Post by ignorantianescia on Oct 17, 2012 6:50:51 GMT
The translations have been around in Germany and the Netherlands for a while, so I've translated some fragments of reviews (academic and non-academic) to give you all an idea of how it has been received. Most were overwhelmingly positive.
Mittelalter Webmagazin
I'll translate this one whole, since it's a short one:
"Surprising, instructive and exciting would be the three adjectives that spontaneously came to my mind if I were only allowed to use three to describe this book. James Hannam writes in a lively, engaging style about the forgotten and partly nameless natural philosophers of the Middle Ages, whose thinking and works laid the foundations of our current progress. With unconcealed sharpness he criticises the inventors and defender of the thesis of the "Dark Ages". He demonstrates profoundly and convincingly that there wasn't merely no battle between Church and science, but that especially he Church as institution and with its demand, that philosophy should direct its attention to nature and its regularities, supported scientific/scholarly thinking and working. He introduces us to inventors, natural philosophers and thinkers from the early Middle Ages to the end of the Renaissance and puts a continuous line of development of the progress known to us in place. Doing this, he does not neglect not to observe natural philosophy and its field of work only from the modern view, but also from the world in which medieval people lived and he includes magic, alchemy and astrology in his analysis as three important fields of studies of the Middle Ages."
"I have read this book with great interest, curious astonishment and a growing admiration for the performances of our ancestors and it receives a place of honour in my bookshelf."
Dr Josef Spindelböck on Amazon, a Roman Catholic cleric, theologian and ethicist.
Well, he gives a five star score, so it is obviously positive
, but this is his conclusion (approx):
"From a plethora of scientific and technical pioneers only Roger Bacon, Richard von Wallingford, Nikolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei be mentioned here [in this review]. They and many others are extensively presented in the description of their lives and the description of what led to their discoveries. An interesting and instructive book!"
Ad Flipse, Radix. Tijdschrift over geloof en wetenschap (2011) no. 2
He is positive about God's Philosophers and agrees on most points in his long review. From the Free University website:
"[Hannam] demonstrates that the foundations of the edifice of modern science have been laid in the Christian past of Europe. He does not show this in a cheap, apologetical way, but nuanced, profound and therefore more convincing."
Rob Lemaire, Politics.be
Again a long, positive review, but this one wonders why Paracelsus is portrayed as a "learned quack" and why his phrase "All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; only the dose permits something not to be poisonous." is not mentioned, though he does not think it detracts from his final conclusion:
"'God's Philosophers' is a book written in an accessible style with qualities which I cannot even all address in this long review. Definitely recommended."
Geerdt Magiels, Cobra.be, 29
October 2010
Positive as well:
"Hannam brings a highly concentrated version of six hundred years of history in an erudite, vivid and nuanced narrative."
Tjerk de Reus, Friesch Dagblad, 9 November 2010
The reviewer says some confusing things about Galileo and heliocentrism, but he seems to have liked the book a lot:
"Were the Middle Ages a dark period, with the Church as an authoritarian and a freedom-robbing power? Nonsense, as the book God's Philosophers shows, written by the British scientist James Hannam. The notion that the world is God's creation, stimulated science."
Marinus de Baar, Trouw, 23 October 2010
This one is positive though sort of critical, though not about the contents but about the press and a book that was not present in the bibliography:
"Hannam's book has been praised enormously in the Anglosaxon press. And admittedly, he has written a very readable book. From the celibate monk Abelard (1079 - 1142), who had a relation with Héloïse that has become famous (or infamous), he quotes: "My hands strayed oftener to her bosom than to the pages." That makes a delicious read. And it is necessary to put the underrated value of the Middle Ages on the map again for the public. But to say that Hannam's book is a 'revelation', like the jury of the Royal Society 2010 Prize for Science Books did, underestimates the work that was done in this area long before Hannam.
"In 1950 Dijksterhuis wrote in his classic 'The Mechanization of the World Picture' that the Middle Ages had approached the physics of the sixteenth and seventeenth century nowhere more closely than in the work of among others Buridan and Oresme. Dijksterhuis also brings attention to the fourteenth century union of mathematics and physics and refers to the Merton Calculators. Duiksterhuis's book has been translated to English among other languages, but is absent in Hannam's bibliography.
