
Back cover to the 1977 Frank Copley translation (Ѻ) of Lucretius' 55BC atheistic-themed atomic theory-advocating On the Nature of Things, which has since "reintroduced dangerous ideas about the nature and meaning of existence" in a world made of only atoms and voids governed by material forces; all of which finding recurring surfacing in the dangerous waters of intellectual revolution of Jean Sales, Johann Goethe, Frederick Rossini, and Libb Thims, to name a few prominent examples.

Back cover to the 1977 Frank Copley translation (Ѻ) of Lucretius' 55BC atheistic-themed atomic theory-advocating On the Nature of Things, which has since "reintroduced dangerous ideas about the nature and meaning of existence" in a world made of only atoms and voids governed by material forces; all of which finding recurring surfacing in the dangerous waters of intellectual revolution of Jean Sales, Johann Goethe, Frederick Rossini, and Libb Thims, to name a few prominent examples.

In terminology, danger refers to something that might cause harm or damage. [1] The term is frequently evoked in attempts at materialism, physicalism, mechanism, and or chemicalism formulations of the humanities, and or combinations there of, e.g. molecular sociology, human chemical thermodynamics, etc.

Overview
In 1600, Giordano Bruno burned at the stake for promoting the dangerous Lucretian-Copernican view.

In 1775, Jean Sales was imprisoned for promoting the view that humans are molecules formed via a great principle from the atoms of the earth.

In 1809, German polyintellect Johann Goethe published his physical chemistry based treatise Elective Affinities, which went on to become his “most dangerous” work; later causing James Froude to lose his post at Oxford and to have his 1848 Nemesis of Faith publicly burned.

In 1889 to 1893, the public lectures of Vilfredo Pareto's, the third social Newton behind Goethe and Henry Adams, were closed by the police; sometime therein, or at least by 1895, he began to pen out his signature theory of "man, a kind of molecule, acting only in response to the forces of ophelimity."

In the 20th century, Karl Marx’s atomic theory based historical materialism sociology theory was adopted by Vladimir Lenin and used to reform the national belief system in Russia, resulting in death tolls upwards of 6-7 million people owing to starvation resulting from misaligned social policy.

In 2006, Frederick Rossini’s "Chemical Thermodynamics in the Real World" (1971) arguments, were harpooned publicly in the Journal of Chemical Education, by physical chemist John Wojcik, as being a danger to society.

In 2005 to 2010, all human molecule, human chemistry, and human thermodynamics topics as articles have been perpetually banned from Wikipedia and threatened to be banned from ChemistryForums.com; and in 2011 it was commented, by Peggy La Cerra, that the PhD advisors who allow graduate students to use Hmolpedia as resource tool to complete PhD dissertations should be shot.

Epicureanism
The works of Epicurus, e.g. as discussed in the Epicurean swerve theory, are the earliest mentions of "danger" in respect to moral philosophy adoption. In 2011, American historian Stephen Greenblatt, in his The Swerve: How the Renaissance Began, seems to credit the start of the renaissance to the discovery of Epicurean swerve theory, via discovery Lucretius’ On the Nature of Things, the abstract of which is as follows: [9]

“One of the world's most celebrated scholars, Stephen Greenblatt has crafted both an innovative work of history and a thrilling story of discovery, in which one manuscript, plucked from a thousand years of neglect, changed the course of human thought and made possible the world as we know it. Nearly six hundred years ago, a short, genial, cannily alert man [Poggio Bracciolini] in his late thirties took a very old manuscript off a library shelf, saw with excitement what he had discovered, and ordered that it be copied. That book was [known at that time] the last surviving manuscript of an ancient Roman philosophical epic, On the Nature of Things, by Lucretius a beautiful poem of the most dangerous ideas: that the universe functioned without the aid of gods, that religious fear was damaging to human life, and that matter was made up of very small particles in eternal motion, colliding and swerving in new directions. The copying and translation of this ancient book-the greatest discovery of the greatest book-hunter of his age-fueled the Renaissance, inspiring artists such as Botticelli and thinkers such as Giordano Bruno; shaped the thought of Galileo and Freud, Darwin and Einstein; and had a revolutionary influence on writers such as Montaigne and Shakespeare and even Thomas Jefferson.”

