The Discoverers

Daniel J. Boorstin

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, Jan 26, 2011 - Science - 768 pages

An original history of man's greatest adventure: his search to discover the world around him.  In the compendious history, Boorstin not only traces man's insatiable need to know, but also the obstacles to discovery and the illusion that knowledge can also put in our way. Covering time, the earth and the seas, nature and society, he gathers and analyzes stories of the man's profound quest to understand his world and the cosmos.

Contents

• FROM SUN TIME TO CLOCK TIME: 26
• THE MISSIONARY CLOCK: 56
• THE EARTH AND THE SEAS: 79
• The Appeal of Symmetry: 92
• The Prison of Christian Dogma: 100
• A Flat Earth Returns: 107
• PATHS TO THE EAST 15 Pilgrims and Crusaders: 116
• How the Mongols Opened the Way: 124
• Missionary Diplomats: 128
• The Discovery of Asia: 134
• The Land Curtain Comes Down: 139
• DOUBLING THE WORLD 20 Ptolemy Revived and Revised: 146
• Portuguese Sea rioneers: 156
• Beyond the Threatening Cape: 165
• To India and Back: 172
• Why Not the Arabs?: 178
• The Chinese Reach Out: 186
• An Empire without Wants: 195
• THE AMERICAN SURPRISE 27 The Wandering Vikings: 204
• Dead End in Vinland: 209
• The Power of the Winds: 217
• The Enterprise of the Indies: 224
• Fair Winds Soft Words and Luck: 231
• Paradise Found and Lost: 235
• Naming the Unknown: 244
• SEA PATHS TO EVERYWHERE 34 A World of Oceans: 256
• The Reign of Secrecy: 267
• Knowledge Becomes Merchandise: 271
• The Ardors of Negative Discovery: 278
• NATURE: 291
• SEEING THE INVISIBLE 38 Into the Mists of Paradox: 294
• The Witness of the Naked Eye: 305
• A Vision Troubled and Surprised: 312
• Caught in the Cross Fire: 322
• New Worlds Within: 327
• Galileo in China: 332
• A Mad Prophet Points the Way: 338
• The Tyranny of Galen: 344
• From Animals to Man: 351
• Unseen Currents Within: 361
• From Qualities to Quantities: 368
• The Microscope of Nature: 376
• SCIENCE GOES PUBLIC 50 A Parliament of Scientists: 386
• From Experience to Experiment: 394
• God Said Let Newton Be: 401
• Priority Becomes the Prize: 408
• CATALOGUING THE WHOLE CREATION 54 Learning to Look: 420
• The Invention of Species: 429
• Specimen Hunting: 436
• Stretching the Past: 446
• In Search of the Missing Link: 457
• Paths to Evolution: 464
• SOCIETY: 477
• WIDENING THE COMMUNITIES OF KNOWLEDGE: 479
• The Lost Arts of Memory: 480
• Empire of the Learned: 489
• The Duplicating Impulse: 498
• The Art of Artificial Writing: 510
• Communities of the Vernacular: 517
• Transforming the Book: 524
• Books Go Public: 533
• The Island of Islam: 539
• Toward a World Literature: 547
• OPENING THE PAST 69 The Birth of History: 558
• Christianity Gives Direction: 566
• Revising the Record: 574
• Explorers among the Ruins: 581
• To Wake the Dead: 588
• Latitudes of Time: 596
• The Discovery of Prehistory: 603
• History as Therapy: 613
• SURVEYING THE PRESENT 77 All Mankind Is One: 626
• The Shock of the Primitive: 636
• A Science of Culture: 646
• An Expanding Universe of Wealth: 652
• Learning from Numbers: 667
• The Infinite and the Infinitesimal: 675
• Some Reference Notes: 685
• Acknowledgments: 715
• Index: 719

About the author

Daniel J. Boorstin was the author of The Americans, a trilogy (The Colonial Experience; The National Experience, and The Democratic Experience) that won the Francis Parkman Prize, the Bancroft Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize. In 1989, he received the National Book Award for lifetime contribution to literature. He was the director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, and for twelve years served as the Librarian of Congress. He died in 2004.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Discoverers; Volume 2 of Knowledge Series
• Author: Daniel J. Boorstin
• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2011
• ISBN: 0307773558, 9780307773555
• Length: 768 pages
• Subjects: History / World; Science / History; Technology & Engineering / History