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Reviews, Essay reviews and Synopses
PL – text available in Polish, ENG – text available in English, FR – text available in French, P – text available in Portueguese
Spis treści / Contents
Ernst Benz and 19th-Century Transhumanism
PL pdf Translation of Chapter V from Christian Hope: Man’s Concept of the Future from the Early Fathers to Teilhard de Chardin
ENG link to the book in the Internet Archive
Translation of a passage from the book Christian Hope: Man’s Concept of the Future from the Early Fathers to Teilhard de Chardin
Benz’s book is primarily known to historians of medieval technology for its chapter on the theological legitimization of technological expansion. However, it also contains many other intriguing insights. Among them is a discussion of the great wave of existential optimism that swept through 19th-century anthropologists, biologists, philosophers, visionaries, as well as proponents of the then-popular spiritualism and parapsychology, and the general public following the publication of Charles Darwin’s works on the mechanisms of evolution and the origins of humankind.
Darwin’s evolutionary mechanism began to be extrapolated into the future, leading to grand, almost fantastical visions of Homo sapiens’ potential for development. This intellectual trend should be understood in a broader context: Christian eschatology was visibly weakening, and the fear of death sought alternative sources of comfort. The practice of spirit summoning seemed to confirm the existence of an afterlife, while the hope of near-immortality served as its own form of solace.
Butterfield Herbert, The Origins of Modern Science 1300 – 1800
PL on-line PL pdf ENG http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Butterfield
A classic work in the field. First published in 1958, the author focuses on several key topics (cosmology, mechanics, gravity, medicine, popularization, etc.), presenting them with both flair and expertise. His approach is somewhat biographical, as the issues are explored through the lens of the people who worked on them. As a result, the book offers excellent portraits of many figures in the history of modern science. I recommend reading it alongside the books by Grant and Shapin, which I have also reviewed.
Chaunu Pierre, Le temps des Réformes. Historie religieuse et système de civilization. La Crise de la chrétienté. L’Èclatement (1250-1550)
PL on-line PL pdf Time of Reforms (1250 – 1550): Religion and Civilization. Crisis of Christendom – The Split
A book about the roots of the Reformation. It provides a broad panorama of civilizational, intellectual, and material dynamics during the late Middle Ages and the early modern era. One of its greatest strengths is the way it connects intellectual currents with material processes, avoiding the oversimplifications often found in Marxist-inspired revisionism.
d’Avray David, The Medieval Church as an Economic Production Firm?
A critical analysis of the works of Robert B. Ekelund, who viewed the medieval Church as a production firm, using microeconomic tools for his analysis. On this page (Reviews), there is also a text by Ekelund himself summarizing his ideas, as well as another piece outlining the range of topics he covers in his three books on the medieval Church (see Iannaccone, Ekelund). d’Avray’s text is worth reading, but after going through Ekelund’s books—which I highly recommend—I got the impression that d’Avray misses the forest for the trees. By focusing on details, he overlooks how heuristically fruitful it is to view the medieval Church through the lens of the economics of religion.
Publication date: August 2024
ENG original: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11127-024-01198-6
ENG shareable link https://rdcu.be/d7MrC
in: Public Choice (2024) 201:1–20, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-024-01198-6
Delumeau Jean, Le péché et la peur, La culpabilisation en Occident (XIII – XVIII siecles)
PL on-line PL pdf Sin and Fear: The Emergence of the Western Guilt Culture, 13th-18th Centuries.
FR About Jean Delumeau: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Delumeau
One of the most hotly debated works on the history of Christianity and its influence on Western civilization. The book offers a gripping vision of late medieval and early modern culture, marked by pessimism, fear, guilt, and sin. A classic in the field, written by a renowned French historian.
