Great Minds Series – serie

Since its publication in 1859, The Origin of Species has been the focal point of debate. Darwin's analysis of flora and fauna calls into question the long-held concepts of spontaneous generation, divine creation, and the unrelatedness of many species. Instead, he argues for Natural Selection: species survive and evolve in response to environmental conditions and other circumstances through a process in which those creatures and plants with stronger, more enduring characteristics live to beget more adaptable offspring. It was Darwin's research aboard the H.M.S. Beagle that led to the clash of intellectual titans - religion and science - over the true nature of humankind. Here is the book that started one of the greatest debates of the Western world.

Political economy had been studied long before Adam Smith. But Wealth of Nations (1776) established it for the first time as a separate science. Smith based his arguments on vast historical knowledge, and developed his principles with remarkable clarity. What set this work apart was its statement of the doctrine of natural liberty. Smith believed that "man's self-interest is God's providence" - that if government abstained from interfering with free competition, the invisible hand of capitalism would emerge from the competing claims of individual self-interest. Industrial problems would be resolved and maximum efficiency reached. After more than two centuries, Smith's work still stands as the best statement and defense of the fundamental principles of capitalism.

Galileo Galilei was a great scientist, and therefore not afraid of causing controversy, even if he had to pay a great price. His public advocacy of the Copernican over the Aristotelian system of the universe flew directly in the face of biblical authority and ecclesiastical tradition. Condemned and placed under house arrest by the Inquisition, Galileo nonetheless devoted his last years to the completion of his Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences, which deals with motion and the resistance of solids. The Two New Sciences, which Galileo called his most important work, may be regarded as the summary statement of a life devoted to scientific experimentation and free inquiry untrammeled by tradition and authority.

Greatly influenced by Charles Darwin, the famed German zoologist and philosopher Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919) boldly defended the fact of organic evolution and seriously considered its far-reaching ramifications for science, philosophy, and theology. Advocating the interplay of empirical evidence and rational speculation, The Riddle of the Universe is his most daring, comprehensive, and successful work. Its monistic and naturalistic worldview offers a cosmic perspective and evolutionary framework that supplants traditional theistic beliefs in God, free will, and the personal immortality of the human soul. This classic volume remains a tour de force of critical thought, free inquiry, and intellectual value.

In this dazzling collection of essays covering a broad range of fields, from Darwinism and the global population explosion to bird watching, distinguished scientist and philosopher Sir Julian Huxley points out new frontiers for scientific research and reaffirms his belief in the intimate connection of the sciences, particularly biology, with the pressing social problems of the present and future. Huxley envisions new horizons for education and divinity within the framework of evolutionary humanism.

Andrew D. White (1832-1918), historian, diplomat, and first president of Cornell University, advocated such progressive causes as equal rights for women and the removal of religious sectarianism from higher education. In this important work, which spawned a great deal of controversy at its appearance, White exhaustively documents the battle between science and religion in matters of creation versus evolution, the geocentric versus the heliocentric universe, and the "fall of man" versus anthropology. The struggle of science over outmoded medieval concepts is still emerging. Even a century after its publication, White's great work has much to teach us about the dangerous effects of religious doctrinalism on education and moral growth.

Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) was one of the founders of modern sociology. Ethics and the Sociology of Morals (La science positive de la morale en Allemagne) laid the foundation for Durkheim's future work. More than a review of current thought, it was a proclamation that ethics needed to be liberated from its philosophical bondage and developed as a distinct branch of sociology. Written when Durkheim was charting the course of his own research, it provides a unique key to the interpretation of his earlier work and presents a number of points of Durkheim's ethical theory which are of considerable interest in light of current ethical theory. This volume makes available in English a crucial essay by a master of social thought.

William Harvey (1578-1657) was a rebel in medical science: Contrary to contemporary practice, he began his epoch-making investigation into the action of the heart and the blood's circulation by minutely observing their action in live animals and by a lengthy series of dissections, rather than by mere reliance on the anatomical lessons of ancient medicine and philosophy. "On the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals", including explanations of heart valves and arterial pulse, stands as a triumph of true scientific inquiry, and is still regarded as one of the greatest discoveries in physiology.

