Henry Smith Williams - A History of Science (volume 4)

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A HISTORY OF SCIENCE

BY HENRY SMITH WILLIAMS, M.D., LL.D.

ASSISTED BY EDWARD H. WILLIAMS, M.D.

IN FIVE VOLUMES

VOLUME IV.

MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF THE

CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

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History of Science

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A HISTORY OF SCIENCE

BOOK IV

MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

AS regards chronology, the epoch covered in the present volume is

identical with that viewed in the preceding one. But now as

regards subject matter we pass on to those diverse phases of the

physical world which are the field of the chemist, and to those

yet more intricate processes which have to do with living

organisms. So radical are the changes here that we seem to be

entering new worlds; and yet, here as before, there are

intimations of the new discoveries away back in the Greek days.

The solution of the problem of respiration will remind us that

Anaxagoras half guessed the secret; and in those diversified

studies which tell us of the Daltonian atom in its wonderful

transmutations, we shall be reminded again of the Clazomenian

philosopher and his successor Democritus.

Yet we should press the analogy much too far were we to intimate

that the Greek of the elder day or any thinker of a more recent

period had penetrated, even in the vaguest way, all of the

mysteries that the nineteenth century has revealed in the fields

of chemistry and biology. At the very most the insight of those

great Greeks and of the wonderful seventeenth-century

philosophers who so often seemed on the verge of our later

discoveries did no more than vaguely anticipate their successors

of this later century. To gain an accurate, really specific

History of Science

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knowledge of the properties of elementary bodies was reserved for

the chemists of a recent epoch. The vague Greek questionings as

to organic evolution were world-wide from the precise inductions

of a Darwin. If the mediaeval Arabian endeavored to dull the

knife of the surgeon with the use of drugs, his results hardly

merit to be termed even an anticipation of modern anaesthesia.

And when we speak of preventive medicine--of bacteriology in all

its phases--we have to do with a marvellous field of which no

previous generation of men had even the slightest inkling.

All in all, then, those that lie before us are perhaps the most

wonderful and the most fascinating of all the fields of science.

As the chapters of the preceding book carried us out into a

macrocosm of inconceivable magnitude, our present studies are to

reveal a microcosm of equally inconceivable smallness. As the

studies of the physicist attempted to reveal the very nature of

matter and of energy, we have now to seek the solution of the yet

more inscrutable problems of life and of mind.

I. THE PHLOGISTON THEORY IN CHEMISTRY

The development of the science of chemistry from the "science" of

alchemy is a striking example of the complete revolution in the

attitude of observers in the field of science. As has been

pointed out in a preceding chapter, the alchemist, having a

preconceived idea of how things should be, made all his

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experiments to prove his preconceived theory; while the chemist

reverses this attitude of mind and bases his conceptions on the

results of his laboratory experiments. In short, chemistry is

what alchemy never could be, an inductive science. But this

transition from one point of view to an exactly opposite one was

necessarily a very slow process. Ideas that have held undisputed

sway over the minds of succeeding generations for hundreds of

years cannot be overthrown in a moment, unless the agent of such

an overthrow be so obvious that it cannot be challenged. The

rudimentary chemistry that overthrew alchemy had nothing so

obvious and palpable.

The great first step was the substitution of the one principle,

phlogiston, for the three principles, salt, sulphur, and mercury.

We have seen how the experiment of burning or calcining such a

metal as lead "destroyed" the lead as such, leaving an entirely

different substance in its place, and how the original metal

could be restored by the addition of wheat to the calcined

product. To the alchemist this was "mortification" and

"revivification" of the metal. For, as pointed out by

Paracelsus, "anything that could be killed by man could also be

revivified by him, although this was not possible to the things

killed by God." The burning of such substances as wood, wax,

oil, etc., was also looked upon as the same "killing" process,

and the fact that the alchemist was unable to revivify them was

regarded as simply the lack of skill on his part, and in no wise

affecting the theory itself.

But the iconoclastic spirit, if not the acceptance of all the

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teachings, of the great Paracelsus had been gradually taking root

among the better class of alchemists, and about the middle of the

seventeenth century Robert Boyle (1626-1691) called attention to

the possibility of making a wrong deduction from the phenomenon

of the calcination of the metals, because of a very important

factor, the action of the air, which was generally overlooked.

And he urged his colleagues of the laboratories to give greater

heed to certain other phenomena that might pass unnoticed in the

ordinary calcinating process. In his work, The Sceptical Chemist,

he showed the reasons for doubting the threefold constitution of

matter; and in his General History of the Air advanced some novel

and carefully studied theories as to the composition of the

atmosphere. This was an important step, and although Boyle is not

directly responsible for the phlogiston theory, it is probable

that his experiments on the atmosphere influenced considerably

the real founders, Becker and Stahl.

Boyle gave very definitely his idea of how he thought air might

be composed. "I conjecture that the atmospherical air consists of

three different kinds of corpuscles," he says; "the first, those

numberless particles which, in the form of vapors or dry

exhalations, ascend from the earth, water, minerals, vegetables,

animals, etc.; in a word, whatever substances are elevated by the

celestial or subterraneal heat, and thence diffused into the

atmosphere. The second may be yet more subtle, and consist of

those exceedingly minute atoms, the magnetical effluvia of the

earth, with other innumerable particles sent out from the bodies

of the celestial luminaries, and causing, by their influence, the

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AHISTORYOFSCIENCEBYHENRYSMITHWILLIAMS,M.D.,LL.D.ASSISTEDBYEDWARDH.WILLIAMS,M.D.INFIVEVOLUMESVOLUMEIV.MODERNDEVELOPMENTOFTHECHEMICALANDBIOLOGICALSCIENCESGetanybookforfreeon:www.Abika.comHistoryofScienceGetanybookforfreeon:www.Abika.com2AHISTORYOFSCIENCEBOOKIVMODERNDEVELOPMENTOFTHECHEMICALANDBIOLOGICA...

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Henry Smith Williams - A History of Science (volume 4)

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