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Parascience, Pseudoscience, and PoliticalPower: Gerald Holton on the Anti-SciencePhenomenon—And Why It Should Not Be

Dismissed as a Harmless Fringe

Number 45 November 9, 1992

Introduction: Homage to a Mentor

1’ve often written of the many historians

of science who have been mentors in mycareer. 1-3We sometimes take mentors forgranted, neglecting to tell the world how

they played a role in our personal or pro-fessional lives. It came as a surprise to re-

alize I hadn’t yet acknowledged GeraldHolton as an important mentor or expressedmy appreciation of his influence. An em-barrassing surprise, really, since he wrotethe foreword to a volume of Essays of anInformation Scientist.4 The Current Con-

rentsm (Cd) essay which follows is an op-portunity to makeup for this oversight.

Many CC readers will know from previ-

ous essays that Holton is Mallinckrodt Pro-fessor of Physics and professor of historyof science at Harvard University, Cam-bridge, Massachusetts. He has distinguishedhimself both in science and (he “science of

science’’—that is, his seminal contributionson the social and cultural aspects of sci-

ence. It is here that our interests intersectand where I first “met” him.

Intersecting Interests:Jefferson and Einstein

For example, whenever I hear “Thomas

Jefferson” I recall his 1981 Jefferson Lec-ture in Washington, DC. Selection to thisaward by the National Endowment for theHumanities is “the highest honor the fed-eral government confers for distinguishedintellectual achievement in the humani-

Gerald Holton

ties.”s The lecture was cited in a previousCC essay on the bicentennial of the USConstitution.6 I’ve also cited Holton’s workon metaphors in science.’.s His book, The-matic Origins of Scientific Thought: Kepler

to Einstein, 9 was featured as a CitationClassic@ in CC. 10These are in addition toour continuing discussion and correspcm-dence on art and science.

Thomas Jefferson said science is funda-mental to the health of the US.5 It is re-freshing to recall how much of its currentresearch leadership the US owes to the in-flux of brilliant European scientists, likeAlbert Einstein, around the time of WorldWar H. Like so many others, I have an

abiding interest in the life and work of

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Einstein, a subject which Holton has re-searched so welI. 11

Refugees from intolerant, intolerable, to-talitarian states, these erni~ant researchersreinforced the intellectual infrastmcture ofgenerations of scientific progress in the US,where both the “freedom and happiness of

man” and the advancement of knowledgewere the two goals of science, to quoteJefferson again.5 Holton, too, emigrated tothe US to escape Nazi persecution in Ger-many, where he was born in Berlin of Aus-trian parents. And our social sciences schol-arship has been enriched as a result.

Parascience and Pseudoscience:Not a Harmless Fringe

Holton sent me a presentation he madeto a conference on “Anti-Science and Anti-Technology Movement in the US andUSSR,” which was recently published in anew journal, Public Understanding of Sci-ence. 12It was a penetrating analysis of the

gamut of “fringe science’’—from astrologyto Lysenkoism to creationism. It also ex-plained why it is unwise to dismiss this“anti-science” phenomenon as a harmlessfringe at a time when it is building politi-cal momentum and influence. Finally,Holton constructed a theoretical frameworkand practical strategy for dealing with thephenomenon.

The relevance and interest of the paperto CC readers seemed obvious. However,space would not permit a reprint of thecomplete 26-page original. So it was de-cided we would condense the paper. Theresulting digest follows. Although the di-

gest is only about one-third the length ofthe original manuscript, it preserves thethrust of Holton’s thoughts on anti-science.

However, the digest by no means substi-tutes for Holton’s originaf article on theanti-science phenomenon. It is meant todraw attention to an important issue for theresearch community by presenting his el-egant and incisive analysis of it. We hopeit will encourage you to read the entire

text in Public Understanding of Science tofully appreciate Holton’s insights.

About the Author

Holton received a bachelor’s and mas-ter’s degree in physics from Wesleyan Uni-versity. He also earned a master’s and PhD

degree, both in physics, from Harvard.Concurrent with his Harvard appointments,Holton is a visiting professor at the Massa-chusetts Institute of Technology (MIT),where he was a founding faculty memberof the Program on Science, Technology,and Society. A member of numerous pres-tigious professional organizations world-wide, he has also received many honors

and awards-including the Millikan, Oer-sted, and Sarton medals.

