Pseudo Science And Society In 19th Century America

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Pseudo-Science and Society in 19th-Century America

Author : Arthur Wrobel
Publisher : University Press of Kentucky
ISBN 13 : 0813186757
Total Pages : 275 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (131 download)

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Book Synopsis Pseudo-Science and Society in 19th-Century America by : Arthur Wrobel

Download or read book Pseudo-Science and Society in 19th-Century America written by Arthur Wrobel and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2021-10-21 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Progressive nineteenth-century Americans believed firmly that human perfection could be achieved with the aid of modern science. To many, the science of that turbulent age appeared to offer bright new answers to life's age-old questions. Such a climate, not surprisingly, fostered the growth of what we now view as "pseudo-sciences"—disciplines delicately balancing a dubious inductive methodology with moral and spiritual concerns, disseminated with a combination of aggressive entrepreneurship and sheer entertainment. Such "sciences" as mesmerism, spiritualism, homoeopathy, hydropathy, and phrenology were warmly received not only by the uninformed and credulous but also by the respectable and educated. Rationalistic, egalitarian, and utilitarian, they struck familiar and reassuring chords in American ears and gave credence to the message of reformers that health and happiness are accessible to all. As the contributors to this volume show, the diffusion and practice of these pseudo-sciences intertwined with all the major medical, cultural, religious, and philosophical revolutions in nineteenth-century America. Hydropathy and particularly homoeopathy, for example, enjoyed sufficient respectability for a time to challenge orthodox medicine. The claims of mesmerists and spiritualists appeared to offer hope for a new moral social order. Daring flights of pseudo-scientific thought even ventured into such areas as art and human sexuality. And all the pseudo-sciences resonated with the communitarian and women's rights movements. This important exploration of the major nineteenth-century pseudo-sciences provides fresh perspectives on the American society of that era and on the history of the orthodox sciences, a number of which grew out of the fertile soil plowed by the pseudo-scientists.

On the Fringe

Author : Michael D. Gordin
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0197555780
Total Pages : 122 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (975 download)

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Book Synopsis On the Fringe by : Michael D. Gordin

Download or read book On the Fringe written by Michael D. Gordin and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-03-23 with total page 122 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Everyone has heard of the term "pseudoscience", typically used to describe something that looks like science, but is somehow false, misleading, or unproven. Many would be able to agree on a list of things that fall under its umbrella-- astrology, phrenology, UFOlogy, creationism, and eugenics might come to mind. But defining what makes these fields "pseudo" is a far more complex issue. It has proved impossible to come up with a simple criterion that enables us to differentiate pseudoscience from genuine science. Given the virulence of contemporary disputes over the denial of climate change and anti-vaccination movements--both of which display allegations of "pseudoscience" on all sides-- there is a clear need to better understand issues of scientific demarcation. On the Fringe explores the philosophical and historical attempts to address this problem of demarcation. This book argues that by understanding doctrines that are often seen as antithetical to science, we can learn a great deal about how science operated in the past and does today. This exploration raises several questions: How does a doctrine become demonized as pseudoscientific? Who has the authority to make these pronouncements? How is the status of science shaped by political or cultural contexts? How does pseudoscience differ from scientific fraud? Michael D. Gordin both answers these questions and guides readers along a bewildering array of marginalized doctrines, looking at parapsychology (ESP), Lysenkoism, scientific racism, and alchemy, among others, to better understand the struggle to define what science is and is not, and how the controversies have shifted over the centuries. On the Fringe provides a historical tour through many of these fringe fields in order to provide tools to think deeply about scientific controversies both in the past and in our present.

Pseudoscience

Author : Allison B. Kaufman
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262537044
Total Pages : 537 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (625 download)

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Book Synopsis Pseudoscience by : Allison B. Kaufman

Download or read book Pseudoscience written by Allison B. Kaufman and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2019-03-12 with total page 537 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Case studies, personal accounts, and analysis show how to recognize and combat pseudoscience in a post-truth world. In a post-truth, fake news world, we are particularly susceptible to the claims of pseudoscience. When emotions and opinions are more widely disseminated than scientific findings, and self-proclaimed experts get their expertise from Google, how can the average person distinguish real science from fake? This book examines pseudoscience from a variety of perspectives, through case studies, analysis, and personal accounts that show how to recognize pseudoscience, why it is so widely accepted, and how to advocate for real science. Contributors examine the basics of pseudoscience, including issues of cognitive bias; the costs of pseudoscience, with accounts of naturopathy and logical fallacies in the anti-vaccination movement; perceptions of scientific soundness; the mainstream presence of “integrative medicine,” hypnosis, and parapsychology; and the use of case studies and new media in science advocacy. Contributors David Ball, Paul Joseph Barnett, Jeffrey Beall, Mark Benisz, Fernando Blanco, Ron Dumont, Stacy Ellenberg, Kevin M. Folta, Christopher French, Ashwin Gautam, Dennis M. Gorman, David H. Gorski, David K. Hecht, Britt Marie Hermes, Clyde F. Herreid, Jonathan Howard, Seth C. Kalichman, Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair, Arnold Kozak, Scott O. Lilienfeld, Emilio Lobato, Steven Lynn, Adam Marcus, Helena Matute, Ivan Oransky, Chad Orzel, Dorit Reiss, Ellen Beate Hansen Sandseter, Kavin Senapathy, Dean Keith Simonton, Indre Viskontas, John O. Willis, Corrine Zimmerman