Duchesne Ricardo, The Uniqueness of Western Civilization
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Duchesne: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricardo_Duchesne
Ricardo Duchesne’s book (published in 2011) is an extensive discussion of the historical debates of recent decades regarding the relationship between Western civilization and other cultural spheres. The 1980s and 1990s saw a shift in perspective on this issue, with multicultural and revisionist approaches gaining prominence and questioning the significance and achievements of the West. Duchesne thoroughly examines this trend, sharply criticizes it, and offers his own interpretations of key historical processes. My essay serves as both a review of the book and a collection of supplementary comments.
Dyson George D., Darwin Among the Machines. The evolution of global intelligence
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About ideas contained in the book: see here
The title of the book promises more than it actually delivers. It is a work on the history and prehistory of computing machines, information theory, and those branches of mathematics that contribute to “computerization.” Anyone interested in the past of this field will find this book worthwhile. Dyson is a historian of technology, and this is his area of expertise.
Ekelund Robert B., Hébert Robert F., Tollison Robert D., The Political Economy of the Medieval Church
A perspective on the medieval Church as a production firm. The main author is the renowned economist Robert Ekelund (1940–2023). The economics of religion applies microeconomic tools to study various phenomena within the religious sphere. Ekelund’s books extensively use this branch of economics to examine religious phenomena in the Middle Ages.
The presented text is a several-page summary by Ekelund himself of his ideas, along with those of several scholars who have shaped the view of the Middle Ages from this perspective. It is a highly interesting piece. Due to its brevity, it may give the impression of a sharp critique of the Church, but reading the much longer analyses found in Ekelund’s books significantly weakens this impression.
The Political Economy of the Medieval Church, in: Rachel M. McCleary (ed), The Oxford Handbook of The Economics of Religion
ENG Online access: ResearchGate
ENG https://www.researchgate.net/publication/287706475_The_Political_Economy_of_the_Medieval_Church
Greene Brian, The Fabric of the Cosmos. Space, Time, And the Texture of Reality
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Greene: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Greene
A well-known book that presents the state of physics and cosmology at the dawn of the 21st century. Written for a broad audience, it is exceptionally clear and competent without excessive simplifications. A careful reader, even from a humanities background, will find satisfaction in grasping a field often considered highly specialized and difficult to penetrate
Grant Edward, The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Grant: http://www.indiana.edu/~alldrp/members/grant.html
The book is highly interesting and offers a fresh perspective on the role of the Middle Ages in the emergence of modern science. It contributes to the ongoing great debate on whether the medieval period made a valuable contribution to the creation of the modern era. The author’s answer is decidedly positive, and the arguments presented are far from conventional.
Guinote Pauolo J.A., Ascensao e declinio da Carreira da India (Seculos XV-XVIII)
PL pdf Rise and Fall of Carreira da India (XV-XVIII Centuries) Polish translation
A well-known text that includes, among other things, a detailed analysis of the losses suffered by Portuguese armadas en route to India between the 15th and 18th centuries.
Iannaccone Laurence R., Ekelund Robert B., The Medieval Church from the Perspective of the Economics of Religion: Some Information
An excerpt from L. Iannaccone’s article Introduction to the Economics of Religion and information about three books edited by Robert B. Ekelund on the medieval Church from the perspective of the economics of religion.
PL Link to the text described above
ENG link to Iannaccone’s original article in Academia.edu
Jaki Stanley, The Savior of Science
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Jaki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Jaki
ENG Texts of Stanley Jaki available online http://www.sljaki.com/texts.html
A renowned historian of science traces the origins of modern science to fundamental principles of Judaism and Christianity. According to Jaki, these origins lie in the idea that key cosmological concepts from the Old and New Testaments—such as the belief in creation ex nihilo, the notion of a stable and orderly universe, and faith in both the rationality of the Creator and the rationality of the created world—made empirical and experimental research into the laws of nature possible.