Over the past decades, Holton has pur-

sued three related research interests. Onehas been the relation between science andculture, which has involved the foundingof Daedalus and the publication of numer-ous books and essays. Another interest hasbeen the intersection between science, tech-nology, and society. This has encompassedthe founding of Science, Technology andHuman Values, the MIT educational pro-gram, and other major activities. His thirdmajor interest is the dynamics of growth inscience, including sociological models forthe expansion of research. His publicationson this topic are too numerous to mentionhere.

A New Journal on the Public

Understanding of Science

As noted earlier, the article digested in

the following was published in the inaugu-ral issue of Public Understanding qf Sci-

ence, on whose editorial advisory boardHolton serves. Launched by IOP (Instituteof Physics) Publishing and the Science Mu-seum, London, its goal is to provide aninternational forum for studies on the pub-

Iic dimensions of science, technology, andmedicine by educators, historians, sociolo-

gists, policy makers, media analysts, andothers. In particular, it has positioned itselfas the one journal “wholly or mainly de-voted to” public understanding of science,as explained by the editor, John Durant,the museum’s assistant director and headof science communication as well as visit-ing professor at Imperial College of Sci-ence, Technology and Medicine, London. 13

I was pleased to learn that a number ofcolleagues and friends are among the asso-ciate editors and editorial advisory board.These include Subbiah Arunachalam, Cen-tral Electrochemical Research Institute,Karaikudi, India, who also serves on theeditorial board of Current Science; SirWalter Bodmer, Imperial Cancer Research

Fund, London; David Edge, University ofEdinburgh, Scotland; Bruno Latour, EcoleNationale Sup&ieure des Mines, Paris;Bruce Lewenstein, Cornell University,

Ithaca, New York; Dorothy Nelkin, New

York University; Arie Rip, University ofTwente, Enschede, The Netherlands; andJohn Ziman, Science Poiicy Support Group,London.

Interested readers can order a free sampleissue of the new quarterly journal by con-tacting IOP Publishing, Techno House,Redcliffe Way, Bristol BS 1 6NX, UK. Eu-ropean orders can be placed by phone(0272-29748 1) or fax (0272-294318), Thenumbers for North America are 516-349-7800, ext. 628, and 516-349-7669, respec-tively.

*****

My thanks to Eric Thurschweil and AlWel~ams-Dorof for their help in the prepa-

ration of this essay,o ISI 1992

REFERENCES

1. Garneld E. Mel Kranzberg receives Bemal Prize as pioneering historian of technology.Currenr Conrenn ( 13):3-9,30 March 1992.

2------------ Robert K. Merton: among the giants. Essays of an information scientisr.Philadelphia: 1S1Press, 1980, Vol. 3, p. 176-8.

3------------ George SarLon: the father of the history of science. ParI 1. .%wton’searly life in Belgium.Part 2, Sarton shapes a new discipline. Ib,d., 1986, Vol. 8, p. 24 I-7; 248-53.

4, Holton G. Foreword. (Gartleld E.) Essays o~tm information scientisr: the awards of science and orheressays. Philadelphia: 1S1Press. 1985. Vol. 7. p. xiii-xxi.

5------------ The advancement of science, and its burdens: the Jefferson Lecture and other essays.Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1986.351 p.

6. Gartleld E. The bicentennial of the US Constitution: the American Philoaophlcat .%ciety and the role ofscholarship in the creation of the US republic. Op. cit., 1989. Vol. 10. p. 13I-7.

7. Holton G. Metaphors in science and education. (Taylor W, cd.) Metaphors of educaficm.London: Heineman, 1984. p. 91-113. (Reprinted in reference 5 above.)

8. Garfield E. The metaphor-science connection. Op. ci[., 1988. Vol. 9. p. 316-23.9. Holton G. Thematic origim of scientific kmghr: Kep/er ro Einstein. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press, 1973.495 p, (Revised edition, 1988.)10. ----------- On the origins of Thematic origins. Citation Classic, Commentary on Thematic origins of

~cientijic dlought; Kep/er to Einswin. Current Conrenrs/Arts & Humanities 1I(9): 14, 24 April 1989;currmt ConrenO/ Engineering, Technology & Applied Sciences 20( 17): 14, 24 April 1989; Current

Contents/Physical, Chemical & Earth Sciences 29( 17):14,24 April 1989; Current Contents/Social&Be/mviora[ Sciences21 ( 17):16,24 April 1989.

11. ----------- Aiben Einstein, historical and cultural perspectives. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UniversityPress, 1982.439 p.

