Table of Contents

(* indicates new entry) Preface Acknowledgements PLOUGHSHARES INTO SWORDS Friend or Foe of Mankind? Splitting the Atom The Man Who Patented the Bomb Why Did the Germans Not Make the Bomb? Bomb Designer Turned Dissident Liberating France Enemy Alien The Threat of Biological Weapons* HOW TO MAKE DISCOVERIES High on Science Deconstructing Pasteur The Battle Over Vitamin C A Mystery of the Tropics The Forgotten Plague What Holds Molecules Together? I Wish I?d Make You Angry Earlier Big Fleas Have Little Fleas How the Secret of Life Was Discovered Dangerous Misprints A Deadly Inheritance Darwin Was Right A Passion for Crystals The Top Designer* The Great Sage* It Ain't Necessarily So* PHOTO GALLERY RIGHT AND WRONGS By What Right Do We Invoke Human Rights? The Right to Choose Swords into Ploughshares: Does Nuclear Energy Endanger Us? What If?* MORE ABOUT DISCOVERIES The Second Secret of Life How W.L. Bragg Invented X-ray Analysis Life?s Energy Cycle The Hormone that Makes Nerves Grow How Nerves Conduct Electricity In Pursuit of Peace and Protein* Keilin and the Molteno* Growing Up among the Elements* Friendly Way to Science* The Scientific and Humane Legacy of Max Perutz (1914-2002) by Sir John Meurig Thomas* My Commonplace Book Notes and References Subject Index

Reviews

Perutz's extraordinary historical grasp and the breadth of his personal experience and cultural perspective give his reviews an interest that often transcends that of the books themselves. He brings luminously to life such figures as Fritz Haber, Lise Meitner and Leo Szilard. He writes with wonderfully lucid precision about science and offers also a fine polemic, first read to the American Philosophical Society, on the meaning of freedom... This is a wholly captivating book; it has warmth, wit and style, and not a dull sentence. I urge you to read, enjoy and learn. Nature The essays are beautifully written, with flashes of wit and humor. Many of the essays were written for the New York Review of Books; anyone addicted to that journal, as I am, will at once get a feel for the style of these essays. I read this as a bedtime book, so I dipped into it at random. When I finally found that there was no more to read, I felt quite disappointed - no more chocolates in the box!" Nature Medicine