Alexander von Humboldt: A Scientist’s Mind, a Poet’s Soul | Hacker News Reader

Alexander von Humboldt: A Scientist’s Mind, a Poet’s Soul

thenewatlantis.com

52 pointspseudolus18 comments

The article references Andrea Wulf's the Invention of Nature a number of times, which I'd like to give a hearty, emphatic +1 recommendation to. It's a beautifully written biography and the Vintage Books paperback is also a physically beautiful book.

A short video [1] with Andrea Wulf about Humboldt and her book.

Edit: A documentary[2] based on the book.

[1]https://vimeo.com/93417125

[2]https://www.smithsonianchannel.com/details/show/humboldt-epi...

One of my favorite books of all time. I saw Wulf speak at Vanderbilt last year and the stories she shares about Humboldt are really remarkable ... One of the world's greatest scientists, adventurers and thinkers. Now his name is hardly known, overtaken by his disciple, Charles Darwin.

I found that book rather annoyingly focused on nature holism and environmentalism, it felt like it was trying way too hard to project 21st century popular sensibilities onto Humboldt. And bizarrely it almost completely ignores his explorations in South America!

"Almost ignore" is a bit strong - his South American trip is 40 of 340 pages. But yes, she doesn't give it any special prominence compared to the rest of his life (as it perhaps would have earned), and she talks a lot about his posthumous impact.

I think you've implicitly rejected the thesis of the book, which is of course your prerogative as a reader, but the way the comment is worded makes it unclear whether you realize you've rejected the thesis.

Andrea Wulf also co-authored an illustrated account of Humboldt's South American expedition [0].

[0] https://www.amazon.com/Adventures-Alexander-Humboldt-Pantheo...

Agreed. Rüdiger Safranski's Goethe: Life as a Work of Art makes a good companion ;)

Purchased! Side note: new books on Amazon always seemed to be perfectly priced so that I buy new instead of used. Is this just a market at equilibrium plus my personal bias? It makes me feel like Amazon is driving used book sellers into the ground in some nefarious way, but I don't know enough about economics to come to any conclusions myself.

Absolutely! That was my favourite book of the year when I read it. And not that long for a biography, actually.

I can't recommend this book enough. I read it this year and enjoyed every second of it.

Humboldt and Jefferson wrote several letters to each other.

Jefferson to Humboldt: "...[your work on south america] comes out too at a moment when those countries are beginning to be interesting to the whole world. They are now becoming the scenes of political revolution, to take their stations as integral members, of the great family of nations. All are now in insurrection. In several the Independents are already triumphant, and they will undoubtedly be so in all. What kind of government will they establish? How much liberty can they bear without intoxication? Are their chiefs sufficiently enlightened to form a well guarded government, and their people to watch their chiefs? Have they mind enough to place their domesticated Indians on a footing with the whites?"

Complicated and interesting!

I remember visiting some sort of talk about A. von Humboldt when I was studying at Freiberg School of Mines (or TU Bergakademie Freiberg, if you're German) (I mention this specifically because Humboldt studied there as well).

Quite an interesting biography if I remember correctly, so I'm looking forward to reading this article when I find the time :D

If you know German, have a look at his writing ("Ansichten der Natur", for example.) The prose is just beautiful!

> His neglect today is unfortunate but instructive.

> Yet the science of our time has no place for Humboldt.

It is worth noting that the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation is very well-known in academia due to its prestigious sponsorships and world-class hospitality for exchange scientists.

Edit: missing line break, typo.

FTR Humboldt didn't establish that foundation, it was only named in his honor. The current foundation was established after WW2 by the German state.

Absolutely. :)

The point of noting the existence of the foundation is more that his values are actually not neglected and very much alive today -- those values are actually promoted by the foundation, and those sponsored by the foundation are encouraged to promote those values, too.

In Chicago, he's known as three things: a neighborhood, a park, and a statue:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt_Park,_Chicago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt_Park_(Chicago_park) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/28/Vo...

Most people here couldn't tell you who he is, though.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com