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Previously, space and time were individually conserved when one moved from reference frame to reference frame, or point of observation. The central point of Einstein's theory is that there are invariants in physics that were previously unsuspected. 79) the amazing thing was not that the alpha particles traversed the foil, but that some were reflected through large angles of deflection, a fact that Rutherford famously compared to firing a 15-inch naval shell at a piece of tissue paper and seeing it bounce back. Blom does attempt to describe Einstein's theory of relativity only to make the usual hash of it. Blom further claims that everything that was to become important in the 20th century "from quantum physics to women's emancipation, from abstract art to space travel, from communism to fascism to the consumer society, from industrialized slaughter to the power of the media" was already evident in those first 15 years.
As to the induistrial slaughter, it was previewed most strikingly not in the Boer War but in the Russo-Japanese War. The work by Rutherford is mentioned, only to get the science entirely wrong. This also receives a passing mention, but no actual narrative, statistics, or analysis. The Haber process (1909) that transforms gaseous nitrogen into ammonia, which can than be processed in fertilizers and dyes, is unmentioned. There are the usual condescending remarks about mass-produced consumer goods and the new shopping emporiums, where "those who could afford it shopped themselves out of existential trouble." One can almost hear the sneer of derision.
Sexual dysfunction, changing sexual roles and sexual anxiety are central themes. I was surprised that there was no mention in the chapter on the year 1900 of Planck's quantum hypothesis, a suggestion based on a mathematical model that soon was given physical meaning by Einstein's work on the photoelectric effect in 1905. Like a poorly-schooled undergraduate in the humanities, he seems to think that the "relativity" part is connected with moral relativism. The only mentions Blom makes of the war get the facts wrong. Rutherford'd alpha particle experiments consisted of observing the scattering of alpha particles by a gold foil. Blom's "The Vertigo Years" claims that "the uncertain future facing us early in the twenty-first century arose from the inventions, thoughts and transformations of those unusually rich fifteen years between 1900 and 1914, a period of extraordinary creativity in the arts and sciences".
Barbed wire, heavy artillery bombardments, bolt-action magazine rifles, quick-firing field artillery and machine guns exacted a terrible toll on both Japanese and Russian armies. The book revolves around sex. This work by Planck, Einstein and Bohr is ignored. Blom never mentions that all European powers had military observers at the site of conflict, yet no one drew the appropriate lessons from those battlefields. Einstein showed that this was not true, that instead the interval, a distance in space time, was conserved. It was with the promise of this sweeping vista that I began to read.
Blom mentions technology from time to time, with no details given, but does little to examine real technological advance. In the special theory, the same is true for momentum and energy, which can be conserved separately in Newtonian mechanics, but which form a composite quantity ("momergy" in John Wheeler's neologism) which is conserved in special relativity. And the design for the British battleship Dreadnought preceded the Battle of Tsushima (May 1905), and not the other way round, an error which Blom makes in his 1906 chapter. The Japanese surprise attack on Port Arthur did not cripple the Russian fleet. The book often reads more like an advertisement for Cialis than a scholarly tome, or even a good popular introduction to those 15 years. If this is to be a book on popular culture, then what of the growth of professional sports.
Marconi's transatlantic radio transmissions (1901-1903), which revolutionized communication, are also missing. I leave this volume with an appreciation for the author's idiosyncratic views of culture, then and now, but with little additional insight into that time. It revolutionized agriculture. The full fruition of this idea within a semiclassical mechanics came with Bohr's model for the Rutherford hydrogen atom, published in 1913, in which the quantum rules and postulates were shown to have significant predictive power. So what is Blom's book about. Thus two separate things, space and time, were shown to be intimately and unexpectedly related.
Contrary to Blom (p. A meter was a meter, and a second a second, regardless of the value of the constant speed of an observer's motion.
And so it goes.Is it a great book, IMHO no. The clash of Germany and France over Morocco is hardly touched, and the continuing wars in the Balkans, which were the prelude to WW1 aren't mentioned at all.What we do have for example, in 1908 is the Suffragette meeting of 1/2 million people in Hyde Park. Don't know. We also have a discussion of the beginning of the 'woman's liberation' movement, the first 'free love' communities, and the affect of Lesbianism on all the above movements.