Voltaire (1694-1778), novelist, dramatist, poet, philosopher, historian, and satirist, was one of the most renowned figures of the Age of Enlightenment. In this collection of anti-clerical works from the last twenty-five years of Voltaire's life, he roundly attacks the philosophical optimism of the deists, the so-called inspiration of the Bible, the papacy, and vulgar superstition. These great works reveal Voltaire not only as a polemicist but also as a profound humanitarian. Selections include "Poem on the Lisbon Disaster," "We Must Take Sides," "The Questions of Zapate," "The Sermon of the Fifty," homilies on superstition and the interpretation of the Old and New Testaments, and his famous "Treatise on Toleration."

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) was an ardent feminist and outspoken champion of women's rights. In this profoundly insightful and cogently argued work, Gilman describes how the social and sexual disparities between men and women, long thought to be preordained and unchanging, are actually the result of economics. The position of women as the property of men, their inability to earn in proportion to the amount of work they do, and the very devaluation of their work, all tend to the exaggerated social differences between men as "providers" and "competitors" and women as "helpless" and "unproductive." These differences lead to social dysfunction and ultimately to the destruction of the bond that ought to exist between and unite the sexes. Gilman's classic plea for greater parity for men and women still speaks directly to the problems women continue to face in the workplace as well as to the ways men view women.

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) has been generally acknowledged as the greatest English satirist. In a prodigious stream of letters, pamphlets, tales, and essays, he assailed, with irony, erudition, and savage wit, several of the abuses and vices he saw around him, including political corruption, religious intolerance, hypocrisy, and the decline of learning. These selections from Swift's greatest writings include some of his best-known pieces against organized religion and the English oppression of Ireland: "A Tale of a Tub"; "A Tritical Essay"; "A Meditation upon a Broomstick"; "Thoughts on Various Subjects"; "An Argument against Abolishing Christianity in England"; "A Discourse concerning the Mechanical Operation of the Spirit"; Drapier letters nos. 1 and 4; "On Political Lying"; "A Character, Panegyric, and Description of the Legion Club"; and "A Modest Proposal."

Albert Einstein (1879-1955), pacifist and humanitarian, has been universally acclaimed the greatest theoretical physicist who ever lived. Adapting the old laws of physics to Einstein's space-time resulted in "relativistic" physics. He, more than anyone else, realized that every physical theory is largely an invention of the mind, a mathematical model used to "mimic" a certain domain of experimental facts. Einstein's work on relativity is indeed the greatest contribution to the philosophy of science.It has long been thought that only a handful of scientists could comprehend Einstein's theory of relativity. But in this book the inventor himself explains both the special and the general theories in terms that the layman can understand.

Sir Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles) is considered to be among the finest scientific works ever published. His grand unifying idea of gravitation, with effects extending throughout the solar system, explains by one principle such diverse phenomena as the tides, the precession of the equinoxes, and the irregularities of the moon's motion.Newton's brilliant and revolutionary contributions to science explained the workings of a large part of inanimate nature mathematically and suggested that the remainder might be understood in a similar fashion. By taking known facts, forming a theory that explained them in mathematical terms, deducing consequences from the theory, and comparing the results with observed and experimental facts, Newton united, for the first time, the explication of physical phenomena with the means of prediction. By beginning with the physical axioms of the laws of motion and gravitation, he converted physics from a mere science of explanation into a general mathematical system.

The Ptolemaic system of the universe, with the earth at the center, had held sway since antiquity as authoritative in philosophy, science, and church teaching. Following his observations of the heavenly bodies, Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) abandoned the geocentric system for a heliocentric model, with the sun at the center. His remarkable work, On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres, stands as one of the greatest intellectual revolutions of all time, and profoundly influenced, among others, Galileo and Sir Isaac Newton.

The brilliant German mathematician Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), one of the founders of modern astronomy, revolutionized the Copernican heliocentric theory of the universe with his three laws of motion: that the planets move not in circular but elliptical orbits, that their speed is greatest when nearest the sun, and that the sun and planets form an integrated system. This volume contains two of his most important works: The Epitome of Copernican Astronomy (books 4 and 5 of which are translated here) is a textbook of Copernican science, remarkable for the prominence given to physical astronomy and for the extension to the Jovian system of the laws recently discovered to regulate the motions of the Planets. Harmonies of the World (book 5 of which is translated here) expounds an elaborate system of celestial harmonies depending on the varying velocities of the planets.

