Precision Instruments and the Demonstrative Order of Proof in Lavoisier's Chemistry Author(s): Jan Golinski Reviewed work(s): Source: Osiris, 2nd Series, Vol. 9, Instruments (1994), pp. 30-47 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/301997 . Accessed: 20/06/2012 14:38 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The University of Chicago Press and The History of Science Society are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Osiris. http://www.jstor.org Precision Instruments and the Demonstrative Order of Proof in Lavoisier's Chemistry By Jan Golinski* If it is true that a controversy approaches its conclusion by the accumulation of facts that impinge upon it, it is only so pro- vided these "facts" are without ambiguity in their implications. For otherwise, twisted by the rival hypotheses, and sometimes with so many more words that they convey less sense, these "facts" so multiply the extraneous questions that controversies become endless. Thus prejudice and imagination freely hold sway and logic is replaced by fashion. -Jean-Andr6 Deluc (1790)1 HAT,I AFTERMORE THAN A DECADE OF DEBATEabout the fundamen- tals of chemical theory,Jean-Andre Deluc should express frustrationis not really surprising.As an upholderof the traditionaltheory of phlogistonand an oppo- nent of the new theory of Antoine-LaurentLavoisier, Deluc fearedthat the contro- versy would never end. Each new fact could be interpretedin differentways by the two sides and, ratherthan resolving the debate,seemed to bringever more subjects into doubt.Reason, supposedly the securepath to scientifictruth, seemed incapable of deciding the issue. The same sentimentwas voiced nearlysimultaneously by the English chemistJames Keir, who tried to curbthe hopes of his fellow phlogistonist JosephPriestley, who looked forwardto an imminentcompromise. Keir cautioned that"there are wonderfulresources in the disputeabout phlogiston, by which either party can evade, so that I am less sanguine than you are in my hopes of seeing it terminated."2 Historiansare interested in controversiesfor muchthe same reasonsthat historical participantslike Deluc and Keir found them so frustrating.As "facts"accumulate on each side, less and less appearsto be certain.Instead, debate ramifies across an ever wider range of questions.Phenomena, methods, apparatus,personal compe- tence, assumptionsand principles-all may become issues in dispute.Hence if con- troversiesbecome prolonged,more and morebackground assumptions and practices * Departmentof History,University of New Hampshire,Durham, New Hampshire03824-3586. l "Lettrede M. DeLuc a M. De La MWtherie,sur la naturede 1eau, du phlogistique,des acides & des airs,"Observations et MWmoiressur la Physique, sur 1'Histoire Naturelle, et sur les Arts et Me- tiers, 1790, 36:144-154, on p. 153. 2 James Keir to Joseph Priestley,[n.d., 1789?], in A ScientificAutobiography of Joseph Priestley (1733-1804), ed. RobertE. Schofield (Cambridge,Mass.: MIT Press, 1966), pp. 252-253, on p. 253. ? 1994 by The History of Science Society. All rights reserved.0369-7827/94/0008-0001$01.00 OSIRIS1994, 9: 30-47 30 PROOF IN LAVOISIER'SCHEMISTRY 31 are exposed to view. Much recent historicalwork has shown the value of disputes as sites for examining scientific practice as a social activity.In controversiesit is particularlyclear how manyelements of historicalcontext shape rival interpretations of natureand how many "wonderfulresources" are availableto those tryingto close the issue3 Lavoisier's"chemical revolution" presents itself as an underexploitedfield for such study.There has been relativelylittle workon the dynamicsof the controversy, which ebbed and flowed throughoutthe 1780s and into the following decade. Per- haps historianshave been too concernedwith trying to grasp in essentialistterms the real natureof Lavoisier'sachievement or assessing whetherit deservesthe label "revolution."The processof persuasionundertaken by Lavoisierand his allies in the 1780s tends to be regardedas an aftermathto the main events. And yet what Carl Perrincalled the "'triumphof the antiphlogistians"was no walkover,but a lengthy process that deserves detailed investigation.Controversy ranged over numerousis- sues of fact and swelled to embracemethodological, linguistic, and social questions. Lavoisier'ssystem as a whole was articulatedin the contextof this debate.The map- ping of the strugglein its temporal,geographical, and social dimensionsis a large- scale task, but one that promises considerablerewards in historicalunderstanding of the