The Scientific World of Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer: The Entanglement of Science, Religion, and Politics in Nazi Germany

Description

In twentieth-century Germany, Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer rose to prominence as a brilliant physical chemist, even as several of his relatives—Dietrich Bonhoeffer among them—became involved in the resistance to Hitler, leading to their executions. This book traces the entanglement of science, religion, and politics in the Third Reich and in the lives of Karl-Friedrich, his family and his colleagues, including Fritz Haber and Werner Heisenberg. Nominated for the Nobel Prize, Karl-Friedrich was an expert on heavy water, a component of the atomic bomb. During the war, he was caught in the middle between relatives who were trying to kill Hitler and friends who were helping Hitler build a nuclear weapon. Karl-Friedrich emerges as a complex figure—an agnostic whose brother was a renowned theologian, and a chemist who both reluctantly advised German nuclear scientists and collaborated with Paul Rosbaud, a spy for the British. Illuminating the uneasy position of science in twentieth-century Germany, The Scientific World of Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer is the story of a man in love with chemistry, his family, and his nation, trying to do right by all of them in the midst of chaos. Front Matter ....Pages i-xx Introduction (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 1-6 The Father’s Scientific World (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 7-28 The First World War (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 29-49 The Promise of Pure Science (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 51-74 Traveling with Polanyi (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 75-86 Turbulence and Conformity (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 87-111 Seizing the Wheel (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 113-131 The Beginning of Resistance (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 133-146 Heavy Water and the Atomic Bomb (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 147-164 The Summer of Decision (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 165-190 The Uranium Club (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 191-212 Steadfast to the End (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 213-238 Rebuilding the World (Kathleen L. Housley)....Pages 239-266 Back Matter ....Pages 267-328