The once-dreaded scourge of smallpox has been eradicated through barrier immunization. The eminent scientist Edward Jenner (1749-1823) was a pioneer in demonstrating that vaccination was an effective means of preventing smallpox. In the three groundbreaking treatises contained in this volume, originally published between 1798 and 1800, Jenner summarizes his evidence in favor of vaccination and describes individual cases.

Before the introduction of antisepsis and inoculation, people commonly died due to unsanitary conditions in the home, or following surgery or childbirth. Between them, the great scientists Louis Pasteur (1822-1893) and Joseph Lister (1827-1912) extended widely the practice of inoculation and revolutionized medical practice. Pasteur's discovery that living organisms are the cause of fermentation formed the basis of the modern germ theory. Following Pasteur's researches, Lister proceeded to develop his antiseptic surgical methods. These breakthroughs in medicine are to be reckoned among the greatest discoveries of the nineteenth century.

David Ricardo (1772-1823), the founder of the classical school of economics, applied the deductive logic of the philosopher James Mill to the analysis of monetary principles. His chief work, Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, first published in 1817, had a profound impact and remains one of the groundworks of modern economics. Ricardo's labor theory of value, as well as his elaboration of the division of incomes, and the function of wages, rent, and trade, deeply influenced the economic philosophies of Karl Marx, John Stuart Mill, Alfred Marshall, and many others.

In The Descent of Man (1871, 1874) Charles Darwin (1809-1882) focused special attention on the origin and history of our own species, a subject he had avoided in his previous writings on evolution. He claimed that the human animal is closest in ancestry to the two African "pongids," or anthropoid apes (chimpanzees and gorillas). Further, Darwin held that our species and these two pongids differ merely in degree rather than in kind - a controversial view that contradicted religious doctrine. The Descent of Man looks at the emergence of humans in terms of primate evolution. Darwin presents a strictly mechanistic and materialist interpretation of our species that is free from superstition and spiritualism.

As the co-formulator with Charles Darwin of the theory of biological evolution via natural selection, naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) argued that plant and animal species develop throughout organic history. Wallace focused special attention on the diversity of tropical life forms and became acutely aware of the adaptive relationship between each species and its particular environment: an ongoing relationship that is necessary for survival and reproduction. After amassing empirical evidence from the Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote Island Life (1881) in order to document the dynamic realtionship between organisms and their climatic habitats. Anticipating our present concern with both endangered species and vanishing environments, Wallace's ecological studies helped substantiate the fact of evolution. This book is an excellent example of long-term research and the far-reaching insights such scientific projects hold for understanding and appreciating the evolving life on Earth.

The Peloponnesian War (431-404 b.c.e.) was the greatest "disturbance" in Greek history to that time. The bitter rivalry between the two chief city-states, Athens and Sparta, and their respective allies ended with the ruin of Athens' naval hegemony and what the Greek historian Thucydides (ca. 460-400 b.c.e.) called a "convulsion" affecting all humankind.Thucydides recreates the often savage events of the war and brings to life its chief protagonists: Pericles, Nicias, Cleon, Alcibiades, and others. The first of the "scientific" historians, Thucydides makes use of documentary material and relies on eyewitness accounts; even where direct documentary evidence is lacking, his keen understanding of human nature helps him to uncover the truth of what actually happened.

Thorstein Veblen (1857-1929), the controversial American economist and social critic, argues that economics is essentially a study of the economic aspects of human culture, which are in a constant state of flux. In his best-known work, The Theory of the Leisure Class (1899), Veblen appropriated Darwin's theory of evolution to analyze the modern industrial system.While industry itself demanded diligence, efficiency, and cooperation, businessmen in opposition to engineers and industrialists were only interested in making money and displaying their wealth in what Veblen coined "conspicuous consumption." Veblen's keen analysis of the psychological bases of American social and economic institutions laid the foundation for the school of institutional economics.

