@article{711477,
      recid = {711477},
      author = {Efron, Noah J.,},
      title = {A chosen calling  : Jews in science in the twentieth  century /},
      pages = {1 online resource (xv, 149 pages)},
      abstract = {Scholars have struggled for decades to explain why Jews  have succeeded extravagantly in modern science. A variety  of controversial theories from such intellects as C. P.  Snow, Norbert Wiener, and Nathaniel Weyl have been  promoted. Snow hypothesized an evolved genetic  predisposition to scientific success. Wiener suggested that  the breeding habits of Jews sustained hereditary qualities  conducive for learning. Economist and eugenicist Weyl  attributed Jewish intellectual eminence to "seventeen  centuries of breeding for scholars." Rejecting the idea  that Jews have done well in science because of uniquely  Jewish traits, Jewish brains, and Jewish habits of mind,  historian of science Noah J. Efron approaches the Jewish  affinity for science through the geographic and cultural  circumstances of Jews who were compelled to settle in new  worlds in the early twentieth century. Seeking relief from  religious persecution, millions of Jews resettled in the  United States, Palestine, and the Soviet Union, with large  concentrations of settlers in New York, Tel Aviv, and  Moscow. Science played a large role in the lives and  livelihoods of these immigrants: it was a universal force  that transcended the arbitrary Old World orders that had  long ensured the exclusion of all but a few Jews from the  seats of power, wealth, and public esteem. Although the  three destinations were far apart geographically, the links  among the communities were enduring and spirited. This  shared experience of facing the future in new worlds, both  physical and conceptual provided a generation of Jews with  opportunities unlike any their parents and grandparents had  known. The tumultuous recent century of Jewish history,  which saw both a methodical campaign to blot out Europe's  Jews and the inexorable absorption of Western Jews into the  societies in which they now live, is illuminated by the  place of honor science held in Jewish imaginations. Science  was central to their dreams of creating new worlds -  welcoming worlds - for a persecuted people. This  provocative work will appeal to historians of science as  well as scholars of religion, Jewish studies, and Zionism.},
      url = {http://library.usi.edu/record/711477},
}