Fugitive Science

Author : Britt Rusert
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 1479805726
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (798 download)

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Book Synopsis Fugitive Science by : Britt Rusert

Download or read book Fugitive Science written by Britt Rusert and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2017-04-18 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Honorable Mention, 2019 MLA Prize for a First Book Sole Finalist Mention for the 2018 Lora Romero First Book Prize, presented by the American Studies Association Exposes the influential work of a group of black artists to confront and refute scientific racism. Traversing the archives of early African American literature, performance, and visual culture, Britt Rusert uncovers the dynamic experiments of a group of black writers, artists, and performers. Fugitive Science chronicles a little-known story about race and science in America. While the history of scientific racism in the nineteenth century has been well-documented, there was also a counter-movement of African Americans who worked to refute its claims. Far from rejecting science, these figures were careful readers of antebellum science who linked diverse fields—from astronomy to physiology—to both on-the-ground activism and more speculative forms of knowledge creation. Routinely excluded from institutions of scientific learning and training, they transformed cultural spaces like the page, the stage, the parlor, and even the pulpit into laboratories of knowledge and experimentation. From the recovery of neglected figures like Robert Benjamin Lewis, Hosea Easton, and Sarah Mapps Douglass, to new accounts of Martin Delany, Henry Box Brown, and Frederick Douglass, Fugitive Science makes natural science central to how we understand the origins and development of African American literature and culture. This distinct and pioneering book will spark interest from anyone wishing to learn more on race and society.

Hawthorne's Mad Scientists

Author : Taylor Stoehr
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780208016522
Total Pages : 313 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (165 download)

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Book Synopsis Hawthorne's Mad Scientists by : Taylor Stoehr

Download or read book Hawthorne's Mad Scientists written by Taylor Stoehr and published by . This book was released on 1978 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Crania Americana

Author : Samuel George Morton
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 40 pages
Book Rating : 4.B/5 (1 download)

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Book Synopsis Crania Americana by : Samuel George Morton

Download or read book Crania Americana written by Samuel George Morton and published by . This book was released on 1840 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Science, Pseudo-Science and Society

Author : Marsha Hanen
Publisher : Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press
ISBN 13 : 0889207933
Total Pages : 314 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (892 download)

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Book Synopsis Science, Pseudo-Science and Society by : Marsha Hanen

Download or read book Science, Pseudo-Science and Society written by Marsha Hanen and published by Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. This book was released on 2006-01-01 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume collects the papers presented at a conference on “Science, Pseudo–science and Society,” sponsored by the Calgary Institute for the Humanities and held at the University of Calgary, May 10–12, 1979. More than many such collections, this one preserves some trace of the intellectual excitement which surrounded this gathering of scholars. A primary inspiration for the symposium on “Science, Pseudoscience, and Society” was a growing awareness of the crucial role the study of pseudo–science plays in the areas of contemporary scholarship which are concerned with the nature of science and its relationship to broader social issues. This volume is organized around three major questions concerning the relationships among science, pseudo–science, and society. The papers in the first section address the question of whether it is possible to draw a sharp demarcation between science and pseudo–science and what the criteria of that demarcation might be. The papers in the second section, recognizing the historical importance of various of the pseudo–sciences, consider their impact—positive or negative—on the development of the sciences themselves. The papers in the third section deal with the question of the relationship between the sciences and pseudo–sciences, on the one hand, and social factors on the other.

The Myth of Race

Author : Robert Wald Sussman
Publisher : Harvard University Press
ISBN 13 : 0674745302
Total Pages : 385 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (747 download)

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Book Synopsis The Myth of Race by : Robert Wald Sussman

Download or read book The Myth of Race written by Robert Wald Sussman and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2014-10-06 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although eugenics is now widely discredited, some groups and individuals claim a new scientific basis for old racist assumptions. Pondering the continuing influence of racist research and thought, despite all evidence to the contrary, Robert Sussman explains why—when it comes to race—too many people still mistake bigotry for science.