English economist and professor Thomas R. Malthus (1766-1834) caused great public controversy among the optimistic positivitists of his day when his Essay on the Principle of Population (1798) showed incontrovertibly that population, when unchecked, tends to increase faster than the availability of subsistence. Therefore preventive checks on population increase are necessary. Malthus, whose work influenced the research of Charles Darwin, admitted he was pessimistic about the future of humankind. He argued, through mathematical proofs and scientific documentation, that without population control the societal result is overcrowding, disease, war, poverty, and vice.

Inviting in its lavish detail, this is Darwin's fascinating account of his five-year journey aboard the Royal Navy ship HMSBeagle(1831-1836) as it surveyed the coasts of South America, New Zealand, Australia, and the now famous Galapagos Archipelago. One of the most important voyages of the 19th century, this is where Darwin made the observations that led to his theory of evolution by means of natural selection, which emerged two decades later. The Voyage of the Beagle (1840-43) has delighted and enlightened millions because of Darwin's loving and insightful observations of the plants, animals, people, and locations he explored. These journals provide striking examples of the great scientist's reasoning ability and intriguing glimpses into his thought processes. They are the precursor to The Descent of Man (1871, 1874), a controversial leap in evolutionary theory from nature to humanity.

In September 1787, a series of persuasive and skillfully argued essays began appearing in New York newspapers urging approval of the newly drafted Constitution of the United States, the ratification of which was being hotly debated in state legislatures. Most of these essays bore the mysterious signature of a certain "Publius," later revealed to be the collective nom de plume of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison. By May 1788, a total of eighty-five articles had been published and they were then collected in a book entitled The Federalist.Through clear, logical exposition and elegant language, The Federalist essays made a forceful case for strong, representative federal government as defined by the Constitution. Hamilton, Jay, and Madison argued that to protect itself against foreign threat and domestic strife the United States needed a unifying federal government to look after the interests of the new nation as a whole. They also emphasized the importance of federal government for maintaining an efficient and healthy economic system, and they exposed the obvious inadequacies of the much weaker Articles of Confederation, which the Constitution was designed to replace.Today historians rank The Federalist among our nation's most important historical documents. These fascinating essays bring to life the political drama surrounding the ratification of the Constitution, while providing insights into the minds of some of America's greatest political thinkers and their interpretation of America's founding charter. This edition includes the complete text of the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution, along with a highly detailed index.

In this controversial study Freud applies the theories and evidence of his psychoanalytic investigations to the study of aboriginal peoples and, by extension, to the earliest cultural stages of the human race before the rise of large-scale civilizations. Relying on the reports of ethnographers such as J. G. Frazer, E. B. Tylor, and others, Freud points out the striking parallels between the cultural practices of native tribal groups and the behavior patterns of neurotics. His ultimate aim is to shed light on the psychological factors involved in the development of culture in the same way as he analyzed the unconscious motivations of neurotic individuals.Beginning with a discussion of the incest taboo, which is one of the main features of the totemic tribal structure, he compares the taboo to the infantile stage of individual psychological development, in which the male child experiences incestuous sexual feelings for his mother (and the girl for her father). He draws parallels between some of the elaborate taboo restrictions seen in these early cultures and the scrupulous rituals of compulsion neurotics, who in a similar fashion are wrestling with the ambivalent emotions aroused by the incest taboo. The implication is that many of the ceremonies andrituals of culture develop as a psychological reaction to the incest taboo, which prohibits the acting out of an infantile impulse that would be socially destructive.Freud contends that cultures evolve through three main stages: the animistic, the religious, and the scientific. The earliest stage of animism corresponds to the narcissistic phase of individual development, when the child overvalues the importance and influence of his inner psychic life on the outer world. In the religious stage of culture, humanity realizes that its own conceptions do not have full power to control outer reality and attributes this power to deities, who nonetheless can be manipulated through religious ceremony. This stage of culture corresponds to the individual growth phase of dependence on the parents. The scientific stage is tantamount to the mature phase of individual development, in which the individual recognizes his very limited power to control the universe and accepts the reality of his own death as well as all other natural realities.Freud concludes by invoking his famous Oedipus complex as the key to the development of culture, just as it is the main conflict underlying all neurotic illness in his theory. The repressed psychological urge to kill the father as the rival for the mother's affections is the underlying motive for the symbols and ceremonies of religion with all its many sacrificial rituals of expiation and its notions of angry gods, original sin, and humankind's guilt and need for atonement.Although Freud's theories and life are controversial today, this masterful synthesis and its undeniable influence on later scholars of religion, anthropology, and psychology make it an indispensable work.

