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Topics in January

Jan 23, 2019

Contents

When the World Shakes

Geophysicists from Freie Universität are studying why small earthquakes are a frequent occurrence in the areas around dams and reservoirs, natural gas fields, and geothermal energy plants.

Small earthquakes are a frequent occurrence in the areas around dams and reservoirs, natural gas fields, and geothermal energy plants. Geophysicists from Freie Universität are investigating the causes.

A Friday evening in Basel, December 2006, 5:48 p.m. First there is a loud boom, and then the Earth shakes. The shocks are felt as far away as southern Bavaria, in Germany. Later, the authorities will announce that the quake had a magnitude of 3.4 on the Richter scale.

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The Language of Clouds

Adalbert Stifter, an Austrian writer, painted cloud formations and made weather phenomena an important motif of his stories as well.

Long before reliable weather reports were available, poets were interested in meteorology. Scholars from the Peter Szondi Institute studied the relationship between weather and literature.

The barometer that Johann Wolfgang von Goethe used to measure air pressure looked very different from present-day instruments. It was shaped like a pear and filled with water. If the weather was nice, the water level in the rounder part of the pear rose; in bad weather, it fell. Goethe was fascinated by this device, which made it possible to view phenomena that were still a complete mystery at the time.

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Following the Trail of Books

From the library of Ernst Feder (1881–1964), a writer and journalist who fled Germany in 1933. A book from his library (which had several thousand volumes) is now at the University Library. So far the library has been unable to give it to his heirs.

The Washington Declaration at 20: an interview with Ringo Narewski, head of the unit charged with restitution of items looted by the Nazis, following the meeting, in Berlin, of the “Provenance Research and Restitution at Libraries” taskforce

The Nazis are known for looting art, but that wasn’t all. They also took countless books during the Third Reich. Many of them are still housed at libraries in Germany today. In 1998, Germany signed on to the Washington Principles, committing to return not only works of art, but also books to the families of their owners wherever possible.

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