Cosmic Influences on Humans, Animals and Plants: An Annotated Bibliography, John T.Burns, Magill  Bibliographies, Scarecrow Press Inc, Lanham, Md., and London, Salem Press, Pasadena, CA and Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1997, 203 pp., £32.80.

This volume by John Burns, Professor of Biology at Bethany College, West Virginia, joins the author’s other bibliography, Cycles in Humans and Nature as an invaluable starting point for research into recent work on the question of celestial-terrestrial influences and correlations. The four sections include material on the influence of sunspots, the solar wind and auroras, lunar and tidal influences, planetary influences and possible mechanisms for cosmic influences. Burns covers much material that would otherwise escape the casual researcher, such as the article on the breeding of the sooty tern published in The Auk in 1959 or Nick Kollerstrom’s paper on ‘The Diurnal Cycle and Chemical Reaction Rate’, published in Exact, Natural and Human Sciences in the Presence of Uncontrolled Environment Factors by the University Library of Brussels in 1992. Attention is given to prominent figures such as John Dewey, Michel Gauquelin and Rudolf Steiner and equal prominence given to different perspectives. This is a superb source document for any researcher concerned with twentieth century attempts to demonstrate cosmic influences, some of it necessary reading for all concerned with the wider ramifications of modern cosmology.