This treatise, written in 1923 by the renowned proponent of deficit spending, is devoted to the need for stable currency as the indispensable foundation to a healthy world economy. Keynes begins by laying out data showing the serious fluctuations in the value of money that began in 1914 and subjected North America, Europe, and India to injurious cycles of inflation and deflation. He describes the various effects on investors, business people, and wage earners of this erratic underlying influence and makes it clear that policies limiting such fluctuations must be implemented to ensure greater economic and social stability. He finds the gold standard, which was used as the basis of value for many currencies, including the U.S. dollar at that time, to be ultimately unreliable since gold itself is also prey to unstable valuations. In the final analysis he recommends the implementation of policies by Great Britain and the United States that aim at achieving stability of the commodity value of the dollar rather than the gold value. "[T]he ideal state of affairs," he argues, "is an intimate co-operation between the Federal Reserve Board and the Bank of England, as a result of which stability of prices and of exchange would be achieved at the same time."As always, Keynes proved to be amazingly prescient: The United States did eventually abandon the gold standard and the U.S. dollar is indeed the basis of currency values today. Keynes's brilliant, clear analysis of the world monetary situation at the beginning of the twentieth century, with his many suggestions and his masterful elucidation of economic principles, is still well worth reading today at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

A work that has had a profound influence on the study of English and American law, The Province of Jurisprudence Determined is a model of rigorous and clear analysis. With its publication Austin brought order to the disparate elements of a legal profession that up until his time was largely unsystematic. Although he was greatly respected by a small circle of supporters, including Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, his work received little attention beyond his friends during his lifetime. It was only after Austin's death that his writings began to attract general notice. Then his analysis became the focal point for strong disagreements over the true nature of law, the definition of law as a form of command with implied sanctions, and the problem of differentiating legal authority, political power, and morality. The later fame of his work appears to have resulted from the controversies it generated.Perhaps Austin's most significant contribution was to make a clear distinction between "positive law" (i.e., laws decreed by the sovereign or government) and moral principles (which he terms the "law of God"). In so doing he defined the field of inquiry for later students. Also of interest is the influence of utilitarian philosophy on his analysis: for example, he viewed the principle of social utility as a benchmark for discerning God's commands and hence for judging the overall moral quality of rules of conduct.Whether one agrees or disagrees with Austin's analysis, it is clear that his work is now established as indispensable for all discussions of jurisprudence.

The much overused word genius aptly describes only a few people in the history of civilization. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) unquestionably belongs in this elite group. Anyone who has looked in amazement at the Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, or the many drawings that sprang from his fertile imagination may wonder how he accomplished these astounding works of art. Fortunately for posterity, Leonardo left his Treatise on Painting, essentially a primer for students interested in learning the craft of drawing and painting.Even a quick perusal of this multifaceted work will reveal the great artist's famously keen powers of observation and his scientific approach to the study of nature. He begins with careful instructions on drawing the main features of human anatomy, then moves on to techniques of rendering motion and perspective. He discusses aspects of good composition; inventiveness; the expression of various emotions; creating effects of light, shadow, and color; and many other subtle points of artistic composition. Throughout Leonardo stresses the importance of meticulous study of the subjects to be rendered and the need for assiduous practice: "Those who become enamored of the practice of the art without having previously applied to the diligent study of the scientific part of it may be compared to mariners who put to sea in a ship without rudder or compass, and therefore cannot be certain of arriving at the wished-for port."This outstanding edition - complete with anatomical drawings by the French classicist master Nicholas Poussin (1594-1665) and geometrical illustrations by the great Italian Renaissance architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472), as well as an informative life of Leonardo and an appendix that lists the artist's manuscripts, principal paintings, and drawings - will make an attractive addition to the libraries of art students, art historians, and anyone interested in the works of the original "Renaissance man"