Book ID: CBB977707696

Scientists Under Surveillance: The FBI Files (2019)

unapi

Brown, J. Patrick (Editor)
Lipton, Beryl C. D. (Editor)
Morisy, Michael (Editor)
Aftergood, Steven (Contributor)
Robinson, Walter V. (Contributor)


The MIT Press


Publication Date: 2019
Physical Details: 440
Language: English

Cold War–era FBI files on famous scientists, including Neil Armstrong, Isaac Asimov, Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, Alfred Kinsey, and Timothy Leary.Armed with ignorance, misinformation, and unfounded suspicions, the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover cast a suspicious eye on scientists in disciplines ranging from physics to sex research. If the Bureau surveilled writers because of what they believed (as documented in Writers Under Surveillance), it surveilled scientists because of what they knew. Such scientific ideals as the free exchange of information seemed dangerous when the Soviet Union and the United States regarded each other with mutual suspicion that seemed likely to lead to mutual destruction. Scientists Under Surveillance gathers FBI files on some of the most famous scientists in America, reproducing them in their original typewritten, teletyped, hand-annotated form. Readers learn that Isaac Asimov, at the time a professor at Boston University's School of Medicine, was a prime suspect in the hunt for a Soviet informant codenamed ROBPROF (the rationale perhaps being that he wrote about robots and was a professor). Richard Feynman had a “hefty” FBI file, some of which was based on documents agents found when going through the Soviet ambassador's trash (an invitation to a physics conference in Moscow); other documents in Feynman's file cite an informant who called him a “master of deception” (the informant may have been Feynman's ex-wife). And the Bureau's relationship with Alfred Kinsey, the author of The Kinsey Report, was mutually beneficial, with each drawing on the other's data. The files collected in Scientists Under Surveillance were obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests by MuckRock, a nonprofit engaged in the ongoing project of freeing American history from the locked filing cabinets of government agencies.The ScientistsNeil Armstrong, Isaac Asimov, Hans Bethe, John P. Craven, Albert Einstein, Paul Erdos, Richard Feynman, Mikhail Kalashnikov, Alfred Kinsey, Timothy Leary, William Masters, Arthur Rosenfeld, Vera Rubin, Carl Sagan, Nikola Tesla

...More
Reviewed By

Review Paul Rubinson (2020) Review of "Scientists Under Surveillance: The FBI Files". Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences (pp. 434-435). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB977707696/

Similar Citations

Book David H. Price; (2016)
Cold War Anthropology: The CIA, the Pentagon, and the Growth of Dual Use Anthropology (/isis/citation/CBB603109839/)

Article Dörries, Matthias; (2011)
The Politics of Atmospheric Sciences: “Nuclear Winter” and Global Climate Change (/isis/citation/CBB001034581/)

Article Hecht, David K.; (2008)
The Atomic Hero: Robert Oppenheimer and the Making of Scientific Icons in the Early Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB000950527/)

Thesis Gorchov, Lynn Karen; (2003)
Sexual Science and Sexual Politics: American Sex Research, 1920--1956 (/isis/citation/CBB001562258/)

Book Drucker, Donna J.; (2014)
The Classification of Sex: Alfred Kinsey and the Organization of Knowledge (/isis/citation/CBB001510051/)

Book Graham, Thomas; Hansen, Keith A.; (2007)
Spy Satellites: And Other Intelligence Technologies That Changed History (/isis/citation/CBB001032651/)

Essay Review Rainger, Ronald; (2001)
Improving Americans (/isis/citation/CBB000100505/)

Article Hall, R. Cargill; (2014)
Reconnaissance Drones: Their First Use in the Cold War (/isis/citation/CBB001550035/)

Thesis Lecklider, Aaron S.; (2007)
Brainpower: Intelligence in American Culture from Einstein to the Egghead (/isis/citation/CBB001561550/)

Book Pauly, Philip J.; (2000)
Biologists and the promise of American life: From Meriwether Lewis to Alfred Kinsey (/isis/citation/CBB000111019/)

Authors & Contributors
Drucker, Donna J.
Sutton, Katie
Cornel, Tabea
Rubinson, Paul Harold
Robinson, Paul
Rainger, Ronald
Concepts
Cold War
Science and society
Sexual behavior
Sexology
Biology
Science and war; science and the military
Time Periods
20th century, late
20th century
21st century
20th century, early
Places
United States
Soviet Union
Americas
Institutions
United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
United States. Central Intelligence Agency
United States. Department of Defense
Indiana University
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Radio Corporation of America
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment