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Styles of Experimental Reasoning in Early Modern Chemistry

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Styles of Experimental Reasoning in Early Modern Chemistry Styles of Experimental Reasoning in Early Modern Chemistry By Victor Dan Boantza A thesis submitted in conformity with requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology University of Toronto © Copyright by Victor Dan Boantza 2009 Styles of Experimental Reasoning in Early Modern Chemistry Victor Dan Boantza Doctor of Philosophy Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology University of Toronto 2009 Abstract The science of chemistry has undergone two major transformative changes during the early modern period, both closely related to two of the most revolutionary episodes in the history of Western science. The dissertation consists of a historical-analytical comparative exploration of early modern chemical thought and practice based on two series of interconnected case studies related, respectively, to the seventeenth-century Scientific Revolution and the eighteenth-century Chemical Revolution. Although rarely considered together in the context of the history of chemistry, during both Revolutions, similar forces combined to generate crises in chemical knowledge and practice, to use a well-known Kuhnian notion. Differences in nature and historical evolution notwithstanding, both instances featured attempts at quantification and physicalist reductions of chemistry: during the 1660s-1680s Boyle advanced a reconciliation of chymical experimental knowledge with the budding mechanical philosophy, predicated upon the physically governed laws of matter and motion; during the last third of the eighteenth-century, Lavoisier (et al.) submitted chemical phenomena to the ‘rule of the balance’, as a part of an all-encompassing experimentalist, theoretical and linguistic reformation anchored in the conservation of weight principle. ii Concerned with the ‘losers’ (the chemists par excellence) rather than the ‘winners’, the study analyzes the reactions of leading contemporary chemists. Part I explores a critique of Boyle’s experimental philosophy and mechanist agendas conducted by French Royal Academician Samuel C. Duclos (1598-1685). In face of what he perceived as the unwarranted mechanical reduction of chymistry, Duclos set out to rehabilitate traditional chemical philosophy, drawing upon Paracelsian and Helmontian notions. This critique (1667-68) sparked a lengthy debate over cohesion and coagulation between academicians of diverging chymical and physical persuasions, culminating in the 1669 dispute over pesanteur and gravity. Part II examines Joseph Priestley’s and Richard Kirwan’s defenses of phlogistic chemistry and their respective versions of chemical experimentalism, followed by a broader contextualizing inquiry into the nature of the metaphysical, epistemological and rhetorical commitments that were defended under the banner of the phlogistic chemical worldview during the late stages of the Chemical Revolution. The category of Style of Experimental Reasoning (SER)—derived from A. C. Crombie and I. Hacking—is introduced, developed and used for capturing salient features of early modern chemical knowledge as it was dynamically molded at the confluence of discourse and practice. In contrasting contemporary chemists’ reactions to the physicalist challenges, the two revolutionary episodes mutually illuminate each other; the category of SER affords a reconstruction of the chemists’ unique realm of action and subsequent production of chemical knowledge. Inquiring into the dialectics of continuity-versus- discontinuity between the two perceived Revolutions, the study redraws the line between the ‘chymical’ and the ‘physical’, providing a new understanding of the metaphysical and experimental complexities involved in the birth of modern chemistry. iii Acknowledgements It is a great pleasure to acknowledge the support of the following people and institutions. I thank my family for supporting me during my graduate studies. Special thanks go to my mother, for her constant interest and concern; her unfailing confidence in me has been a particular source of encouragement and motivation. I thank Raphael Steinitz for his keen interest in my work and progress, for his support, and for many interesting conversations. Daphna Sharan has stood by me for many years, patiently reading all my papers since my years as an undergraduate at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel. I am deeply grateful for her support, insights, and advice. Her presence in my life has kept me grounded. I am grateful for the financial support through scholarships and grants without which my research would have been impossible. My thanks go to the University of Toronto Connaught Scholarship Fund, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship