[Tears] Earth Abides by George R. Stewart

[James Nicoll]

Earth Abides by George R. Stewart

A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.

https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

[Don]

Post by James Nicoll
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

Excerpted from your review:

2: Until I looked up Berkeley to check the spelling, which
I invariably get wrong, I did not know it was named for
/that/ Bishop Berkeley.

Catholic Berkeley's Notebook contains this intriguing passage:

N.B. my Abstract & general Doctrines ought not to be condemn'd
by [Francis Bacon's] Royall Society [of London].

In regards to Berkeley's Relativity, the Wikipedia article you cite is a
hot mess. Something about Berkeley's attitude seems to anger both
Bacon's Royal Society of London and Wikipedia. Here's Berkeley's
pertinent thoughts on Relativity:

Absolute Space and Motion

Absolute motion and absolute space are not understood
realistically or instrumentally by Berkeley. He recommends
that natural philosophers dismiss the concepts. Relative
space and motion will more than adequately serve the
purposes of physics. The debate about absolute motion and
space has a long and complex history. Berkeley’s critique
is often regarded as an anticipation of that of Ernest Mach.

<https://iep.utm.edu/george-berkeley-philosophy-of-science/>

Berkeley's Relativity anticipated Einstein's Relativity, in other words.
This topic was last broached by me in rec.arts.sf.written about a decade
ago. And at least one regular back then acted insulted and promised to
have the last word on Wikipedia. ROTFLMAO.

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php
telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.

[John Savard]

Post by Don
In regards to Berkeley's Relativity, the Wikipedia article you cite is a
hot mess. Something about Berkeley's attitude seems to anger both
Bacon's Royal Society of London and Wikipedia. Here's Berkeley's
Absolute Space and Motion
Absolute motion and absolute space are not understood
realistically or instrumentally by Berkeley. He recommends
that natural philosophers dismiss the concepts. Relative
space and motion will more than adequately serve the
purposes of physics. The debate about absolute motion and
space has a long and complex history. Berkeley’s critique
is often regarded as an anticipation of that of Ernest Mach.
<https://iep.utm.edu/george-berkeley-philosophy-of-science/>
Berkeley's Relativity anticipated Einstein's Relativity, in other words.
This topic was last broached by me in rec.arts.sf.written about a decade
ago. And at least one regular back then acted insulted and promised to
have the last word on Wikipedia. ROTFLMAO.

That classical mechanics doesn't distinguish between states of
constant motion is well known. But what I recall from the standard
textbooks I was exposed to is that knowledge of this fact was credited
to Newton himself.

Einstein's achievement was to put together such partial insights as
Lorentz contraction to show that relativity, the equivalence of all
inertial frames of motions, could _still_ be the case after Maxwell's
equations were added to physics. No one from the distant past could
have anticipated _that_ until after Maxwell's equations existed.

John Savard

[William Hyde]

Post by Don

Post by James Nicoll
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

2: Until I looked up Berkeley to check the spelling, which
I invariably get wrong, I did not know it was named for
/that/ Bishop Berkeley.
Catholic Berkeley's Notebook

Anglican.


William Hyde

[Don]

Post by William Hyde

Post by Don

Post by James Nicoll
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

2: Until I looked up Berkeley to check the spelling, which
I invariably get wrong, I did not know it was named for
/that/ Bishop Berkeley.
Catholic Berkeley's Notebook

Anglican.

You are correct. Bless you for motivating me to procure permanent
protection from wikipedia pathogens.

Berkeley was a good bishop. As bishop of an economically poor
Anglican diocese in a predominantly Roman Catholic country,
he was committed to the well-being of both Protestants and
Catholics.

<https://iep.utm.edu/george-berkeley-british-empiricist/>

In Joseph Stock’s account of the life of the Bishop we read
that Berkeley addressed a letter to the Roman Catholic Clergy
of Cloyne in 1745 and in 1749 another to the clergy of that
persuasion in Ireland under the title a Word to the Wise. It
was written with so much candour and moderation as well as good
sense that those gentlemen, highly to their honour, in the
Dublin Journal of 18 November 1749 thought fit to return ‘their
sincere and hearty thanks to the worthy author, assuring him that
they are determined to comply with every particular recommended in
his address to the utmost of their power’.

<http://cloyne.ie/about/george-berkeley-bishop-of-cloyne/>

Beware: wikipedia's hot take is another hot mess. ROTFLMAO.

Danke,

[Lynn McGuire]

Post by James Nicoll
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

Read it. Twice. Five star book. Maybe six star book.

Lynn

[John Savard]

Post by James Nicoll
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A lucky survivor of the pandemic that nearly annihilated humanity
resolves to rebuild civilization, with the help of fellow survivors
and his own lack of applicable skills.
https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/purple-mountain-majesties

It was definitely informative for you to note that the author also
wrote several other, much less well-known, works which had related
themes. This helps in understanding what his actual goals were in
writing the book, among other things.

John Savard