"A highly readable history of human ideas, Corben's book traces the
development of modern scientific concepts from antiquity to the present.
His primary theme is the ultimate triumph of truth over misguided
intellectual despotism, both secular and sacred." -Booklist
"For thousands of years, our ancestors pursued the spiritual and
intellectual quests of trying to understand the world that surrounds us
and the world that lies within . . . We shall trace these . . . ideas
through their successes and failures, through brilliant developments
obstinately opposed or ignored, the lucky guesses, the incorrect
hypotheses strongly clung to, and the personal dangers that were the
rewards of many scholars who struggled to understand them . . .
"Our ancestors made serious mistakes in their efforts to understand
natural phenomena; they got hung up for centuries on what we see as
ridiculous ideas, and carried out research (as we do, even if very
careful) with one hand tied by their own prejudices and the other bound
by the beliefs of their contemporaries. But they were just as smart as
people are today. They did not have the benefit of a modern education,
and even now those who have had that opportunity and have not learned
from it are back with them in the Dark Ages of superstition, peddling
their beliefs in astrology, numerology, and the literal truth of every
word in the book of Genesis . . .
"Just as surely as democracy is wary of dictators, so intellectual
democracy must be wary of intellectual dictators who destroy freedom of
thought in themselves and their own children and would like to do the
same thing to others." - FROM THE PREFACE
