Hitler's Scientists: Science, War and the Devil's Pact

Cornwell, John; Simon Prebble

ISBN 10: 1593160186 ISBN 13: 9781593160180

Publisher: Listen & Live Audio, 2003

Synopsis

From the bestselling author of Hitler’s Pope comes a gripping, in-depth account of Germany’s horrific abuse of science and its consequences- then and now.

By the first decade of the twentieth century, Germany was the Mecca of science and technology in the world. However, by the beginning of the First World War, Germany began to display some of the features that would blight the conduct of ideal science through the rest of the century. After Hitler came to power in 1933, science and technology were quickly pressed into service by racist, xenophobic ideologies. From 1939 to the war’s end, scientists working under military control began research on nuclear chain reaction with the prospect of arming Hitler with an atomic bomb. By 1943, few areas of German science, technology, and industry had not been tainted by degenerate exploitation of slave labor with attendant brutality, human experimentation, and mass killing. How German scientists behaved in the era spanning the beginning of the First War and the end of the Second raises many questions, disturbing and relevant to this day, about how scientists act under pressure of social and political circumstances and events. In pondering the moral and political predicament of the unregulated pursuit of scientific progress, Hitler’s Scientists today prompts uncomfortable parallels with the past.

About this title

About the Author

Author John Cornwell is in the department of history and philosophy of science at Cambridge University. He is also an award winning journalist and director of the Science and Human Dimension Project at Cambridge University. He is a regular feature writer at the Sunday Times (London) and the author and editor of four books on science, including Power to Harm, on the Louisville Prozae trial. He lives in Cambridge, England.

Reviews

HITLER'S SCIENTISTS is a fascinating examination of how Nazism interacted with science in a myriad of contexts. The author discusses everything--from the infamous experiments conducted in the concentration camps to the scientific metaphors that shaped public discourse under Hitler's regime. The work concludes with an extended discussion of scientific ethics thenand now. Simon Prebble's narration is superb. His tone is serious throughout, as befits the topic, but he also manages to sound deeply compassionate (for scientists and subjects) and incredulous (at Nazism's deep but deadly stupidities). Prebble delivers a range of foreign and scientific terms crisply, sounding at home with all of them. Cornwell quotes from many documents, and Prebble distinguishes among all readily. G.T.B. 2004 Audie Award Finalist © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Edition details

• Publisher: Listen & Live Audio
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1593160186
• ISBN 13: 9781593160180
• Binding: Audio CD