Program, the IHPST, and the Chemical Heritage Foundation for the Roy G. Neville Fellowship. I thank Janis Langins and Brian Baigrie for their suggestions and comments on my doctoral research. Lawrence Principe has been a source of inspiration in both his work and in person. Special thanks go to David Knight for his comments on my thesis and for stimulating discussions. The many good times with my friends and colleagues have kept the writing of this dissertation in perspective. In particular, I thank Arik Sherman, Amir Karton, Nimrod Maman, Merom Kalie, Martha Harris, Conor Burns, Brigit Ramsingh, and Erich Weidenhammer. iv Two scholars and friends, Ofer Gal and Alice Stroup, deserve particular mention. Ofer Gal has introduced me to the History and Philosophy of Science in 1999 and since that time he has been a constant source of information, critical comment, and assistance; I am truly grateful for the many things he had taught me over the years, and for his unsparing moral and intellectual support. Alice Stroup began by generously sharing with me, a few years ago, her archival material and conjectures on chemistry and the early Parisian Royal Academy of Sciences; since then she shared freely her remarkably wide knowledge of the history of early modern science and French history, has read and commented on several drafts and papers, and provided me with a vital source of intellectual enthusiasm and originality. Lastly, and most significantly, I thank my doctoral supervisor, Trevor H. Levere, a fountain of knowledge and experience, and my chief mentor over the past six years. I am deeply grateful for his advice, interest, generosity, and concern, and above all for his unique perceptiveness as a teacher, as well as for the intellectual environment and professional standards he provided me with during my graduate studies. Much of what I have learned and achieved as a doctoral student career owes to him. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction Overview 1 Methodological Framework: Objectives and Subjects Two “Revolutions”, One “Normal Science” and The “Crises” of Early Modern Chemistry 8 Quantification and Physicalist Reduction: A “Crisis-Provoking Problem” 14 The Chymical vs. the Physical: Reactions and Actions in Early Modern Chemistry Thematic Outline 22 From Reaction to Action: Style of Experimental Reasoning (SER) 28 PART I: CHYMISTRY AND THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION Chapter 1 Chemical Philosophy and Boyle’s Philosophical Chemistry: Duclos Reads Boyle Background Samuel C. Duclos and Chymistry at the Early Académie 39 “Precise Speculations” and “Sensible Operations” 47 The Crisis of Chymical Principles 53 “Out of the Strong Came Something Sweet” 58 Duclos’s Principles 73 Particles of Saltpetre 79 Duclos on Boyle’s “Un-Succeeding Experiments” 93 Alkahest, Corpuscles and Fire 102 From Cohesion to Pesanteur 120 Conclusion and Interlude PART II: CHEMISTRY AND THE CHEMICAL REVOLUTION Chapter 2 Collecting Airs and Ideas: Priestley’s Style of Experimental Reasoning Introduction: Enduring Historiographic Difficulties 144 Background to Priestley’s Chemical Practice and Writing(s) 150 Experimental Commitments: The Case of Nitrous Air 154 The Science of Making and the Making of Science: Priestley’s SER 166 Conclusion 176 Excursus: Rereading Priestley Out of (traditional) Context 178 Chapter 3 Richard Kirwan’s “Ingenious Modifications… Into the Theory of Phlogiston” Introduction: History and Historiography 182 Phlogistic Transmutations and the Metaphysics of Pneumatic Entities 190 The Phlogistic Constitution and Role of Heat 200 Kirwan Enters the Phlogistic Arena: Innovations and Renovations 212 vi Conclusion 230 Chapter 4 Chemical Uniformity and the Rise of a “False Shew of Simplicity” 232 Introduction 232 “Red Vapours” vs. “Absolute facts” 236 “Certain Quantities” vs. “Proportions” 249 The Force of affinity and Affinity as a Force 253 Uniformity vs. Simplicity 259 Conclusion 265 “LAWS OF ANOTHER ORDER”: CONCLUDING REMARKS 267 BIBLIOGRAPHY 278 vii List of Figures P. 212: Figure 1: Adair Crawford’s conceptual representation of the relationship between “heat capacity” and “absolute heat” in two bodies or “quantitative matter.” Crawford, A. Experiments and Observations on Animal Heat, London: J. Murray & J. Sewell, 1779. P. 214: Figure 2: Richard Kirwan’s table of specific heats. Reproduced in W. Cleghorn’s De igne, 1779, trans. & comm. by D. McKie & N. H. de V. Heathcote. London, 1960. (reprinted in Annals of Science 14.1, 1958) P. 255: Figure 3: Table of “Single Elective Attractions” from Bergman’s Dissertation on Elective Attractions, London: J. Murray, 1785 versus Lavoisier’s ”table of oxygenous principle” from Kirwan’s Essay on Phlogiston and the Constitution of Acids, London: J. Johnson, 1789. viii 1 INTRODUCTION OVERVIEW The science of chemistry has undergone two major
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