Why People Believe Weird Things

Author : Michael Shermer
Publisher : Holt Paperbacks
ISBN 13 : 9781429996761
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (967 download)

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Book Synopsis Why People Believe Weird Things by : Michael Shermer

Download or read book Why People Believe Weird Things written by Michael Shermer and published by Holt Paperbacks. This book was released on 2002-09-01 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revised and Expanded Edition. In this age of supposed scientific enlightenment, many people still believe in mind reading, past-life regression theory, New Age hokum, and alien abduction. A no-holds-barred assault on popular superstitions and prejudices, with more than 80,000 copies in print, Why People Believe Weird Things debunks these nonsensical claims and explores the very human reasons people find otherworldly phenomena, conspiracy theories, and cults so appealing. In an entirely new chapter, "Why Smart People Believe in Weird Things," Michael Shermer takes on science luminaries like physicist Frank Tippler and others, who hide their spiritual beliefs behind the trappings of science. Shermer, science historian and true crusader, also reveals the more dangerous side of such illogical thinking, including Holocaust denial, the recovered-memory movement, the satanic ritual abuse scare, and other modern crazes. Why People Believe Strange Things is an eye-opening resource for the most gullible among us and those who want to protect them.

Strange Science

Author : Lara Pauline Karpenko
Publisher : University of Michigan Press
ISBN 13 : 047213017X
Total Pages : 311 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (721 download)

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Book Synopsis Strange Science by : Lara Pauline Karpenko

Download or read book Strange Science written by Lara Pauline Karpenko and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating look at scientific inquiry during the Victorian period and the shifting boundary between mainstream and unorthodox sciences of the time

Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience

Author : William F. Williams
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1135955220
Total Pages : 445 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (359 download)

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Book Synopsis Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience by : William F. Williams

Download or read book Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience written by William F. Williams and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-12-02 with total page 445 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience is the first one-volume, A-to-Z reference that identifies, defines, and explains all of the terms and ideas dealing with the somewhat murky world of the "almost sciences". Truly interdisciplinary and multicultural in scope, the Encyclopedia examines how fringe or marginal sciences have affected people throughout history, as well as how they continue to exert an influence on our lives today. This comprehensive reference brings together: superstitions and fads that are part of popular culture, such as fortune telling; healing practices once thought marginal that are now become increasingly accepted, such as homeopathy and acupuncture; frauds and hoaxes that have occurred throughout history, such as UFOs; mistaken theories first put forward as serious science, but later discarded as false, such as phrenology and racial typing, etc. More than 2000 extensively cross-referenced and illustrated entries cover prominent phenomena, major figures, events topics, places and associations.

A History of Their Own

Author : Bonnie S. Anderson
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 9780195128390
Total Pages : 642 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (283 download)

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Book Synopsis A History of Their Own by : Bonnie S. Anderson

Download or read book A History of Their Own written by Bonnie S. Anderson and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2000 with total page 642 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Organization of the book focuses on the developments, achievements, and changes in women's roles in society rather than placing women in historical chronology. A History of Their Own restores women to the historical record, brings their history into focus, and provides models of female action and heroism.

Lectures on Phrenology

Author : George Combe
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 408 pages
Book Rating : 4.A/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Lectures on Phrenology by : George Combe

Download or read book Lectures on Phrenology written by George Combe and published by . This book was released on 1839 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Pseudo-science and Society in Nineteenth-century America

Author : Arthur Wrobel
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 262 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis Pseudo-science and Society in Nineteenth-century America by : Arthur Wrobel

Download or read book Pseudo-science and Society in Nineteenth-century America written by Arthur Wrobel and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 19th century was the golden age of many things, and pseudo-science was one of them. Nowhere was this more obviously the case than in America. If he shopped around, a 19th-century American could consult a psychographer or a hydropath or a magnetizer(in 1843, there were supposed to be more than 200 magnetizers - practitioners of mesmerism -in Boston alone). As soon as he had taken off his water girdle, he was free to put on his Heidelberg Electric Belt, and perhaps smoke an electric cigarette. He could read pamphlets explaining why husbands and wives ought to have sex once every two years, on a sunny day in August or September, between 11 A.M. and noon. These are only a few of the topics touched on in ''Pseudo-Science and Society in 19th-Century America,'' a new collection of essays edited by Arthur Wrobel, a professor of American literature at the University of Kentucky. Mr. Wrobel and his fellow contributors trace the impact of most of the major pseudo-sciences of the period, and some of the minor ones; they look at them in the light of other 19th-century cultural developments, and try to set them in a specifically American context. Only one of the essays deals with an individual pseudo-scientist - Taylor Stoehr's absorbing account of Robert H. Collyer, a lecturer of the 1830's and 40's whose specialties included phrenology, mesmerism and painless dentistry (fairly painless, thanks to a combination of mesmerism, alcohol and opium). In due course, Collyer concocted a hybrid science of his own called phrenomagnetism, which enabled him to detect a whole host of ''organs'' in the brain that orthodox phrenology had somehow missed - organs of Sarcasm, Love of Pets, Desire for Seeing Ancient Places and other specialized propensities. His final inspiration, which plainly owed something to the advent of photography, was psychography, a system of transferring mental images by bouncing them off a bowl of molasses.