"That does not deny that 'God's Philosophers' has to tell the general public a lot. But the darkness above the Dark Ages had faded away by earlier research before Hannam shone his light in the well in which according to Voltaire Reason and Truth had hid themselves."
He had mentioned that the Merton Calculators, Oresme and Buridan appear in God's Philosophers, by the way. I guess the point boils down to:
"Contrary to the cliché, medievals certainly did important technological and scientific discoveries. That conclusion is not new, but historian James Hannam writes about it in a very delicious way."
R.H., 11 October 2010
A very positive and elaborate review:
"This book has changed my view on the Middle Ages. I have discovered an unexpected amount of overlooked knowledge and a procession of colourful and intriguing figures about whom I certainly want to know more. It is a comprehensive and impressive work. The argument has been structured in an insightful way, divided into relatively short chapters and written in a very readable style. My only problem consisted of the insufficient residues of my elementary knowledge on mathematics and physics. It was however an opportunity to brush them up."
Stine, 17 February 2010
"Hannam says that historians of science can no longer maintain that science and religion exclude or obstruct eachother. Though the opposite, claiming that Christianity promotes the development of science, remains controversial. Aristotle tried to explain everything from principles, without knowing whether they were also correct, a small-minded standpoint. For if God created it another way, and so you leave from the wrong point, what to do next? Who expects a universe created by a reliable God who employs rational laws, would better try to figure out those laws by using observations and experiments."
[url=http://www.filosofiemagazine.nl/00/fm/nl/0/artikel/print/26967/De_Middeleeuwen_waren_niet_zo_du
ister.html]Christopher Assendorp[/url], Filosofie Magazine
A praising review:
"With this book Hannam wants to give a general introduction to the history of the Middle Ages. God's Philosophers succeeded in that intention convincingly, also because Hannam knows how to write his knowledge down in clear language with ease. The book is always readable and is permeated with juicy "human interest" passages. Not the least of those is the story of the fourteenth century logician Abelard and his Héloïse, which Hannam rightfully calls 'one of the great tragic love affairs in history'. This book is not only an honour to forgotten science but also an ode to the rich history of the Middle Ages."
And as Omega Point: a Flemish radio broadcast, though the online player is limited to the first part of the discussion of the book. The academic historian seems sceptical of your treatment of the humanist scholars, James.
www.cobra.be/cm/1.881371?view=popupPlayer
Mittelalter Webmagazin
I'll translate this one whole, since it's a short one:
"Surprising, instructive and exciting would be the three adjectives that spontaneously came to my mind if I were only allowed to use three to describe this book. James Hannam writes in a lively, engaging style about the forgotten and partly nameless natural philosophers of the Middle Ages, whose thinking and works laid the foundations of our current progress. With unconcealed sharpness he criticises the inventors and defender of the thesis of the "Dark Ages". He demonstrates profoundly and convincingly that there wasn't merely no battle between Church and science, but that especially he Church as institution and with its demand, that philosophy should direct its attention to nature and its regularities, supported scientific/scholarly thinking and working. He introduces us to inventors, natural philosophers and thinkers from the early Middle Ages to the end of the Renaissance and puts a continuous line of development of the progress known to us in place. Doing this, he does not neglect not to observe natural philosophy and its field of work only from the modern view, but also from the world in which medieval people lived and he includes magic, alchemy and astrology in his analysis as three important fields of studies of the Middle Ages."
"I have read this book with great interest, curious astonishment and a growing admiration for the performances of our ancestors and it receives a place of honour in my bookshelf."
Dr Josef Spindelböck on Amazon, a Roman Catholic cleric, theologian and ethicist.
Well, he gives a five star score, so it is obviously positive
, but this is his conclusion (approx):"From a plethora of scientific and technical pioneers only Roger Bacon, Richard von Wallingford, Nikolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei be mentioned here [in this review]. They and many others are extensively presented in the description of their lives and the description of what led to their discoveries. An interesting and instructive book!"
Ad Flipse, Radix. Tijdschrift over geloof en wetenschap (2011) no. 2
He is positive about God's Philosophers and agrees on most points in his long review. From the Free University website:
"[Hannam] demonstrates that the foundations of the edifice of modern science have been laid in the Christian past of Europe. He does not show this in a cheap, apologetical way, but nuanced, profound and therefore more convincing."