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Social mechanics | Molecular sociology
The following is a statements attest to the so-called dangers of the late 19th century early 20th century social mechanics and social chemistry like theories:

“Between the method of Quetelet, who represents, so to speak, molecular sociology, and that of Comte, who especially represents synthetic sociology, Spencer takes the mean, which, although it is without the qualities of the first, is also without the qualities of the first, is also without the dangers of second.”
— Guillaume de Greef (1902), “Introduction to Sociology” [10]

“In 1900, Alessandro Grappali wrote: ‘It has been more than fifty years since Auguste Comte gave birth to his young discipline [social physics]: the baptism of life by clearly defining the methods, but the task and the fuel, have not been able to change the state of crisis that inevitably beset any discipline in its infancy.’ These lines could also be written now. Probably Durkheim with his Rules of Sociological Method said the way, the only real way of scientific sociology. But the inevitable mistakes that Groppali reported, have not disappeared, especially as Durkheim has left for the moment no one after him to continue his work. Mr. combat Bouglé Professor those mistakes which even their authors return. Witness Mr. René Worms whose Sociology, reduced to fair value the organicist theories. But there is a more ‘pure’ design, more ‘scientific’, so-called sociology, which has long been adeptness, which gave her the safest works between 1896 and 1914. It is more false and more dangerous; we want to talk about the mechanistic conception of social science. Comte especially Quetelet and Spencer also have their responsibility for this design. These are especially Mr. Haret, Lester Ward, Winiarski, and A.-P. Barcelo, who developed the mechanistic conception.”
— Petre Trisca (1922), Preliminaries on Social Mechanics: Analysis of Works (pg. 1)

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Human molecules

See main: Human molecule (banned)

In 1775, French philosopher Jean Sales was imprisoned, by the Chatelet, and later sentenced to perpetual banishment, from France, for writing about people as “human molecules” formed from the "atoms" of the earth by a "great process". The erudite two cultures genius Voltaire (IQ=195) was the only thinker of the time who has insight enough to see through to the way ahead of its time genius of Sales' work and in 1777, at the age 83, a year before his reaction end (death), gave 500 pounds, the equivalent of about $100,000 USD in modern terms, to towards his release. French philosopher, chemist, physicist, paleontologist, and priest Pierre Teilhard's writings on “human molecules” were perpetually banned by the church, throughout his life, 1925 to 1955, and because of his views he was excommunicated from the church; his writings were all published posthumously.



A frank representative of the perceived "danger" associated with the ramifications inherent and embedded within the revolutionary subject of human chemical thermodynamics, whether discussed in reference to Goethe's 1809 Elective Affinities or Rossini's 1971 "Chemical Thermodynamics in the Real World", a subject, namely the "moral symbols" of physical chemistry, in direct conflict to the religio-mythology based morality and belief system of modern the modern world.

Goetheanisn | Elective Affinities
The following outlines the perceived "danger" associated with the ramifications inherent and embedded in the subject of human chemical thermodynamics—a subject in direct opposition to that of modern religion, and the ancient belief systems (primarily Egyptian) embedded therein.

“Adler disputes the reductive determinism in Goethe's idea of nature, thus relieving the most dangerous consequence of the analogy for human decision making. Allemann goes one step further and demonstrates definitively that the analogy between chemicals and characters fails.”
— Stefani Engelstein (2008), Anxious Anatomy [8]

The following is British translator David Constantine’s 1994 synopsis of German polyintellect Johann Goethe's 1809 physical chemistry based novella Elective Affinities, which situates the views that true morality is based on the "symbols" (see: moral symbols) and "reactions" of physical chemistry: [7]

“In Elective Affinities Goethe conducts an experiment with the lives of people who are living badly. Charlotte and Eduard, aristocracts with little to occupy them, invite Ottilie and the Captain into their lives; against morality, good sense, and conscious volition all four are drawn into relationships as inexorably as if they were substances in a chemical equation. The novel asks whether we have free will or not; more disturbingly, it confronts its characters with the monstrous consequences of their repression of any real life in themselves. Goethe wrote Elective Affinities when he was sixty and long established as Germany's literary giant. He remained an uneasy and scandalous figure, none the less, and readers of Elective Affinities were profoundly disturbed by its penetrating study of marriage and passion.”

