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Overview
A one-voume reference to the history of ideas that is a compendium of everything that humankind has thought, invented, created, considered, and perfected from the beginning of civilization into the twenty-first century. Massive in its scope, and yet totally accessible, A HISTORY OF KNOWLEDGE covers not only all the great theories and discoveries of the human race, but also explores the social conditions, political climates, and individual men and women of genius that brought ideas to fruition throughout history.
"Crystal clear and concise...Explains how humankind got to know what it knows."
Clifton Fadiman
Selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club and the History Book Club
"Crystal clear and concise...Explains how humankind got to know what it knows."
Clifton Fadiman
Selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club and the History Book Club
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9780345373168 |
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Publisher: | Random House Publishing Group |
Publication date: | 03/17/1992 |
Edition description: | Reissue |
Pages: | 448 |
Product dimensions: | 6.10(w) x 9.20(h) x 0.90(d) |
About the Author
Charles Van Doren has advanced degrees in both literature and mathematics and has written and edited more than a score of books, many of them in the field of history. He is the author of The Joy of Reading and A History of Knowledge.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments | xiii | |
Author to Reader | xv | |
Progress in Knowledge | xv | |
Kinds of Progress in Knowledge | xvi | |
Universal History | xvi | |
Primitive Man | xviii | |
Knowledge of Particulars | xix | |
General Knowledge | xix | |
Certain Knowledge | xxi | |
Knowledge and Happiness | xxiii | |
Outline of the Book | xxiii | |
1. | Wisdom of the Ancients | 3 |
Egypt | 4 | |
India | 6 | |
China | 7 | |
Mesopotamia | 9 | |
Aztec and Inca | 11 | |
Human Sacrifice | 13 | |
Judaism | 15 | |
Christianity | 16 | |
Judaism and Christianity Compared | 18 | |
Islam | 19 | |
Judeo-Christianity and Islam Compared | 20 | |
Buddhism | 21 | |
Lessons from the Past | 23 | |
Alphabets | 25 | |
Zero | 27 | |
2. | The Greek Explosion | 29 |
The Problem of Thales | 30 | |
The Invention of Mathematics: The Pythagoreans | 34 | |
The Discovery of Atomic Theory: Democritus | 38 | |
The Problem of Thales: The Ultimate Solution | 41 | |
Moral Truth and Political Expediency: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle | 42 | |
The Fallacy of the Consequent | 44 | |
Greece versus Persia: The Fruitful Conflict | 48 | |
The Tragedy of Athens | 51 | |
Herodotus, Thucydides, and the Invention of History | 53 | |
The Spirit of Greek Thought | 56 | |
3. | What the Romans Knew | 60 |
Greek Theory, Roman Practice | 65 | |
Law, Citizenship, and Roads | 67 | |
Lucretius | 70 | |
Cicero | 72 | |
Seneca | 77 | |
Tacitus | 81 | |
What the Romans Did Not Know | 84 | |
4. | Light in the Dark Ages | 86 |
The Fall of Rome | 86 | |
Post-Roman Europe | 88 | |
The Triumph of Christianity: Constantine the Great | 91 | |
The Promise of Christianity: Augustine | 92 | |
After the Fall | 95 | |
5. | The Middle Ages: The Great Experiment | 98 |
The Struggle for Subsistence | 98 | |
A World of Enemies | 99 | |
The Problem of God | 100 | |
The Science of Theology | 100 | |
Theology in Other Religions | 102 | |
Principles of Theocracy | 103 | |
Empire and Papacy | 105 | |
Monasticism | 106 | |
Crusaders | 109 | |
Millennial Fears, Postmillennial Achievements | 110 | |
The Dispute about Truth | 112 | |
Boethius | 113 | |
Pseudo-Dionysius | 113 | |
Avicenna | 114 | |
Peter Abelard | 115 | |
Bernard of Clairvaux | 116 | |
Averroes | 117 | |
Thomas Aquinas | 119 | |
The Pyrrhic Victory of Faith over Reason | 122 | |
Dante's Dance | 124 | |
6. | What Was Reborn in the Renaissance? | 127 |
The New Style in Painting: Perspective | 128 | |
Man in the Cosmos | 129 | |
The Revival of Classical Learning: Petrarch | 130 | |
Inventing the Renaissance: Boccaccio | 132 | |
The Renaissance Man | 134 | |
Renaissance Men: Leonardo, Pico, Bacon | 137 | |
The Renaissance Man and the Ideal of Liberal Education | 141 | |
Renaissance Humanism | 142 | |
Montaigne | 144 | |
Shakespeare | 146 | |
Cervantes | 148 | |
The Black Death | 151 | |
Gutenberg's Achievement | 153 | |
Renaissance Cities | 155 | |
Nation-States | 156 | |
The Crisis of the Theocratic State | 158 | |
Erasmus | 159 | |
