The Scientific World of Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer (eBook)

The Entanglement of Science, Religion, and Politics in Nazi Germany

Kathleen L. Housley (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2018
328 Seiten
Springer International Publishing (Verlag)
978-3-319-95801-9 (ISBN)

Infos

In twentieth-century Germany, Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer rose to prominence as a brilliant physical chemist, even as several of his relatives—Dietrich Bonhoeffer among them—became involved in the resistance to Hitler, leading to their executions. This book traces the entanglement of science, religion, and politics in the Third Reich and in the lives of Karl-Friedrich, his family and his colleagues, including Fritz Haber and Werner Heisenberg. Nominated for the Nobel Prize, Karl-Friedrich was an expert on heavy water, a component of the atomic bomb. During the war, he was caught in the middle between relatives who were trying to kill Hitler and friends who were helping Hitler build a nuclear weapon. Karl-Friedrich emerges as a complex figure—an agnostic whose brother was a renowned theologian, and a chemist who both reluctantly advised German nuclear scientists and collaborated with Paul Rosbaud, a spy for the British. Illuminating the uneasy position of science in twentieth-century Germany, The Scientific World of Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer is the story of a man in love with chemistry, his family, and his nation, trying to do right by all of them in the midst of chaos.

Autor

Kathleen L. Housley is the author of ten books. Her essays on what she calls the force fields between science, religion, and the arts have appeared in many publications, including Image, The Christian Century, and Metanexus.

Inhalt

Preface 7
Acknowledgements 9
Contents 11
List of Figures 14
Notes on Sources 16
Chapter 1 Introduction 20
Chapter 2 The Father’s Scientific World 26
Chapter 3 The First World War 48
Chapter 4 The Promise of Pure Science 69
Chapter 5 Traveling with Polanyi 93
Chapter 6 Turbulence and Conformity 105
Chapter 7 Seizing the Wheel 130
Chapter 8 The Beginning of Resistance 149
Chapter 9 Heavy Water and the Atomic Bomb 163
Chapter 10 The Summer of Decision 181
Chapter 11 The Uranium Club 207
Chapter 12 Steadfast to the End 229
Chapter 13 Rebuilding the World 255
Appendixes 283
Appendix I: Chronology of Main Events 283
Appendix II Biographical Profiles 286
A 287
B 287
C 292
D 293
E 295
F 297
G 299
H 301
J 304
K 306
L 307
M 310
N 311
O 312
P 313
Q 315
R 315
S 316
T 319
U 320
V 321
W 321
Z 323
Selected Bibliography 324
Index 333

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 5.9.2018
• Reihe/Serie: Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology
• Reihe/Serie: Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology
• Zusatzinfo: XX, 328 p. 18 illus.
• Verlagsort: Cham
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► 1918 bis 1945
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
• Schlagworte: Dietrich Bonhoeffer • ethics and science • Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer • Manhattan Project • Max Planck • Michael Polanyi • Nazi Atomic bomb research • Nazi Germany • nazi resistance • Nazism • Paul Rosbaud • Pure science • quantum mechanics • Science and religion • shell shock • The Bonhoeffer family • the Uranium Club • Werner Heisenberg • World War II
• ISBN-10: 3-319-95801-1 / 3319958011
• ISBN-13: 978-3-319-95801-9 / 9783319958019