The Art of Scientific Discovery, or the General Conditions and Methods of Research in Physics and Chemistry

Abstract

IT is not easy to say when scientific research, using the expression in its strictest sense, was first commenced. M. Libri remarks: “Les recherches des Pythagoriciens sur les vibrations des corps, sont les plus anciennes expériences de physique qui soient parvenues jusqu' à nous.” Archimedes must certainly be credited with some knowledge of research; and to a lesser extent Ptolemy the astronomer, and Hero, of Alexandria. But, as a matter of fact, experimental researches in physics were not made before the epoch of Galileo, nor in chemistry before the epoch of Lavoisier. The discovery of new methods of mathematical analysis on the one hand, and the invention of instruments of precision on the other, were necessary forerunners of the development of research. Moreover, the advocacy of the abandonment of that blind reverence for authority which had retarded the progress of the sciences for many centuries, tended in the same direction. In this respect, whatever we may say of Campanella, Nizolius, Telesius, and others, our own Francis Bacon did more true service than any of his predecessors; and we must always regard his writings as the most potent engine concerned in the overthrow of Aristotelianism, Scholasticism, and the method of pure logic, and in the substitution of the experimental method blended with just logical induction and deduction.

The Art of Scientific Discovery, or the General Conditions and Methods of Research in Physics and Chemistry.

By G. Gore. (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1878.)