Scientific Babel : the language of science from the fall of Latin to the rise of English Copyright Page; Dedication; Contents; Introduction: Talking Science; Chapter 1: The Perfect Past That Almost Was; Chapter 2: The Table and the Word; Chapter 3: Hydrogen Oxygenovich; Chapter 4: Speaking Utopian; Chapter 5: The Wizards of Ido; Chapter 6: The Linguistic Shadow of the Great War; Chapter 7: Unspeakable; Chapter 8: The Dostoevsky Machine; Chapter 9: All the Russian Thats Fit to Print; Chapter 10: The Fe Curtain; Chapter 11: Anglophonia; Conclusion: Babel Beyond; Acknowledgments; List of Archives; Notes; Index. Today scientists are a resolutely monoglot community using exclusively English but the rise of English was anything but inevitable and only very recent. In a sweeping history from the Middle Ages through to today Michael Gordin untangles the web of politics money personality and international conflict that led to the English language dominated world of science we now inhabit. He takes us on a journey from the fall of Latin to the rise of English telling how we lost Dutch Italian Swedish and many other languages on the way. The significance of language in the nationalistic realm of science is astounding just one word mistranslated into German from Russian triggered an inflammatory contest between Germany and Russia for the credit of having discovered the periodic table. In Michaels hands we see that science isnt the universal quest for truth we thought but rather the subject of political jockeying national rivalry and fierce competition. Intelligent revealing and full of amazing stories Scientific Babel shows how the world has remade science just as much as science has transformed the world.