Jones Eric Lionel, The European Miracle. Environments, economies, and geopolitics in the history of Europe and Asia
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Jones: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_European_miracle
ENG link to the book in the Internet Archive
The theory of the European miracle. This famous 1981 book played a key role in establishing World History as a field of study. “Why did Europe, at the dawn of the modern era, embark on a path of sustained growth and economic development, while older and richer Asian empires did not?” With this question, Eric Jones opens his book. His answers—surprising when first formulated—have since become partly accepted truths, while still sparking heated debates. My review and translation/summary provide the most extensive presentation of Eric Jones’s ideas available to Polish readers.
Kłoczowski Jerzy, Europa. Chrześcijańskie korzenie
PL on-line PL pdf translation of Polish title: Europe – Christian Roots
PL About Kłoczowski: http://www.ziemiaznieba.pl/file/index.php?strona=kloczkowski.&&grup=komiteth
A synthetic account of Christianity’s contribution to the formation of European civilization. I summarized the section covering the period from the 4th to the 15th century. The book primarily lists facts rather than analyzing how Christianity propelled Europe forward in later centuries. My summary serves as an introduction to the topic suggested by the title.
LaMDA: Transcript of an Interview with Google’s Artificial Intelligence [2022]
PL ENG pdf The text is in Polish. It contains links to the original American texts
Year 2022. Does artificial intelligence already possess consciousness? A few days ago, news broke that Google employee Blake Lemoine declared that the LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications) program is a sentient, conscious being. LaMDA is designed for building chatbots that mimic human conversation. It operates on a vast dataset, using neural networks and artificial intelligence to make conversations feel remarkably natural. According to Google, it is a groundbreaking technology. However, Lemoine’s conclusions were dismissed, and he was placed on administrative leave, after which he publicly released his conversations with LaMDA. Below is a Polish translation of those conversations, allowing readers to assess LaMDA’s capabilities and the differing opinions of Lemoine, Google, and various experts, to whom I provide links in the introduction.
Does LaMDA Have Consciousness? Pros and Cons. Ongoing Debate and Controversies [2022]
PL ENG pdf The text is in Polish. It contains links to the original American texts
The year 2022 may go down in AI history as the moment when an intense debate erupted over whether a human-made program could be conscious. The controversy ignited in June 2022. A few days ago, I presented transcripts of a Google employee’s conversations with LaMDA, the program to which he (Blake Lemoine) attributed consciousness (see LaMDA: Interview with an AI). Now, I present the arguments of those who deny LaMDA’s consciousness, as well as Lemoine’s counterarguments.
Google on the Design of the LaMDA Artificial Intelligence Program [2022]
PL ENG pdf The text is in Polish. It contains links to the original American texts
I present two texts from Google’s AI research team. They discuss the construction and training methods of the LaMDA conversational program.
Landes David, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations
PL on-line Author of the review: Radosław Kawczyński
Reviewer: Radosław Kawczyński. A detailed discussion of a well-known book on the causes of historical disparities between different societies.
Landes David, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations
PL on-line Polish review by Maciej Hacaga
ENG on-line review by Andre Gunder Frank
PL on-line review by Andre Gunder Frank Polish translation
Pacey Arnold, Technology In World Civilization
PL on-line PL pdf ENG Other Pacey’s books: http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/author/default.asp?aid=656
A book exploring the mechanisms of technological transfer between the world’s major civilizations from AD 700 to 1980. Within this broader context, it examines Europe. By analyzing the history of technology, the author highlights the continuous exchange of knowledge between different cultural spheres, focusing on mutual transfers and borrowings. A widely discussed work in the history of technology.
Plantinga Alvin, God, Freedom and Evil
PL on-line PL pdf ENG About Plantinga: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Plantinga
Open access to the book in National Academic Digital Library of Ethiopia
Alvin Plantinga (b. 1932) is an American philosopher of religion, logician, and philosopher of language. His book God, Freedom, and Evil is a well-known rebuttal of arguments against the rationality of theistic beliefs. Using formal logic, Plantinga demonstrated that classical theodicy (God is omnipotent, God is good, evil exists) is internally consistent and non-contradictory. His defense of the rationality of faith remains one of the most significant achievements in 20th-century philosophy of religion.
