| American Science: Plows, Plagues, and Petroleum: How Humans Took Control of Climate. William F. Ruddiman. xiv + 202 pp. Princeton University Press, 2005. $24.95. In Franconia in southern Germany (where I grew up), there are plenty of towns with names ending in reuth, the best known of these being Bayreuth, famous for performances of operas inspired by Teutonic mythology. Reuth denotes a clearing–that is, a place ridden of trees. To the south we find town names with the endings ried and reid, whereas ... |