The Scientific Attitude

Author : Lee McIntyre
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262039834
Total Pages : 291 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (62 download)

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Book Synopsis The Scientific Attitude by : Lee McIntyre

Download or read book The Scientific Attitude written by Lee McIntyre and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2019-05-07 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An argument that what makes science distinctive is its emphasis on evidence and scientists' willingness to change theories on the basis of new evidence. Attacks on science have become commonplace. Claims that climate change isn't settled science, that evolution is “only a theory,” and that scientists are conspiring to keep the truth about vaccines from the public are staples of some politicians' rhetorical repertoire. Defenders of science often point to its discoveries (penicillin! relativity!) without explaining exactly why scientific claims are superior. In this book, Lee McIntyre argues that what distinguishes science from its rivals is what he calls “the scientific attitude”—caring about evidence and being willing to change theories on the basis of new evidence. The history of science is littered with theories that were scientific but turned out to be wrong; the scientific attitude reveals why even a failed theory can help us to understand what is special about science. McIntyre offers examples that illustrate both scientific success (a reduction in childbed fever in the nineteenth century) and failure (the flawed “discovery” of cold fusion in the twentieth century). He describes the transformation of medicine from a practice based largely on hunches into a science based on evidence; considers scientific fraud; examines the positions of ideology-driven denialists, pseudoscientists, and “skeptics” who reject scientific findings; and argues that social science, no less than natural science, should embrace the scientific attitude. McIntyre argues that the scientific attitude—the grounding of science in evidence—offers a uniquely powerful tool in the defense of science.

The Sensitives

Author : Oliver Broudy
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1982128526
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (821 download)

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Book Synopsis The Sensitives by : Oliver Broudy

Download or read book The Sensitives written by Oliver Broudy and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2021-07-20 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over fifty million Americans endure a mysterious environmental illness that renders them allergic to chemicals. Innocuous staples from deodorant to garbage bags wreak havoc on sensitives. No one is born with EI; it often starts with a single toxic exposure. Symptoms include extreme fatigue, brain fog, muscle aches, inability to tolerate certain foods. Broudy investigates this disease, and delves into the intricate, ardent subculture that surrounds it--Adapted from jacket

The Mound Builder Myth

Author : Jason Colavito
Publisher : University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN 13 : 080616669X
Total Pages : 407 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (61 download)

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Book Synopsis The Mound Builder Myth by : Jason Colavito

Download or read book The Mound Builder Myth written by Jason Colavito and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2020-02-20 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Say you found that a few dozen people, operating at the highest levels of society, conspired to create a false ancient history of the American continent to promote a religious, white-supremacist agenda in the service of supposedly patriotic ideals. Would you call it fake news? In nineteenth-century America, this was in fact a powerful truth that shaped Manifest Destiny. The Mound Builder Myth is the first book to chronicle the attempt to recast the Native American burial mounds as the work of a lost white race of “true” native Americans. Thomas Jefferson’s pioneering archaeology concluded that the earthen mounds were the work of Native Americans. In the 1894 report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, Cyrus Thomas concurred, drawing on two decades of research. But in the century in between, the lie took hold, with Presidents Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, and Abraham Lincoln adding their approval and the Mormon Church among those benefiting. Jason Colavito traces this monumental deception from the farthest reaches of the frontier to the halls of Congress, mapping a century-long conspiracy to fabricate and promote a false ancient history—and enumerating its devastating consequences for contemporary Native people. Built upon primary sources and first-person accounts, the story that The Mound Builder Myth tells is a forgotten chapter of American history—but one that reads like the Da Vinci Code as it plays out at the upper reaches of government, religion, and science. And as far-fetched as it now might seem that a lost white race once ruled prehistoric America, the damage done by this “ancient” myth has clear echoes in today’s arguments over white nationalism, multiculturalism, “alternative facts,” and the role of science and the control of knowledge in public life.