1704 in science
Encyclopedia
The year 1704 in science
and technology
involved some significant events.
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
and technology
Technology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...
involved some significant events.
General
- John HarrisJohn Harris (writer)John Harris was an English writer, scientist, and Anglican priest. He is best known as the editor of the Lexicon Technicum: Or, A Universal English Dictionary of Arts and Sciences , the earliest of English encyclopaedias, and as the compiler of the Collection of Voyages and Travels which was...
publishes the first edition of the Lexicon TechnicumLexicon technicumLexicon Technicum: Or, An Universal English Dictionary of Arts and Sciences: Explaining not only the Terms of Art, but the Arts Themselves was in many respects the first alphabetical encyclopedia written in English...
, an encyclopedic dictionaryEncyclopedic dictionaryAn encyclopedic dictionary typically includes a large number of short listings, arranged alphabetically, and discussing a wide range of topics. Encyclopedic dictionaries can be general, containing articles on topics in many different fields; or they can specialize in a particular field...
of science.
Astronomy
- approx. date - The first modern orreryOrreryAn orrery is a mechanical device that illustrates the relative positions and motions of the planets and moons in the Solar System in a heliocentric model. Though the Greeks had working planetaria, the first orrery that was a planetarium of the modern era was produced in 1704, and one was presented...
is built by George GrahamGeorge Graham (clockmaker)George Graham was an English clockmaker, inventor, and geophysicist, and a Fellow of the Royal Society.He was born to George Graham in Kirklinton, Cumberland. A Friend like his mentor Thomas Tompion, Graham left Cumberland in 1688 for London to work with Tompion...
and Thomas TompionThomas TompionThomas Tompion was an English clock maker, watchmaker and mechanician who is still regarded to this day as the Father of English Clockmaking. Tompion's work includes some of the most historic and important clocks and watches in the world and can command very high prices whenever outstanding...
.
Meteorology
- Daniel DefoeDaniel DefoeDaniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...
documents the Great Storm of 1703Great Storm of 1703The Great Storm of 1703 was the most severe storm or natural disaster ever recorded in the southern part of Great Britain. It affected southern England and the English Channel in the Kingdom of Great Britain...
with eyewitness testimonies in The StormThe Storm (Daniel Defoe)The Storm is a pioneering work of journalism and science reporting by British author Daniel Defoe. It has been called the first substantial work of modern journalism, the first account of a hurricane in Britain, and was the first book-length work of Defoe's career. It details the events of a...
(London).
Physics
- Isaac NewtonIsaac NewtonSir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...
releases a record of experimentExperimentAn experiment is a methodical procedure carried out with the goal of verifying, falsifying, or establishing the validity of a hypothesis. Experiments vary greatly in their goal and scale, but always rely on repeatable procedure and logical analysis of the results...
s and the deductionDeductive reasoningDeductive reasoning, also called deductive logic, is reasoning which constructs or evaluates deductive arguments. Deductive arguments are attempts to show that a conclusion necessarily follows from a set of premises or hypothesis...
s made from them in OpticksOpticksOpticks is a book written by English physicist Isaac Newton that was released to the public in 1704. It is about optics and the refraction of light, and is considered one of the great works of science in history...
, a major contribution in study of opticsOpticsOptics is the branch of physics which involves the behavior and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behavior of visible, ultraviolet, and infrared light...
and refractionRefractionRefraction is the change in direction of a wave due to a change in its speed. It is essentially a surface phenomenon . The phenomenon is mainly in governance to the law of conservation of energy. The proper explanation would be that due to change of medium, the phase velocity of the wave is changed...
of light.
Technology
- The second electric machineElectric motorAn electric motor converts electrical energy into mechanical energy.Most electric motors operate through the interaction of magnetic fields and current-carrying conductors to generate force...
is invented by British engineer Francis Hauksbee the elder (16661666 in scienceThe year 1666 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Mathematics:* Sir Isaac Newton develops differential calculus.* Samuel Morland produces several designs of pocket calculating machine and also publishes A New Method of Cryptography.-Physics:* Sir Isaac Newton uses a prism to...
