This selection omits several volumes of tables, tracts for computers and monographs on physical anthropology.
Loki (1880) The New Werther. London: C. Kegan Paul.
Through letters to his renounced beloved, Arthur describes the disappointments of philosophy, science, art and love until, like Goethe’s Werther, he commits suicide. For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 3) and E. S. Pearson (1936, pp. 200-1)
[Anonymous] (1882) The Trinity. A Nineteenth Century Passion-Play, The Son; or, Victory of Love. Cambridge: E. Johnson.
In the foreword to this retelling of the Christ story Pearson wrote “Modern science and modern culture are freeing us from the old theological shackles; let them take heed that in destroying a human divinity they do not forget a divine humanity.” For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 4) and E. S. Pearson (1936, pp. 201ff)
Karl Pearson (ed.) (1885) The Common Sense of the Exact Sciences by W. K. Clifford. London: Kegan Paul, Trench
The Exact Sciences are mathematics, pure and applied. The book was re-issued in 1946 with a laudatory preface by Bertrand Russell who had read it when he was fifteen.
Karl Pearson (ed.) (1886/93) A History of the Theory of Elasticity and of the Strength of Materials from Galilei to the Present Time by I. Todhunter, Vols I & II (II in two parts). Cambridge: University Press.
Pearson wrote more than half of this enormous work. He kept to Todhunter’s plan of summarising each contribution and the result is an encyclopedic treatise on the literature of elasticity organised chronologically rather than a history of science work of the modern kind. For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 3) and E. S. Pearson (1936, p. 209 )
Karl Pearson (1888) The Ethic of Freethought, London, T. Fisher Unwin Trench.
The first papers “endeavour to formulate the opinions which a rational being of to-day may hold with regard to the physical and intellectual worlds.” A second group “regards one or two phases of past thought and life from the Freethinker’s standpoint.” The final group “deals with great race problems”—socialism and the woman’s question. For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 3) and E. S. Pearson (1936, pp. 198-206)
Karl Pearson (1892) The Grammar of Science, with further editions in 1900 and 1911. London: Walter Scott (1892) and A. & C. Black (1900 & 1911).
This positivist account of science was widely read in English and in translations. The second edition was enlarged to take account of Pearson’s mathematical studies in evolution. The third edition was conceived on an even larger scale but only the first (Physical) volume appeared. For the 1937 reissue in the Everyman series E. S. Pearson returned to the chapter plan of 1892 but kept the wording of 1900; he also wrote an introduction. In 1991 Thoemmes published a reprint of the first edition with an introduction by Andrew Pyle. For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 3) and E. S. Pearson (1936, pp. 214-7) and (1938, pp. 185-6).
Karl Pearson (1897) Chances of Death and Other Studies of Evolution, 2 vols. London: Edward Arnold.
This contains both statistical and historical studies of evolution. The latter include reconstructions of prehistoric society based on the “fossils” of language and customs. Behind the long study of the “German Passion-Play” is the thought that the mediæval philosophy of life contained “social, economic, and æsthetic elements wanting in the civilisation of today.” For discussion see Porter (2004, ch. 3) and E. S. Pearson (1936, p. 225) .
Karl Pearson (1901) National Life from the Standpoint of Science, with a second edition in 1905. London: A. & C. Black.
This gives Pearson’s views on nations, socialism and eugenics: “We find that the law of survival of the fitter is true of mankind, but that the struggle is that of the gregarious animal. A community not knit together by strong social instincts by sympathy between man and man, and class and class cannot face the external contest…” In the second edition the original lecture was supplemented by data appendices
Karl Pearson (1914) Tables for Statisticians and Biometricians, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
The main purpose of these first tables was to assist in the fitting of the Pearson curves. More specialised volumes came later as well as a Part II in 1931. Much effort went into table-making and it was an activity Pearson rated highly: “What the true statistician, the true physicist demands” is “the conversion of algebraical results into tables;” an “all-round mathematician” needs to be a “computer.” (Lectures on the History of Statistics, p. 245.) See E. S. Pearson (1938, p. 195)
Karl Pearson (1914/24/30) The Life, Letters and Labours of Francis Galton, Vols. I, II, IIIA & IIIB, Cambridge: University Press
This huge work is one of the most ambitious biographies of a scientist ever written. Available online at Gavan Tredoux’s Galton website.
For discussion see E. S. Pearson (1938, pp. 193-195)
E. S. Pearson (ed) (1978) The History of Statistics in the 17th and 18th Centuries against the Changing Background of Intellectual, Scientific and Religious Thought: Lectures by Karl Pearson given at University College, 1921-1933. London: Griffin.
Here, unlike in the Todhunter Elasticity volumes, the “changing background” is essential to the picture. There is a useful review: I. Hacking (1981) Karl Pearson’s History of Statistics, British Journal of the Philosophy of Science, 32, 177-183.