12------------ How to think about the ‘anti-science’ phenomenon. Pub/it Understand. Sci. 1( I ):103-28,January 1992.

13. Durant J. Editorial. Public Understand. SCI. 1(1): I-5, January 1992,

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How to Think About the ‘Anti-Science’ Phenomenon*

ByGerald Holton

Opposition to science as conventionally defined can take a great variety of forms, from interest inastrology to attacks on relativity theory, from false beliefs based on scientific illiteracy to supportof Lysenkoism or Creationism. Which of these are relatively negligible, and which are potentiallydangerous? What do these symptoms of disaffection portend, for science and culture in our time?

Belief in anti-science (or ‘alternative science’, ‘parascience’ ) is grounded in a person’s functionalworldview, and is one symptom of a long-standing struggle over the legitimacy of the authority ofconventional science. This analysis leads to the identification of a set of strategies for dealing withthe counter-visions which periodically attempt to raise themselves from the level of apparentharmlessness to that of politically ambitious success.

The surface of the problem

My main task is to outline how to thinkabout anti-science at the proper level. Theterm anti-science can lump together toomany, quite different things that have incommon only that they tend to annoy orthreaten those who regard themselves asmore enlightened. We must disaggregatefrom the disparate jumble that which is thetruly worrisome part of anti-science, so thatwe can discriminate between ‘real’ science(good, bad, and indifferent; old, new, orjust emerging; etc.); pathological science(as in Irving Langmuir’s essay on peoplewho thought they were doing real sciencebut were misled:); pseudo-science (astrol-ogy and the ‘science’ of the paranormal);blatant silliness and superstition (’pyramidpower’ ); scientism (the exaggerated claimsof technocrats for scientific and technologi-cal powers, as in ‘Star Wars’ projects); andother forms.

Thereby we shall be able to focus on thesingle most malignant part of the phenom-enon: the type of pseudo-scientific nonsensethat manages to pass itself off as an ‘alter-native science’, and does so in the serviceof political ambition. Here our Soviet col-leagues will be able to instruct us becauseof their unhappy experience in past decadeswith Lysenkoism. attacks on the relativity

theory and quantum mechanics, and on cos-mologists who were thought to have of-fended against the doctrines of Engels’sAnti-Duhring.

Much of what looks at first glance likeanti-science turns out to be something else.For example, much of tabloid sensational-ism involving UFOS is merely hucksterismfeeding on primitive ignorance (unless, aswith the reputed inauguration of a sectionon ‘UFO-logy’ in the Soviet Academy ofScience, the craze gets official backing).

Yet, if our aim is to filter out, name, andanalyse the really dangerous segment ofwhat some call the anti-science movement,we shall not find much help in the litera-ture, There exists no adequate, serious treat-ment of it, nor even of the modem outbokthat feels threatened by anti-science. All ofus enter this study equally in need of abetter understanding.

Why does the ‘anti-sciencephenomenon’ concern us?

In a democracy, no matter how pcmriyinformed the citizens are, they do properlydemand a place at the table where deci-sions are made which have a large scien-tific/technical component. In that mismatchof rights and knowledge base lies the po-tential for erroneous policy and eventual

● Greatty condensed from an article in Public Understanding ofScierrce 1(1):103-28, January 1$92.The completeversion will be published in Holton G. Onscience and anri-science. Cambridge, MA: HarvardUniversity Press, 1993(chapter 6). Based on a presentation to the Joint US-USSR conference on ‘Anti-Science and Arrri-TechnologyMovement in the US and USSR’, held 2-3 May 1991at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US.

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social instability. History has shown repeat-edly that a disaffection with science canturn into a rage that links up with far moresinister movements.

Thoughts of this kind are really behindthe concerns that the phenomenon of anti-science raises in the minds of many intel-lectuals, West and East. By themselves, allthe astrologers, anti-evolutionists, spiritu-alists and peddlers of new-age thinkingcould otherwise be merely a source of con-descension or amusement. We seem to dis-cern behind these multi-faceted phenom-ena something perilous, a potentially fatalflaw in the self-conception of the peopletoday. Could it be, at this end of the cen-tury, that the widespread lack of a properunderstanding of science itself might be ei-ther a source, or a tell-tale sign, of aculture’s decline?

