1941. The Nazi Attack on International Science

London: Watts & Co., 1941. First edition.
1941--BRITISH BIOLOGIST & HISTORIAN JOSEPH NEEDHAM WARNS THAT NAZISM ENDANGERS GLOBAL SCIENCE.
12x18 cm color printed stapled paper covers, 47 pp, light browning of paper, unmarked, very good in protective mylar sleeve. REVIEW IN NATURE 1942: "In a recent Thinker's Forum pamphlet entitled "The Nazi Attack on International Science"(London: C.A. Watts and Co., Ltd., 6d.), Dr. Joseph Needham presents a brief but telling analysis of the nature of Nazism, and describes some of the effects it has produced in science and learning both inside Germany and outside. Society is now passing through an era of (truncated) change from individualistic capitalistic economics to some form of collectivism, and just as the earlier change from a feudal aristocracy to capitalist democracy was marked by violent upheavals such as the Thirty Years' War and the French Revolution, so Dr. Needham believes that Nazism and Fascism are byproducts of the present phase of the evolution of society. The necessary conditions are two powerful groups between which there are relations of mutual fear; and the racketeer, in this case the Nazi, plays off one against the other. The Nazis' have played this part successfully with the German people and also with other nations. Having attained power, the Nazis had to have "anation of tools". This they achieved by the doctrines of anti-intellectualism, racialism, restriction of science to matters of military value, and the principle of the 'leader'. Incidentally, Dr. Needham points out that the war between China and Japan has its origin in a similar racial-national spirit which has arisen in the latter country." --Nature 149, 215-215 (21 February 1942.
JOSEPH NEEDHAM (1900 –1995) was a British biochemist, historian of science and sinologist known for his scientific research and writing on the history of Chinese science and technology. Needham graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. In January 1925, Needham earned an MA. In October 1925, Needham earned a PhD. He had intended to study medicine, but came under the influence of Frederick Hopkins, resulting in his switch to biochemistry. Although his career as biochemist and an academic was well established, his career developed in unanticipated directions during and after World War II. Three Chinese scientists came to Cambridge for graduate study in 1937. Lu, daughter of a Nanjing pharmacist, taught Needham Chinese, igniting his interest in China's ancient technological and scientific past. He then pursued, and mastered, the study of Classical Chinese privately with Gustav Haloun. Under the Royal Society's direction, Needham was the director of the Sino-British Science Co-operation Office in Chongqing from 1942 to 1946. He devoted his energy to the history of Chinese science until his retirement in 1990, even though he continued to teach some biochemistry until 1993. (Inventory #: 1516)