John T. Blackmore: Two Recent Trilogies on Ernst Mach¹

Abstract

What would Mach think of about six (or altogether nine) volumes written on him, his ideas and his life? John T. Blackmore has in his life-work undertaken this scientifi c effort (together with several authors/editors including his wife Setsuko Tanaka). Before Blackmore’s life-work and especially his most recently published work will be reviewed in detail, a brief overview of the perspective of Mach from which the review approaches this question will be given in the following.

¹The following review provides an overview of John T. Blackmore’s life work and takes a more detailed focus on the latest three books in the two-trilogy series by Blackmore, John T., Itagaki, Ryoichi and Tanaka, Setsuko “Ernst Mach’s Infl uence Spreads” (2009, 486 pp., $40.00), “Ernst Mach’s Graz” (2010, 245 pp., $25.00) and “Ernst Mach’s Prague” (2010, 476 pp., $40.00), Bethesda, MD, and Tokyo: Sentinel Open Press. The books are in the following sometimes abbreviated as “Infl uence”, “Graz” and “Prague”. Also some of Ernst Mach’s works are abbreviated, such as “The Science of Mechanics” as “Mechanics”. Mach citations are translated by the author from the German reference with the exception of the “Mechanics” and the “Conservation of Energy” as they are exceptionally good translations which themselves additionally provide interesting hints on Mach (by the translators T.J. McCormack and P.E.B. Jourdain, but this shall not be further elaborated here).