Catching The Light: The Entwined History Of Light And Mind

Catching the Light: The Entwined History of Light and Mind

From Library JournalZajonc is an academic physicist who specializes in quantum physics, but his approach to the subject of light is somewhat unconventional from the perspective of many of his colleagues. He provides a capsule history of humans' changing understanding of the nature of light; scientific developments are interspersed with the comments of numerous philosophers, literary figures, and miscellaneous other non-scientists. In summary, he appears to argue that modern science has failed to supply us with a complete understanding of light and that we would be better off with an amalgam that incorporates spiritual and philosophical aspects as well as scientific models. His views are in part unorthodox but deserve a hearing. Recommended chiefly for academic libraries.- Jack W. Weigel, Univ. of Michigan Lib., Ann ArborCopyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.A history of science blends religion, physics, painting, and literature to answer questions concerning light, describing the myths of light, recounting human anecdotes, and placing current views on light in evolutionary perspective.From Publishers WeeklyTo the ancient Egyptians, light was "the sight of God." To quantum physicist Max Planck, light consisted of discrete particles or photons. How humanity has conceived of and responded to light is the subject of an intriguing investigation by Amherst physics professor Zajonc. In lyrical, precise prose, he argues that while Plato viewed the "mind's eye" as a form of cognition uniting inner and outer light, Newton and Faraday signaled a transition to a mechanistic conception of seeing and of light. Goethe's theory of color and light, rooted in the imagination, and Rudolf Steiner's metaphysics of light as angelic emanations brought "a renaissance of the mythic," which Zajonc welcomes as he seeks to restore a spiritual dimension to our perception of light and of the world. Along the way he considers Kandinsky, linear perspective, a cultural history of rainbows, Zoroastrianism, Keats and Einstein.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.