sitter
explains how he or she became
interested in astronomy. Their
answers are as different as their
facial expressions – some serene,
some intense and a few fairly
bubbling with excitement at the
subject they love. It is a fascinating
history, and a beautiful celebration
of a subject half-mocked,
half-praised as “the science of
pretty pictures”. A touring
exhibition of the photographs will
visit the Royal Society in October
and Armagh County Museum in
November/December; details are
available at the website below.
● http://douglas-menzies.com/
index2.html