Thomas More | 160 | |
Henry VIII | 161 | |
Martin Luther | 163 | |
Tolerance and Intolerance | 165 | |
Man at the Center | 166 | |
7. | Europe Reaches Out | 168 |
Mongol Empires | 169 | |
Marco Polo | 170 | |
Voyages of Discovery | 172 | |
Columbus | 174 | |
Sailing Around the World | 177 | |
The Birth of World Trade | 178 | |
Trade in Ideas | 179 | |
Homage to Columbus | 182 | |
8. | The Invention of Scientific Method | 184 |
The Meaning of Science | 184 | |
Three Characteristics of Science | 187 | |
Aristotelian Science: Matter | 190 | |
Aristotelian Motion | 191 | |
The Revolt Against Aristotle | 192 | |
Copernicus | 195 | |
Tycho Brahe | 196 | |
Gilbert | 197 | |
Kepler | 198 | |
Galileo | 199 | |
Descartes | 203 | |
Newton | 205 | |
Rules of Reason | 209 | |
The Galilean-Cartesian Revolution | 211 | |
9. | An Age of Revolutions | 213 |
The Industrial Revolution | 213 | |
Human Machines and Mechanical Humans | 214 | |
An Age of Reason and Revolution | 216 | |
John Locke and the Revolution of 1688 | 218 | |
Property, Government, and Revolution | 220 | |
Two Kinds of Revolution | 222 | |
Thomas Jefferson and the Revolution of 1776 | 223 | |
The Declaration of Independence | 224 | |
Property in Rights | 226 | |
Robespierre, Napoleon, and the Revolution of 1789 | 228 | |
The Rise of Equality | 232 | |
Mozart's Don Giovanni | 234 | |
Goethe's Faust | 238 | |
10. | The Nineteenth Century: Prelude to Modernity | 243 |
The Difference Money Makes | 244 | |
Economic Life Before 1800: The Peasant | 245 | |
The Lord | 247 | |
The Cleric | 248 | |
The King | 248 | |
The Merchant | 249 | |
The Rise of the Labor Market: Economics | 251 | |
Faustian Development | 255 | |
Marxism: Theory and Practice | 257 | |
Marxian Insights | 261 | |
Economic Facts: Steam Power | 264 | |
Equality in the Muzzle of a Gun | 266 | |
The Magic of Electricity | 269 | |
Magical Mathematics | 271 | |
New Ways of Seeing | 273 | |
The End of Slavery | 275 | |
Shocking the Bourgeoisie | 278 | |
Darwin and Freud | 280 | |
11. | The World in 1914 | 284 |
Economic Divisions | 284 | |
The Study of War | 285 | |
Colonialism | 287 | |
The Boer War | 289 | |
The Powder Keg of Europe | 289 | |
Character of the 1914-1918 War | 291 | |
Thoughts on War and Death | 292 | |
Causes of War | 295 | |
12. | The Twentieth Century: The Triumph of Democracy | 297 |
The Progress of Democracy | 299 | |
Communism | 304 | |
Totalitarianism | 307 | |
Theocracy in the Twentieth Century | 311 | |
Economic Justice | 313 | |
Why Not World Government? | 314 | |
One World, One Human Race | 317 | |
13. | The Twentieth Century: Science and Technology | 321 |
Greek Atomic Theory | 321 | |
The Revival of Atomic Theory | 323 | |
What Einstein Did | 325 | |
What the Bomb Taught Us | 327 | |
The Problem of Life | 328 | |
The Science of Heredity | 329 | |
How DNA Works | 330 | |
The Size of the Universe | 332 | |
Galaxies | 332 | |
The Smallness of Earth | 334 | |
The Big Bang and the Primordial Atom | 334 | |
Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle | 337 | |
Uncertainties of Knowledge | 338 | |
One Giant Step | 341 | |
Green Rebellion | 342 | |
The Terrestrial Greenhouse | 343 | |
Digital Computers and Knowledge | 345 | |
Turing Machines | 348 | |
Technological Dependence | 350 | |
Triumphs of Medicine | 351 | |
Drug Cultures | 353 | |
The AIDS Challenge | 354 | |
14. | The Twentieth Century: Art and the Media | 356 |
The Media and Their Messages | 356 | |
A Visual Revolution: Picasso, Braque, Cubism | 359 | |
Pollock, Rothko, and the Hexagonal Room | 361 | |
Urban Revolution: The Bauhaus and Le Corbusier | 363 | |
Literary Prophets: Yeats | 365 | |
A Passage to India | 366 | |
The Castle and the Magician | 367 | |
Waiting for Godot | 369 | |
Mass Media and Education | 370 | |
15. | The Next Hundred Years | 375 |
Computers: The Next Stage | 377 | |
The Moral Problem of Intelligent Machines | 379 | |
Companion Computers | 379 | |
The Birth of Thinking Machines | 381 | |
Three Worlds: Big, Little, Middle-sized | 383 | |
Chaos, a New Science | 384 | |
Mining Language: Ideonomy | 386 | |
Exploring the Solar System | 387 | |
The Message? | 390 | |
Man as a Terrestrial Neighbor | 392 | |
The Gaia Hypothesis | 395 | |
Genetic Engineering | 397 | |
Eugenics | 398 | |
Mapping the Genome | 400 | |
Democracy and Eugenics | 402 | |
Speed | 403 | |
Addictions | 406 | |
War in the Twenty-first Century | 408 | |
Computer Revolt | 410 | |
Index | 413 |
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