Full Moons

For millennia, the moon has fascinated mankind, inspiring awe, admiration, dread and mystery. But from about the mid-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth, Western science tended to banish accounts of the moon's influence to the scrap heap of superstition. Recent serious scientific research, however, is showing that the power of the moon--the full moon in particular--may indeed be more fact than fiction. Modern research is showing that the moon does affect life on earth, even if the means of its influence are not quite what moon lore has told us to expect. Paul Katzeff's study of the moon and its influence is divided into three parts. The first part examines mythological and folklore themes about the moon: insanity, fertility, werewolfism, its role in religion, and so forth. The second part deals with scientific research in such areas as the moon's influence on tides in the earth's atmosphere, weather, earthquakes, sexual cycles, plants, animals, and the murder and suicide rates. The third section considers theories the scientists have put forth to explain the apparent effects.--Adapted from book jacket.