This premise would go onto become what has been called, by Herman Grimm (1880), as Goethe's "most dangerous" work.

In short, Goethe's physical chemistry based 1809 novella Elective Affinities famous has been called by himself his "best book" and by commentators his most "dangerous book", particularly for the religiously-conservative English speaking public. The first two English translations, in fact, were done anonymously. In the first of these, a 1854 collected works set for Bohn's Library, the publisher Henry Bohn gives a preface section "warning" to the readers:

“Exceptions may be taken to some of the statements contained in this production of Goethe.”

and comments further that: “The [translation of] Elective Affinities has been executed by a gentleman [identified posthumously in 1901 as James Froude] well known in the literary world, who does not wish his name to appear.” This is anonymity is explained well by English science historian and philosopher David Knight and his 2009 synopsis of the situation: [6]

“Froude’s semi-autobiographical Nemesis of Faith [a renunciation of Christian faith], published in 1848, owed much to Goethe’s novel of human and chemical reactions, Elective Affinities, which he translated. Nemesis lost him his fellowship at Exeter College, Oxford, where his book was publicly burned.”


A depiction of an olden days Christian book burning, which is similar, in semi-recent terms, to James Froude's 1849 Elective Affinities influenced Christian-faith renouncing Nemesis of Faith being publicly burned, after which he lost his post at Oxford, and thus resultantly did the first English translation of Goethe's revolutionary-doctrine containing self-defined "best book" anonymously. [6]

A depiction of an olden days Christian book burning, which is similar, in semi-recent terms, to James Froude's 1849 Elective Affinities influenced Christian-faith renouncing Nemesis of Faith being publicly burned, after which he lost his post at Oxford, and thus resultantly did the first English translation of Goethe's revolutionary-doctrine containing self-defined "best book" anonymously. [6]

Likewise, in the second "anonymous" English translation (1872), albeit Froude's translation announced in 1901, American woman’s rights and sexual freedom activist Victoria Woodhull is asked to provide the introduction section, to the D.W. Niles edition, wherein she comments: [3]

“Indeed, it strikes me almost ludicrous, that the translator has shrunk from appending his name to the work, if he has done so from any idea that its dangerous views might tend to impair his reputation.”

In 1880, German author, art historian, philosopher, and Goethean biographer Herman Grimm summarized things as such: [2]

“A just exposition of [Goethe's] views has not been arrived at, because Elective Affinities, after having been spoken of for fifty years as Goethe's most dangerous work, is today passed over and very little known.”

The danger inherent here, in straight-forward talk, is that currently 3/4ths of the modern world holds a morality belief system structured around belief in the existence of God—Goethe’s work overthrows this premise entirely—and in affect overthrows modern religion—the system that binds—for a new system that binds—a godless one—based on belief that humans are made of atoms, nothing more, nothing less, and that morality—right or wrong movement—is governed by the symbols of physical chemistry.

Rossini debate
The view of Goethe’s Elective Affinities, as summarized by Grimm as "Goethe’s most dangerous work" (as recounted by Astrida Tantillo, 2001), is near synonymous in reactionary style to the reactionary language used, nearly two-hundred years later, in the 2006 Rossini debate, on the possibility of American chemical thermodynamicist Frederick Rossini’s hypothesis that chemical thermodynamics might be able to explain the nature of the freedom vs. security, as would be applicable to a post 9/11 world. [4] Specifically, American religiously-based belief system physical chemist John Wojcik, in one heated part of his response letter to Journal of Chemical Education, uses the term "danger" four times: [5]

“The danger of such anthropomorphisms is that we really come to believe that there is substance in them. In this particular case, there is the danger that true human freedom will be reduced to some sort of physical freedom on the same par with entropy. There is the danger that some will think that true human freedom can be measured in terms of some sort of calculus of simultaneous maximums and minimums. And worst of all, there is the danger that chemical thermodynamics will have ascribed to it a power that it simply does not have, namely, the power to “explain” the human condition. There may be a sense in which chemistry is the “central science”. This is certainly not it.”

