[this web page last updated 20 June 2005]

Green Cat Books

A new imprint of Green Lion Press

Presenting classical readings in science in an affordable, modular format.

Now Available: the first three modules in the series of Science Classics for Humanities Studies

Dana Densmore, Selections from Newton's Principia

Howard J. Fisher, Faraday's Experimental Researches in Electricity: The First Series

William H. Donahue, Selections from Kepler's Astronomia Nova

SCIENCE CLASSICS FOR HUMANITIES STUDIES is a series of study modules designed to bring fundamental works of science and mathematics within the grasp of students and other readers without the need for specialized preparation. The series reflects the Green Lion’s conviction that an understanding of science, and especially of the classical works of science, is essential for all students of the humanities. Science, no less than poetry or philosophy, is human thought, a response both to the outer world of our senses and the inner experience of our consciousness. The more profound a scientific work is, the more directly it addresses itself to our humanity; therefore, there is much in the greatest works of science that can be grasped without special preparation. Yet too many educational programs find themselves limited by the supposed divide between the humanities and the sciences—the so-called “two cultures.”

Further, teachers and institutions who wish to heal this unnecessary fracture have had to confront two discouraging barriers. On the one hand, classic texts of real science are often found to be forbiddingly technical in content and burdened with terminologies either antiquated or arcane. On the other hand, popularizations of these classics insulate students from the actual workings of thought and imagination that classic texts embody. Green Lion Press has addressed this dilemma with the series SCIENCE CLASSICS FOR HUMANITIES STUDIES, issued in slim, inexpensive student editions under the Green Cat Books imprint.

Each volume in the series is a compact, inexpensive presentation of classic scientific and mathematical texts, offering generous but judicious guidance for the reader. We have drawn on our many years of reading these books with non-specialist students to choose selections of real substance, and to provide helps that make the texts accessible while at the same time allowing the original texts to speak for themselves, in their own voices.

Besides humanities students, this series will be of interest to those interested in science but lacking time or expertise to read these works unabridged and without assistance. It will also serve readers who already enjoy a technical background but who may wish to experience more directly the sources of contemporary scientific concepts.

Classic works of science and mathematics, no less than other works of literature, drama, and philosophy, lead us to questions (and answers) that may enlighten or delight us, or may lead us to a new understanding of the multiplex and often conflicting views of reality presented in great scientific works. It is the Green Lion’s aim to enable readers not only to observe but to participate in such significant achievements of thought. Volumes in the SCIENCE CLASSICS FOR HUMANITIES STUDIES series focus on Newton's Principia, Faraday’s Experimental Researches in Electricity, Kepler’s Astronomia Nova, the world systems of Ptolemy and Copernicus, and Euclid’s theory of magnitude and number.