The Creative Moment: How Science Made Itself Alien to Modern Culture

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Taking our present ignorance of science and technology as a symptom of profound cultural malaise, writer and physicist Joseph Schwartz offers a provocative and fascinating look back into the history of science to find out how it progressively lost touch with the rest of society. Acting as a sort of science critic, Schwartz examines a range of great "creative moments," from seventeenth-century Florence and Galileo (whose decision to describe his theories in mathematical language avoided trouble with the Church, ...
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Overview

Taking our present ignorance of science and technology as a symptom of profound cultural malaise, writer and physicist Joseph Schwartz offers a provocative and fascinating look back into the history of science to find out how it progressively lost touch with the rest of society. Acting as a sort of science critic, Schwartz examines a range of great "creative moments," from seventeenth-century Florence and Galileo (whose decision to describe his theories in mathematical language avoided trouble with the Church, but began the trend to number-worship in physics) to Cold Spring Harbor in 1946 and the invention of molecular biology, which ultimately fostered a way of thinking so restrictive that it may now be imperiling the search for an AIDS cure. Why Einstein's relativity theory is so famously arcane, when it ought not to be....Why the bomb-makers of Los Alamos allowed themselves to be manipulated by the military....Why physicists have come up with almost no new ideas since the 1920s....These are the kinds of questions The Creative Moment tackles and illuminates with a freshness and knowledgeability that is the hallmark of a truly new approach to understanding science and technology.
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Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
The coauthor of Einstein for Beginners here continues his crusade to demystify science by placing some of its legendary ``creative moments'' in full context. Schwartz transforms textbook dates and events like Alamogordo into phenomena with real social dimensions. Most of those events are breakthroughs within his own discipline (and our most ahistoric science), physics. Schwartz means to show in these ``moments'' a progressive loss of the sense of discovery: a reification of science that parallels the persistent triumph, in larger society, of image over purpose. His seven cases, ranging from Galileo's trial by the Roman Catholic Church to the Manhattan Project, are fortuitous choices for the general reader: ``Munich 1919/Almagordo 1945'' could almost be produced as a one-act play, so closely are the forces of science and society joined in the 20-year struggle over quantum physics. Schwartz is a graceful writer and a thoughtful scientist; even unconcerned readers will find themselves brought round the back way to the idea that science is an inherently human activity whose roots in wonder must be reclaimed. (May)
Library Journal
Former physics professor and coauthor of Einstein for Beginners (Pantheon, 1978) Schwartz explores the contradiction between science and technology's tremendous impact on our world and most people's ignorance of scientific and technological theories and processes. He assigns much of the blame to science, criticizing both the form of today's science (the arcane theories of particle physics, biological determinism) and the ends to which it is applied (nuclear bombs, misdirected medical research). This harsh criticism is tempered by Schwartz's real appreciation of science's potential to explain and exhilarate. This original and thought-provoking book includes a wealth of ideas, some quite controversial, that force the reader to think critically about the place of science in our lives. Recommended.--Eric Hinsdale, Simmons Coll. Graduate Sch. of Management Lib., Boston
Booknews
Physicist-author Schwartz explores some of the frailties of scientific endeavor, which is, after all, a human activity and subject to the blind spots and misdirection of human nature and culture. Schwartz writes compellingly for a general audience and supplies useful notes and sources. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780060167882
  • Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
  • Publication date: 5/1/1992
  • Edition description: 1st ed
  • Pages: 320

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Preface
Ch. 1 Florence 1623/Cambridge 1687 1
Ch. 2 Paris 1824/Berlin 1916 35
Ch. 3 Munich 1919/Alamogordo 1945 72
Ch. 4 Cold Spring Harbor 1946 118
Ch. 5 Berkeley 1963/Geneva 1984 157
Ch. 6 London 1991 186
Notes and Sources 207
Index 243
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