Al Biruni, one of the greatest Arab scholars, was born on September 4, 973, in what is now Uzbekistan. He showed talent at an early age and by his early 20's had written several acclaimed papers. Political unrest in his 20's and 30's found him at one point at Gurgan, on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Peace found him in Ghaznah, which is today in Afghanistan.
From 1017 to 1030 he travelled extensively in India, becoming fluent in Sanskrit. From this he wrote his monumental survey, India, of the history, customs and beliefs of the subcontinent.
His other books include The Chronology of Ancient Nations, the Masudic Cannon, Book of Instructions, and more than 100 others, some of which are lost. He died on December 13, 1048, aged 75. He is buried in Ghaznah.
The Book of Instruction in the Elements of the Art of Astrology was written for Lady Rayhanah, to whom it is dedicated. R. Ramsay Wright, the translator, said it could be regarded as a primer of 11th century science.
Among its highlights are a comprehensive list of more than 150 Lots, various forms of aspects and planetary relationships, planetary positions relative to the sun, an excellent text on rulerships as well as comprehensive notes on weather and meteorological phenomena. This book was unknown to medieval European astrologers. This edition, comprising the astrological part of the original (sections 347-530) has been taken from Wright's pioneering 1934 translation, itself taken from Persian and Arabic sources.
Debunked!: Esp, Telekinesis, and Other Pseudoscience
Can you walk over red-hot charcoal without burning your feet? Appear to stop the beating of your heart? Bend spoons using the power of your mind? InDebunked!
Nobel Prize winner Georges Charpak and physics professor Henri Broch team up to show you the tricks of the trade and sleight of hand that keep astrologers, TV psychics, and spoon benders in business.
Using only the simplest of science, the authors explore the effectiveness of horoscopes—the blander the better—and why, with a television audience in the millions, any strange, unlikely prediction is almost certain to come true. If such insider information does not impress your colleagues, why not pierce your tongue with a skewer or demonstrate your eerie powers by using telepathy and the telephone to get a distant friend to intuit the number and suit of a card picked at random. Charpak and Broch show you how.
Not merely an expose of magic tricks, this book demonstrates how pseudoscientists use science, statistics, and psychology to bamboozle an audience—sometimes for fun, sometimes for profit. During the most scientifically advanced period in human history, belief in the paranormal and the supernatural is alarmingly common. Entertaining and enlightening,Debunked! is the antidote, vigorously asserting the virtues of doubt, skepticism, curiosity, and scientific knowledge. This lucid translation makes the arguments clear, understandable, and a pleasure to read.
Cardano's Cosmos: The Worlds and Works of a Renaissance Astrologer
Girolamo Cardano was an Italian doctor, natural philosopher, and mathematician who became a best-selling author in Renaissance Europe. He was also a leading astrologer of his day, whose predictions won him access to some of the most powerful people in sixteenth-century Europe.
In Cardano's Cosmos, Anthony Grafton invites readers to follow this astrologer's extraordinary career and explore the art and discipline of astrology in the hands of a brilliant practitioner.
Renaissance astrologers predicted everything from the course of the future of humankind to the risks of a single investment, or even the weather. They analyzed the bodies and characters of countless clients, from rulers to criminals, and enjoyed widespread respect and patronage.
This book traces Cardano's contentious career from his first astrological pamphlet through his rise to high-level consulting and his remarkable autobiographical works. Delving into astrological principles and practices,
Grafton shows how Cardano and his contemporaries adapted the ancient art for publication and marketing in a new era of print media and changing science. He maps the context of market and human forces that shaped Cardano's practices--and the maneuvering that kept him at the top of a world rife with patronage, politics, and vengeful rivals. Cardano's astrology, argues Grafton, was a profoundly empirical and highly influential art, one that was integral to the attempts of sixteenth-century scholars to understand their universe and themselves.
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