ABSTRACT
The history of science can, as a rule, be most objectively described not by participants in the events but by specialists in a respective field or professional historians of science, who are ready to consider thoroughly and to compare all the available material. As for me, first of all I myself participated in the theoretical studies of ferroelectric phenomena and soft modes and, second, I have no taste for historic researches and for analysis of priority questions. Therefore, I have made up my mind to make here some remarks of a historical character only because of the existing rather peculiar situation. Indeed, in all Russian books that deal with the relevant problems, I am referred to as the author or one of the few authors of the phenomenological (thermodynamic) theory of ferroelectric phenomena and of the concept of a soft mode. Almost with the same persistence, my work on the theory of ferroelectricity and soft modes is never mentioned in books published in the West. Those translated into Russian are always supplied with notes by translators or editors of translation informing the reader that the theory of the BaTi03-type ferroelectrics and, in general, the thermodynamic theory of ferroelectrics has been developed also by Ginzburg and that the concept of a soft mode also belongs to Ginzburg. The suspicion may arise in this connection that such a situation is a result of either a misplaced patriotism of the Soviet authors or of some priority claims on my part (such claims, if any, could have influenced the Soviet authors) . I believe neither is true. I have never put forward priority claims and do not intend ever to do this . The Soviet authors often refer to my papers cited here simply because they are known to them and easily available. As far as L D Landau1 is concerned, my first work on the theory of ferroelectrics [2] 1 Here I mean the book by L D Landau and EM Lifshitz [1], in section 19 of which it is stated that "the quantitative theory of ferroelectricity can be developed in terms of the
was done, in fact, before his eyes and in concluding paper [2] I acknowledge his 'discussion of the problem'.