No doubt, being that affinity chemistry was the forerunner to chemical thermodynamics, similar arguments were voiced during these fifty-years, as Grimm summarized, as to the underlying premise and implications of Goethe’s novella: namely that Goethe's version of affinity chemistry based morality (or physical chemistry base morality in modern terms) supplants and in fact replaces all of the world religions, and as such the unwritten bedrock of modern society; meaning that a very dangerous revolution in thinking may possibly be awaiting future generations of humankind.

Hmolpedia
The same sense of "danger" can be felt in the paradigm changing work of American electrochemical engineer Libb Thims. While and editor at Wikipedia, in regards to a repeated attempt to get three articles established at Wikipedia, namely: human thermodynamics, human chemistry, and human molecule, a modern-day internet "witch hunt" resulted. One example is the following which comes from Wikipedia administrator Kww in 2007 in efforts to get the human chemistry/human thermodynamics articles removed from Wikipedia:

“Delete and salt and ban author: Another in the web of "human chemistry' garbage perpetrated by [Libb Thims]. No real notability, an involvement with a fringe pseudoscience that is so far on the fringe that it nearly seems to be an analogy, no good third-party sources, and the only Wikipedia editor that has taken any interest in him writes dishonest self-promoting articles as a hobby. Kill the article, ban the author.”

Similarly, in Thims' first university lecture in 2010, at University of Illinois at Chicago, which occurred in the aftermath of the heated Moriarty-Thims debate, both Irish physicist Philip Moriarty and American organic chemist Frank Lambert emailed lecture hosting professor, Iranian-born American Ali Mansoori with a stern warning that he should not allow Thims to lecture to his students.

Likewise, in 2011, in regards to graduate students beginning to use Hmolpedia as resource tool to complete PhD dissertations, American evolutionary psychologist Peggy La Cerra, noted for her circa 1990 depression energy theory of the mind, commented the following to Thims:

“If people are using this site to do their PhD dissertations and getting away with that, their advisors should be shot.”

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References
1. Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary (2002).
2. Grimm, Herman F. (1880). The Life and Times of Goethe (§23: Study of Natural Science: “The Natural Daughter” and “Elective Affinities”, pgs. 442-74; quote, pg. 463). Trans. Sarah Adams. Little, Brown, and Company.
3. Goethe, Johann. (1872). Elective Affinities (with an Introduction by Victoria C. Woodhull). D.W. Niles.
4. Tantillo, Astrida O. (2001). Goethe’s Elective Affinities and the Critics (pg. 48). Camden House.
5. Wójcik, John F. (2006). ‘A Response to Chemical Thermodynamics in the Real World.’ (PDF) J. Chem. Educ. (83) 39.
6. (a) Knight, David. (2009). The Making of Modern Science: Science, Technology, Medicine and Modernity: 1789-1914 (Elective Affinities, pgs. 29, 184, 255). Polity Press.
(b) David M. Knight (faculty) – Durham University.
7. Goethe, Johann. (1994). Elective Affinities (introduction, note on translation, selected bibliography, chronology, and explanatory notes by David Constantine) (abs). World Classics.
8. Engelstein, Stefani. (2008). Anxious Anatomy: the Conception of the Human Form in Literary and Naturalist Discourse (§Goethe’s Monstrous Otto, pgs. 26-30; Metamorphology, pgs. 48-54; Elective Affinities or Chosen Correspondences, pgs. 55-60; dangerous consequence, pg. 252). SUNY Press.
9. (a) Greenblatt, Stephen. (2011). The Swerve: How the Renaissance Began (abs). Random House.
(b) The Swerve: How the World Became Modern – Wikipedia.
10. Greef, Guillaume de. (1903). “Introduction to Sociology” (translated by Robert Morris) (molecular sociology, pgs. 511-12, 515, 592, 615), The American Journal of Sociology, 8(5):577-622.

External links
● Danger – Wikipedia.