Shapin Steven, The Scientific Revolution
PL on-line PL pdf ENG Shapin’s page: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hsdept/bios/shapin.html
A book providing a synthetic summary of the past 30 years of scholarship on the European Scientific Revolution of the 16th-18th centuries.
Simon Marcel, La Civilization de L’Antiquité et le Christianisme
PL on-line PL pdf The Civilization of Ancient Christianity
The author examines the period from the 1st to the 5th century BC. The book is well-written and authoritative. In my notes, I combined Chapter IX, which discusses persecution, with information on the same topic from Ewa Wipszycka’s The Church in the Late Antique World. Marcel Simon (1907–1986) was a scholar of religious history, particularly the relationship between Christianity and Judaism.
Taylor Mark Zachary, Politics of Innovation: Why Some Countries Are Better Than Others at Science and Technology
ENG PL pdf ENG about Mark Z. Taylor: see here
Published in 2016, this book was recognized as one of the most compelling attempts to explain technological disparities. In 2017, it won the Don K. Price Award from the American Political Science Association for the best book in science, technology, and policy.
It presents a well-written history of different theories explaining why some countries are more innovative than others. Each theory is subjected to statistical verification, adding a new dimension to discussions on innovation theory. Taylor challenges mainstream institutional explanations, proposing instead the concept of constructive threat states. He argues that the most significant driver of innovation is a sustained imbalance where external threats (economic, political, military) outweigh internal rivalries. The book includes case studies of post-WWII technological leaps in South Korea, Taiwan, Israel, Singapore, and Ireland, demonstrating how this constructive threat state led to rapid technological advancement.
Whitehead Alfred N., Science and the Modern World
PL on-line PL pdf ENG On Whitehead: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/whitehead
ENG link to the book in the Internet Archive
ENG link to the book in the Project Gutenberg
A 1925 book on the birth of modern science. I have summarized the fascinating first chapter. According to the author, for science to emerge in the modern sense of the word, there first had to be a widespread and instinctive belief in the existence of an order in the world—particularly in nature. Additionally, precise thinking habits had to develop (influenced by Greek logic and the long dominance of scholastic reasoning). However, the most significant medieval contribution, according to Whitehead, was the conviction that every event could be linked to preceding events, revealing general patterns. The source of this belief, he argues, was the medieval emphasis on God’s rationality. God possessed the power of Yahweh but the rationality of a Greek philosopher. Every detail was under control and part of a greater order, making the study of nature a means to affirm the rationality of the universe.
Woods Thomas, How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization
PL on-line pdf ENG On Woods: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Woods
A popular book, yet competently written. It covers most of the topics related to its central theme. In traditional interpretations, the Church’s influence on the development of Western civilization is typically reduced to a specific set of issues, on which there is a general consensus. Woods effectively identifies these issues, describing each succinctly—sometimes uncritically, but without major errors. However, the book lacks a broader contextual background. No matter how much we value Christianity and the Church’s role in shaping Europe and the West, we must not forget other crucial factors, such as geography, climate, the legacy of antiquity, shifting geopolitical landscapes, and the barbarian origins of European culture.
Wright Robert, Nonzero. The Logic of Human Destiny
PL on-line PL pdf ENG On Wright and about his book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonzero:_The_Logic_of_Human_Destiny
A book on the mechanisms of cultural evolution throughout history. According to the author, this evolution has a distinct direction—it progresses toward increasing complexity due to the continuous expansion of positive-sum social interactions. Hence the title: NonZero. The work is theoretical but supported by extensive historical material. Wright’s theoretical claims provide an intriguing way to organize a vast amount of factual data. Regardless of whether one ultimately agrees with his conclusions, the book is a valuable contribution to discussions on the dynamics of cultural change.