biography
| name: |
Velikovsky, Immanuel
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1895–1979)
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| biography:
| Physician, psychoanalyst, cosmologist, and writer, born in Vitebsk, Russia. As a young man he studied in Moscow, mastering several disciplines and learning several languages. He then studied botany and zoology at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, returned to Moscow to take a medical degree, and did postgraduate medical studies in Berlin. After marrying (1923), he lived in Paris and then Palestine (1928–38) before settling in New York City (1939). Working as a psychoanalyst and independent scholar, he burst upon the scholarly and scientific world in 1950 with his book, Worlds in Collision, which claimed that a fragment of the planet Jupiter - later known as Venus - had careened through space in 1500BC and brushed against Earth, causing various phenomena that in turn impacted on history (events recorded in the Bible and elsewhere). Attacked by most scientists, he gained at least some sympathy when it was revealed that the scientific establishment had tried to force his publisher to drop the book. Capitalizing on his notoriety, he lectured widely and wrote articles and books, including Ages in Chaos (1952) and Oedipus and Akhnaton: Myth and History (1960), mostly promoting his equally heretical views on the links between natural phenomena, legends, history, and the human psyche. Although his theories convinced a small circle of true believers, and may contain some kernels of truth here and there, they have generally not held up to scientific scrutiny. Undoubtedly a brilliant polymath, he appears to have contributed more to understanding human psychology than to the advancement of science. |
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