(1) The Pulse of Progress: including a Sketch of Jewish Theory (2) Climate through the Ages: a Study of the Climatic Factors and their Variations

Abstract

MR. ELLSWORTH HUNTINGTON, of the Geographical Department of Yale University, in a series of thirteen interesting volumes, besides numerous papers, has ingeniously and eloquently advocated the view that in the environment of which man is the creature, climate is the most powerful factor. As a corollary to this view he holds that climatic changes are the main cause of the rise and fall and of the migrations of civilisation. In the present work he puts his theory in a more attractive form as he limits the climatic pulse in historic times to a comparatively narrow beat, as he explains the vicissitudes of ancient Greece by climatic influences of the order of a change of mean temperature of the year from 62° F. to 63.1° F., with a variation of humidity of 10 per cent. To determine ttie mean annual temperature within 1.1°F. is practicable for few countries only; and it would be impossible to prove or disprove so slight a change for any country except within recent times. That climate is an important factor in human welfare, and that people's working efficiency varies with weather, is universally recognised; and these facts are confirmed by the interesting statistics brought forward by Mr. Huntington from American industrial and educational records. It may nevertheless be doubted whether the climatic changes in historic times have been the main factor in the migration of races and civilisations.

(1) The Pulse of Progress: including a Sketch of Jewish Theory.

By Ellsworth Huntington. With a Chapter on Climatic Changes, by G. C. Simpson. Pp. x + 341. (New York and London: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1926.) 21s. net.

(2) Climate through the Ages: a Study of the Climatic Factors and their Variations.

By C. E. P. Brooks. Pp. 439. (London: Ernest Benn, Ltd., 1926.) 15s. net.