One may try to shrug off such darkthoughts by pointing to the bright side, notleast the practically universal popular en-chantment with high-tech. One may seekcomfort in the fact that even though onlyless than half of the US adult populationbelieves in the evolutionary descent of hu-man beings from eadier species, and eventhough half has trouble finding one side ofa square when given one of the other sides,the US public at large reports to pollsters agreater level of belief in the potential ofscience and technology as a force for thegood (at least in the abstract) than equiva-lent tests have shown for other major in-dustrial countries, such as France and Ja-pan.

This uninfomted assertion of interest isnot troubled by the well-documented, con-tradictory feeling about scientists, which isless positive. In America at the end of thetwentieth century it is not science but reli-gion which, as in the days of the seven-teenth-century Pilgrims, is perhaps thestrongest force in private and national life—just as Tocqueville had noticed in the 1830s.About one-third of our adults, and a largefraction of these from evangelical sects,now say they are ‘born-again’ believers;over half believe in the possibility of thedaily occurrence of miracles through praye~60% say they believe in the literal exis-tence of Hell for the eternally damned. And

the financial support given last year as pri-vate donations to religious organizationsamounted to a remarkable $54 billion. Still,the large majority of average Americansreport experiencing no conflict at all be-tween science and faith, despite the factthat the modem science-based worldviewevolved in good part from the reaction tocontradictions between these two undeni-able imperatives.2

Anti-science as counter-vision

The anti-science phenomenon is not atall just an incomplete or ignorant or dam-aged form of the ‘proper’ worldview thatmany of us here believe should character-ize our civilization at this time in history.Instead—and leaving aside the banal, rela-tively harrrdess or ignorant varieties-whatthe more sophisticated so-called anti-sci-entists offer is, to put it bluntly, an articu-lated and functional, and potentially pow-erful counter-vision of the world, withinwhich there exists an allegiance to a ‘sci-ence’ very different from conventional sci-ence.

Today there exist a number of differentgroups which from their various perspec-tives oppose what they conceive of as thehegemony of science-as-done-today in ourculture. These groups do not form a coher-ent movement, and indeed have little inter-est in one another. But what they do havein common is that each, in its own way,advocates nothing less than the end of sci-ence as we know it.

Let me just name the four most promi-nent portions of this current countercon-stituency. Starting from the intellectuallymost serious end, there is a type of modemphilosopher who asserts that science cannow claim no more than the status of auseful myth—the term is used by Mary

Hesse—not to speak of a new wing of so-ciologists of science who, going far be-yond their reasonable task, wish, in BrunoLatour’s words, to ‘abolish the distinctionbetween science and fiction’,

Next, there is a group, small but veryinfluential, of alienated intellectuals, ofwhom Arthur Koestler served as prominent:xemplar. For them to be doomed to igno-

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rance is the worst wound. But the fantasticgrowth rate of new knowledge, and ourspotty record as educators, has inflicted onthem, as Lionel Trilling honotrrabl y con-fessed, a devastating ‘humiliation’.3

Third, there is a resurgence among whatI have called the Dionysian, with theirdedication ranging from ‘New Age’ think-ing to wishful parallelism with Easternmysticism, from intellectual anarchy tocrystal power.4 Some have their roots innineteenth-century Romanticism, some inthe 1960s’ counter-cultures; but all agreethat one of the worst sins of modernthought is the concept of objectivelyreachable data.

A fourth group, again very different, is aradical wing of the movement representedby such writers as Sandra Harding, whorecently said physics today ‘is a poor model[even] for physics itself’. For her and herlike-minded colleagues, science now hasthe fatal flaw of ‘androcentrism’; that, to-gether with faith in the progressiveness ofscientific rationality, has brought us to thepoint where, she writes, ‘a more radicalintellectual, moral, social, and politicalrevolution [is called for] than the foundersof modern Western cultures could haveimagined’ .s

That these groups have been able to gainconsiderable attention is due in part to thefact that the ground for dismay with mod-em science and technology has been pre-pared by three different factors, all operat-ing in the same direction.

First, with science and engineering nowcentral components of modem life, frombirth to death, it is not surprising that con-cern is widespread over some real or imag-ined consequences of science-driven tech-nology, nor that some of these concernshave in fact been first examined and madepublic by scientists and engineers.

This leads to the second factor, of whichthe now international ecology movement isan indicator. Earlier than even most scien-tists, some critics intuited the fragility anddelicacy of the interconnections that gov-ern the well-being of all species on Earth.Their methodology and their rhetoric maynot always have been sound, but their mo-tivation has been a Darwinian one.