processes of science.4 Such a mappingcannot be attemptedhere, thougha step can be takentowards it by surveyingthe role of instrumentsin the controversy.Trevor Levere has recently remindedus of the importanceof Lavoisier'snovel instruments,including the calo- rimeterand the balance,and of theirrole in the campaignagainst phlogiston. Fred- eric L. Holmes has pointed out how radicala breakthis apparatusmarked with the "longueduree" of the eighteenth-centurychemical laboratory. And ArthurDonovan has arguedthat Lavoisier's instrumentation signals his transferinto chemistryof the methods of the more mathematizedphysical sciences.5In this articleI build upon this work to place Lavoisier'sapparatus against the backgroundof the controversy surroundinghis new chemistry.My aim is to use the circumstancesof dispute to expose the assumptionsand practicesgoverning his deploymentof this particular technology. 'For sociological work on controversies,see H. M. Collins, Changing Order: Replication and Induction in Scientific Practice (London/BeverlyHills: Sage, 1985); and Collins, ed., Knowledge and Controversy:Studies of Modern Natural Science, special issue of Social Studies of Science, 1981, 11(1). Historical studies include Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer,Leviathan and the Air- Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the ExperimentalLife (Princeton:Princeton Univ. Press, 1985); Martin J. S. Rudwick, The GreatDevonian Controversy:The Shaping of ScientificKnowledge among Gen- tlemanly Specialists (Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press, 1985); and James A. Secord, Controversyin VictorianGeology: The Cambrian-SilurianDispute (Princeton:Princeton Univ. Press, 1986). 4Carleton Perrin, "The Triumphof the Antiphlogistians$'in The Analytic Spirit: Essays in the History of Science in Honor of Henry Guerlac, ed. HarryWoolf (Ithaca,N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 1981), pp. 40-63. Other work on the controversyincludes Karl Hufbauer,The Formationof the German Chemical Community(1720-1795) (Berkeley/LosAngeles: Univ. CaliforniaPress, 1982); JohnG. McEvoy,"The Enlightenmentand the ChemicalRevolution" in Metaphysicsand Philosophy of Science in the Seventeenthand Eighteenth Centuries:Essays in Honour of Gerd Buchdahl, ed. R. S. Woolhouse (Dordrecht:Kluwer Academic, 1988), pp. 307-325; and some of the essays in ArthurDonovan, ed., The ChemicalRevolution: Essays in Reinterpretation,Osiris, 2nd ser., 1988, 4. 5Trevor H. Levere, "Lavoisier:Language, Instruments,and the Chemical Revolution"in Nature Experimentand the Sciences, ed. Levere and W. R. Shea (Dordrecht:Kluwer Academic 1990), pp. 207-233; FredericLawrence Holmes, Eighteenth-CenturyChemistry as an InvestigativeEnterprise (Berkeley: Office for History of Science and Technology,Univ. California, 1989), esp. Ch. 5; and ArthurDonovan, "Lavoisierand the Origins of ModernChemistry," Osiris, 1988, 4:214-231. 32 JAN GOLINSKI Controversyenables us to see how materialapparatus is embeddedin specific settingsof practicethat enable it to functionas a tool of investigationand persuasion. We shall see that Lavoisierhad to mobilize particularpersonnel and their skills to craft and use his instruments.He forged links with practitionersof the exact sci- ences, trainedin the French mathematicalengineering tradition, and with skilled instrumentmakers.6 He expendedsubstantial financial resources on the construction of his apparatus.He mastereddifficult techniques of measurementand calculation- in calibration,for example. He also constructedsocial and literary"technologies," managingthe audiencesat set-pieceexperimental demonstrations and conveying the results in a writtenform that stressedthe accuracyof the proceduresand the high standardof proof therebyachieved. In the ongoing controversy,many aspects of this form of practicewere made explicit in the courseof challengesto, and defenses of, Lavoisier'sclaims. Outside Lavoisier'sown setting, his instrumentsdid not always convey their hoped-forpersuasive potential. Many resources enabled opponents such as Priestley andKeir to evadethe purportedimplications of his experiments.Priestley articulated a radically different model of scientific practice and condemnedLavoisier's sup- posed accuracyas the spuriousresult of excessively complex experimentalcontriv- ances. For Priestley,his own inability to replicate the French experimentswas a reason not to trust them. Thus discussion of instrumentswas implicatedin wider debates about the way science should be practiced.Arguably, the