Linus Pauling: A Life in Science and Politics Book

"One of the few unquestioned greats of twentieth-century science, Linus Pauling was the only person to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes—one in chemistry, for deciphering the quantum physics of large m"

Publishers Weekly

Pauling (1901-1994) won fame for his pioneering and prolific studies concerning the natures of chemical bonds and structures, then for his activist leadership against atmospheric nuclear testing and the consequent McCarthyist inquisitions he weathered. In his later years, he was an advocate of ``orthomolecular'' medicine and a champion of megavitamin therapy. The first person ever to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes (Chemistry, 1954; Peace, 1963), he was a preeminent personality in mid 20th-century science and intellectual politics. This biography represents a novel collaboration by three generations of the Goertzel family-parents Mildred and Victor (psychologists and biographers), son Ted (professor of sociology at Rutgers) and grandson Ben (a cognitive scientist at the University of Western Australia). Although the biography was not authorized, the authors utilize unique interviews with Pauling and research spanning four decades; they achieve a coherent integration of descriptive biography, character study and history of scientific thought. The influential currents in Pauling's intellect, personality and politics are well characterized in this definitive work, which lay readers and scientists alike will find enlightening and rigorous. Illustrations. Library of Science alternate. (Sept.)