The need for ecological-systems think-ing, both for its benign significance andbecause of the evident threats, is rather new,having emerged into global thought onlyin the last third of the twentieth century,and is bound to become a chief preoccupa-tion of the twenty-first. There were ofcourse very significant pioneers earlier,such as John Muir and Patrick Geddes, whoprepared our minds in terms of their localor localizable concerns. Even RachelCarson was focusing only on the threats tothe ecosystem from certain chemicals. Wenow treasure these pioneers even more, be-cause they prepared us to understand betterthe global meaning that had to be extrapo-lated from their messages.

Last but not least, with the rise of manyscientists to visibility and prominence inour own nation’s life, something was trig-gered in the American response which isperhaps idiosyncratic for this country butin fact is fundamentally healthy-namely,skepticism against this, as against any, formof strong, organized authority.

Three types of ameliorating strategies,and their limits

I began by asking the question whetherthe multifaceted anti-science phenomenon,even if widespread, is at bottom only amore or less harmless diversion, or whetherit signals an important cultural challengeand therefore must be taken seriously.

My answer is now clear. If we leave asideas intrinsically unimportant the passingfads, ignorance, canalizations, etc. (andtheir commercial exploitation). we can fo-cus on pseudo- or parascientific schemesthat arise from deep conviction. These aregrounded in a fairly stable and functional,motivating worldview. It is these that canbe directed at the core of contemporary ctrl-ture (as would, for example, an analogousanti-literature phenomenon: in fact, someof the new cultural movements in the USAhave just that purpose). Even though thecounter-constructs embodying parascienceare a minority view today in the USA, theirentrenchment is a living reminder of anold, worldwide struggle of mutual delegiti-mation of rival cultural claimants.

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How alarming this is felt to be dependsof course on whether earnest and success-ful interventions are undertaken in oppo-sition to the counter-construct, or whetherintellectuals and policy makers on thewhole will lazily continue to give onlylip service to this problem, as they havedone with scientific and general culturalilliteracy.

As a practical matter, there seem to beonly three types of interventions that makesense:

1, The traditional one: formation, froman early age on, of a modem worldviewthat will preempt the attractions of its op-posite. This implies not only early nurtur-ing of the chi Id by a sound educationalsystem designed for this purpose; one wouldalso need the support by that individual’sparents, teachers, and other cimegivers whothemselves should have passed through aneducation of this kind.

2. Interactions of the sort that bring tolight directly the internal contradictions inthe alternative picture; or massive and per-sistent adult education efforts.

3. Widely visible exposure of the fail-ures of the claims of parascience, and per-sistent political action to prevent its formalacceptance into schooling systems. Thus,while convinced followers of ‘creationism’themselves are probably unreachable ow-ing to the robustness and internal function-ality of their supporting world picture, atleast one can reverse, as was done recentlyin Texas after a decade-long fight, thestranglehold of these powerfully presentedminority views on the selectors of textbooksfor the whole state’s school system.

Toward a conclusion

Among examples that help us deriveguidelines are two in particular. One is therise of the machine-breaking Luddites inBritain in 1811 to 1816. It was a move-ment first spawned by economic grievances,but eventually became a violent explosionagainst the technological symbols of a suf-focating and unyielding factory systems

Here I wish only to refer to it, as it has acertain overlap with the other example,which took place in the 1920s and early

1

1930s. In the early phase of the growth ofNazism in Germany, there arose, in thewords of Fritz Stem, the ‘cultural Luddites,who in their resentment of modernity soughtto smash the whole machinery of culture.”

In looking back on such historic cases,we can draw two important lessons. Thefirst is that alternative sciences or parasci-ences by themselves may be harmlessenough (except as one of the opiates of themasses), but that when they are incorpo-rated into political movements they can be-come a time bomb waiting to explode.

We have recently been watching just sucha possibility in the USA. Among the rel-evant documentation is an essay by JamesMoore, released by the American Acad-emy of Arts and Sciences, entitled ‘TheCreationist Cosmos of Protestant Funda-mentalism’.8 It chronicles the recent riseand political power of the anti-evolutionmovement in the USA. While oppositionto evolutionist teachings has a long historyin America, Moore notes that ‘today, Fun-damentalists may have a fair claim that upto a quarter of the population of the US,and a rapidly increasing number of con-verts worldwide, live in a universe createdmiraculously [in six days] only a few thou-sand years ago, and on an earth tenantedonly by those fixed organic kinds that sur-vived a global Ffood .... The creationist cos-mos of Protestant Fundamentalism has ac-quired an authority rivalling that of theestablished sciences’ (p. 46).8

The most noteworthy point is the joiningof ‘Creationism’ with the agenda of politi-cally ambitious evangelists such as Falwell,Robertson, Swaggert, Bakker, and Ken-nedy. As the proponents’ published viewshows, the stakes are much higher for themthan merely displacing current biologytexts. They focus on the traditional Funda-mentalist task: how to prepare this worldfor the coming of the next.