Rob Lemaire, Politics.be
Again a long, positive review, but this one wonders why Paracelsus is portrayed as a "learned quack" and why his phrase "All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; only the dose permits something not to be poisonous." is not mentioned, though he does not think it detracts from his final conclusion:
"'God's Philosophers' is a book written in an accessible style with qualities which I cannot even all address in this long review. Definitely recommended."
Geerdt Magiels, Cobra.be, 29
October 2010
Positive as well:
"Hannam brings a highly concentrated version of six hundred years of history in an erudite, vivid and nuanced narrative."
Tjerk de Reus, Friesch Dagblad, 9 November 2010
The reviewer says some confusing things about Galileo and heliocentrism, but he seems to have liked the book a lot:
"Were the Middle Ages a dark period, with the Church as an authoritarian and a freedom-robbing power? Nonsense, as the book God's Philosophers shows, written by the British scientist James Hannam. The notion that the world is God's creation, stimulated science."
Marinus de Baar, Trouw, 23 October 2010
This one is positive though sort of critical, though not about the contents but about the press and a book that was not present in the bibliography:
"Hannam's book has been praised enormously in the Anglosaxon press. And admittedly, he has written a very readable book. From the celibate monk Abelard (1079 - 1142), who had a relation with Héloïse that has become famous (or infamous), he quotes: "My hands strayed oftener to her bosom than to the pages." That makes a delicious read. And it is necessary to put the underrated value of the Middle Ages on the map again for the public. But to say that Hannam's book is a 'revelation', like the jury of the Royal Society 2010 Prize for Science Books did, underestimates the work that was done in this area long before Hannam.
"In 1950 Dijksterhuis wrote in his classic 'The Mechanization of the World Picture' that the Middle Ages had approached the physics of the sixteenth and seventeenth century nowhere more closely than in the work of among others Buridan and Oresme. Dijksterhuis also brings attention to the fourteenth century union of mathematics and physics and refers to the Merton Calculators. Duiksterhuis's book has been translated to English among other languages, but is absent in Hannam's bibliography.
"That does not deny that 'God's Philosophers' has to tell the general public a lot. But the darkness above the Dark Ages had faded away by earlier research before Hannam shone his light in the well in which according to Voltaire Reason and Truth had hid themselves."
He had mentioned that the Merton Calculators, Oresme and Buridan appear in God's Philosophers, by the way. I guess the point boils down to:
"Contrary to the cliché, medievals certainly did important technological and scientific discoveries. That conclusion is not new, but historian James Hannam writes about it in a very delicious way."
R.H., 11 October 2010
A very positive and elaborate review:
"This book has changed my view on the Middle Ages. I have discovered an unexpected amount of overlooked knowledge and a procession of colourful and intriguing figures about whom I certainly want to know more. It is a comprehensive and impressive work. The argument has been structured in an insightful way, divided into relatively short chapters and written in a very readable style. My only problem consisted of the insufficient residues of my elementary knowledge on mathematics and physics. It was however an opportunity to brush them up."
Stine, 17 February 2010
"Hannam says that historians of science can no longer maintain that science and religion exclude or obstruct eachother. Though the opposite, claiming that Christianity promotes the development of science, remains controversial. Aristotle tried to explain everything from principles, without knowing whether they were also correct, a small-minded standpoint. For if God created it another way, and so you leave from the wrong point, what to do next? Who expects a universe created by a reliable God who employs rational laws, would better try to figure out those laws by using observations and experiments."
[url=http://www.filosofiemagazine.nl/00/fm/nl/0/artikel/print/26967/De_Middeleeuwen_waren_niet_zo_du
ister.html]Christopher Assendorp[/url], Filosofie Magazine
A praising review:
"With this book Hannam wants to give a general introduction to the history of the Middle Ages. God's Philosophers succeeded in that intention convincingly, also because Hannam knows how to write his knowledge down in clear language with ease. The book is always readable and is permeated with juicy "human interest" passages. Not the least of those is the story of the fourteenth century logician Abelard and his Héloïse, which Hannam rightfully calls 'one of the great tragic love affairs in history'. This book is not only an honour to forgotten science but also an ode to the rich history of the Middle Ages."
And as Omega Point: a Flemish radio broadcast, though the online player is limited to the first part of the discussion of the book. The academic historian seems sceptical of your treatment of the humanist scholars, James.
www.cobra.be/cm/1.881371?view=popupPlayer