Philipp Blom ('Encyclopedie') has written a very interesting book, but spends way to much time discussing 'manliness' 'sexual disfunction' and the sociology of Europe post- fin-de-siecle. Is it an interesting book, yes. Wasn't mentioned. Starting with the Paris Exhibition of 1900, he states an event and then from that states a premise and then spends the rest of the chapter explaining his reasoning and proof for and against his premise.
Did anything else happen that year. Make your own decision.Zeb Kantrowitzzbestblogaround.blogspot.com For anyone looking for a discussion of each year and what happened, don't bother reading this book. What we then have is a discussion of the Suffragette movement beginning in 1875 up to the granting of the vote for woman just after WW1.
An intriguing and different look at a major turning point in history which parallels today's paradigm shifts due to technology, psychology, and the rise and fall of empires.
And what a future it is in Blom's historicalanthology of anecdotes and popular social history. (Who knew thatthe great Sarah Bernhardt had a habit of sleeping in her coffin and having herself photographed in it). Don't get mewrong as the book offers much to be enjoyed. Philipp Blom at the beginning and end of his book invites the readerto imagine being deprived of any information about the twentiethcentury after July 1914. But like its subject Icame out of the reading experience with Vertigo. But then Blom can also come up with theodd story or with a cultural perception which keeps the reader alwaysinterested in finding what may come up next in the narrative. I recommend youattempt this but only with my reservations and patience advised.
Each year is checked off one after the other with events that happened most likely in England, France, Germany or Russia. Overall I found the perspective of the subject matter constantly interesting and unfortunately the writing style less to myliking as it is scattered and full of long pointless sentences attemptingto bring several anecdotes to some logical connection (i.e., "The goalwas to return, by way of a violent cataclysm, to a primeval harmonywith destiny, to a primeval community based on a spiritual essence,the very antithesis of the modern tribes." You say what). (Even the film industry began notin Hollywood but in France where the first big motion pictureexhibited showed French women factory workers leaving their plantafter work). Blom says, "The rush of modernity caused danger (accidents, the terrorist bombs), the anxious feeling of speeding along without control, of holding on to live wire, flung and `whirled about in the vortex of infinite forces'. the modern Department store for example.
This Blom says will give back to the periodbefore WWI its future. Blom focuses on the first decade of the20th Century as an age of speed, technology, and rapid change including both the male and female rolls also covers the rise of newspapers and commercialism. Blom also passes interest in MarieCuie whose story is told better elsewhere. Bottom line theVERTIGO YEARS may give the reader vertigo as Bloom skips, stops, andinterrupts his narative in an organization style that is not easy to follow or keep pace with. In 1904 Blom takesa turn to the Congo and King Leopold which much better told in KINGLEOPOLD's GHOST by Adam Hochschild.
In addition, I found in it a lot of parallel with our times a hundred years later. Starting from an intimate story, Blom moves to analyze a whole period and shows how the story fits into it or even symbolizes it. And more importantly, it inspired me to reach for other history books, Internet, or whatever, to find out more about the topics Blom tackles. It reveals many little known events that were a sensation in their time, but we know little about them today.
For example, I first read one of the latter chapters, titled Wagner's Crime, because I thought it was about the composer whose music I like. Killings such as Wagner's also take place, including those committed by deranged teenagers. The battle between the sexes is far from over. And while some of us are "futurists," others would like to stop the clock from ticking and hold on to the 20-th century beliefs and practices. This is one of the best books I've read in recent years and I am sure I will come back to it for reference many times. History books are often dull and loaded with dry fact. Instead, the chapter centers around an insane serial murderer, a provincial Austrian teacher. I am glad Blom summarized the points from his previous chapters, rounding his image of the era.The book was hard to put down.
The chapter derives its title from the sensational murder committed by the wife of a French politician.I disagree with the reviewer who said the last chapter is repetitive. We are going through similar anxieties and insecurities at the beginning of the new century. I cannot think of a better book to read at this time. I find, for example, similarities between neurasthenia and fibromyalgia. The last chapter, about year 1914 is titled Murder Most Foul. People suffer from similar mental and other diseases.
This one is engaging and inspiring. For example, I played my Stravinsky CD while I read passages about the Paris premiere of the Rites of Spring.I have always been interested in the early 19-hundreds and fin-de-siecle, but this book really gave me the flavor of the era, as if I were living through it. Wrong. His style is engaging, witty and full of surprises. I had no doubt it was about the assassination of the Austrian archduke in Sarajevo.
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