On the way to that goal, they have en-countered surprisingly little vocal opposi-tion from the world of scholarship, science,w theology in the USA. On the contrary,they have acquired powerful aflies in highplaces. Their sympathizers included a Presi-ient of the USA in the 1980s; he is onrecord as holding to a worldview that has

open arms not only for astrology, but alsofor UFOS, for Creationism, and for a formof Fundamentalism that concerns itself withthe inevitable approach in the near futureof an apocalyptic Ending.

The other lesson to draw from our his-toric cases is simply this. History recordsan important and revealing asymmetry: theoriginal Machine Luddites of the nineteenthcentury were soon brutally crushed; but theCultural Luddites have often, at least for atime, been the winners, although at greatcost to their civilization.

It is sobering that in every case therewere intellectuals who tried to stand up tothe Cultural Luddites, but they rose too late,were far too small in number, received littleencouragement from their peers, and had

less commitment and staying power thandid their opponents.

As we have seen, history records thatthe serious and dedicated portion of theanti-science phenomenon, when marriedto political power, does signal a majorcultural challenge. In short, it is prudentto regard the committed and politicallyambitious parts of the anti-science phe-nomenon as a reminder of the Beast thatslumbers below. When it awakens, as ithas again and again over the past centu-ries, and as it undoubtedly will again someday, it will make its true power known.Those who care to learn the lessons ofthe past may be well advised to try todefang the counter-vision even in itspresent, less virulent state.

References

1,Langmuir, 1., 1989, Pathological science. Physics Today, 42( 10),36.

2. Niemi, R. G., Mueller, J., and Smith, T. W., 1989, Trends in Public Opinion: A Compendium of Survey Data(New York Greenwood Press).

3, Trilling, L., 1972,Mind in the Modem World: The 1972 Jefferson Lzcture in the Humanities(New York Viking).

4. I have treated this phenomenon in Holton, G., 1986, Dionysians, Apollonian, and the scientific imagination.The Advancement of.$cience, and Its Burdens (Cambridge University Press), Chap. 3. A thorough,carefully supported analysis of the fashionable attempts to link modem science and Eaatem lore isRestive, S., 1978and 1982,Parallels and paradoxes in modem physics and Eastern mysticism. SocialStudies of Science, 8.143-181 (Part I) and 12,37-71 (Part 11),

5. Hadng, S., 1986, The Science Quewicm in Feminism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press), p. 10 see thetrenchant reviews of this issue in Levin, M., 1988,American Scho.kw,57, 10C-106,and in Geertz, C.,1990,A lab of one’s own. New York Review of Books, 37(8 November), 19-23.

6. See, for example, Thonris, M. 1., 1970,The Luddites: Machine-Breaking in Regency .Errgland (Hamden, CTM. Archon Books); DarvaO,F. O., 1934,Popular Disturbances and Public Order in Regency England(London: Oxford University Press); and Pearamr,G., 1979,Resistance to the machine. Counrer-Movemenrs in the Sciences, edkd by H. Nowotny and H. Row (Dnrdrechc Reidel).

7. Stem, F., 1961,The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study of the Rise of Gerrnonic Ideology (Berkeley, CA:University of Crdifomia press), p. xvii. See also the important bcok Beyerchen, A., 1977, Scientists underHitler.’ Politics in the Third Reich (New Haven, CT Yale University Press).

8. In Marty, M. E., and Appleby, R. S., 1992,Fundamentalisms and Sociery: Reclaiming the Sciences, theFamily, and Society, vol. 2 (University of Chkago Press).

Author

Gerald Holton is Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics and professor of history of scienceat Harvard University, and concurrently visiting professor at the Massachusetts Instituteof Technology. He is based at the Jefferson Physical Laboratory, Harvard University,Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, US. Among his publications are: Thematic Origins ofScient@ Thought: Kepler to Einstein (Harvard University Press, 2d ed. 1988), TheAdvancement of Science, and Its Burdens (Cambridge University Press, 1986), and TheScientific Imagination: Case Studies (Cambridge University Press, 1978).

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