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Book Review |
Man as Machine
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
This is in many ways an imposing—not to say, daunting—book. The numbers are themselves impressive. The two volumes run to almost 1700 pages. The bibliography alone is 133 pages long. Many an academic author will wonder, somewhat ruefully, just how Oxford University Press was persuaded to publish something so gigantic.
This perplexity is reinforced by the fact that it is by no means clear for whom this vast work is intended. It is decidedly not a popular exposition of the development of modern cognitive science aimed at a general readership. The book is too long, too technical and far too expensive for all but the few who have access to a university library. It is, however, no student textbook. Some historians of science and technology may feel obliged to try to read it—although few will have the stamina to stay the course. One is left to conclude that the community,
Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine
University College London
United Kingdom