-17131713 in scienceThe year 1713 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Astronomy:* John Rowley of London produces an orrery to a commission by Charles Boyle, 4th Earl of Orrery.-Mathematics:* September 9 - Nicolas Bernoulli first describes the St...
): the machine was a sphere of glass rotated by a wheel. - For watch movements, Peter Debaufre invents the Debaufre escapementEscapementIn mechanical watches and clocks, an escapement is a device that transfers energy to the timekeeping element and enables counting the number of oscillations of the timekeeping element...
, the first frictional rest watch escapement produced: the escapement consists of two saw-tooth escape wheels of the same count. - For watch bearings, a jewel bearing made of rubyRubyA ruby is a pink to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum . The red color is caused mainly by the presence of the element chromium. Its name comes from ruber, Latin for red. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called sapphires...
, comprising a ring (the "hole") with a sink for oil, is invented by Nicholas Facio with Peter and Jacob Debaufre, who used pierced natural rubies. Other gemstones have been used since, including garnetGarnetThe garnet group includes a group of minerals that have been used since the Bronze Age as gemstones and abrasives. The name "garnet" may come from either the Middle English word gernet meaning 'dark red', or the Latin granatus , possibly a reference to the Punica granatum , a plant with red seeds...
(which is too soft) and diamondDiamondIn mineralogy, diamond is an allotrope of carbon, where the carbon atoms are arranged in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure called a diamond lattice. Diamond is less stable than graphite, but the conversion rate from diamond to graphite is negligible at ambient conditions...
s. In the 20th century, synthetic ruby or sapphireSapphireSapphire is a gemstone variety of the mineral corundum, an aluminium oxide , when it is a color other than red or dark pink; in which case the gem would instead be called a ruby, considered to be a different gemstone. Trace amounts of other elements such as iron, titanium, or chromium can give...
becomes universal for jewel bearings. - In oil paintingOil paintingOil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...
, colormaker Diesbach of BerlinBerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
(GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
) accidentally invents the pigmentPigmentA pigment is a material that changes the color of reflected or transmitted light as the result of wavelength-selective absorption. This physical process differs from fluorescence, phosphorescence, and other forms of luminescence, in which a material emits light.Many materials selectively absorb...
Prussian bluePrussian bluePrussian blue is a dark blue pigment with the idealized formula Fe718. Another name for the color Prussian blue is Berlin blue or, in painting, Parisian blue. Turnbull's blue is the same substance but is made from different reagents....
, a powerful dark blue pigment with greenish undertones (made from alumAlumAlum is both a specific chemical compound and a class of chemical compounds. The specific compound is the hydrated potassium aluminium sulfate with the formula KAl2.12H2O. The wider class of compounds known as alums have the related empirical formula, AB2.12H2O.-Chemical properties:Alums are...
and animal bones); therefore, Prussian blue cannot be found in a paint layer predating 1704.
Births
- February 28 - Louis GodinLouis GodinLouis Godin was a French astronomer and member of the French Academy of Sciences. He worked in Peru, Spain, Portugal and France.-Biography:...
, French astronomer (died 17601760 in scienceThe year 1760 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Chemistry:* Louis Claude Cadet de Gassicourt investigates inks based on cobalt salts and isolates cacodyl from cobalt mineral containing arsenic, pioneering work in organometallic chemistry.-Geology:* John Michell suggests...
) - June 4 - Benjamin HuntsmanBenjamin HuntsmanBenjamin Huntsman was an English inventor and manufacturer of cast or crucible steel.-Biography:Huntsman was born the third son of a Quaker farmer in Epworth, Lincolnshire. His parents were Germans who had emigrated only a few years before his birth.Huntsman started business as a clock, lock and...
, English inventor and manufacturer (died 17761776 in scienceThe year 1776 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Botany:* William Withering publishes The botanical arrangement of all the vegetables naturally growing in Great Britain, the first flora in English based on Linnaean taxonomy....
) - June 17 - John KayJohn Kay (flying shuttle)John Kay was the inventor of the flying shuttle, which was a key contribution to the Industrial Revolution. He is often confused with his namesake: fellow Lancastrian textile machinery inventor, the unrelated John Kay who built the first "spinning frame".-Life in England:John Kay was born...
, English inventor (died 17801780 in scienceThe year 1780 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Health:* Clément-Joseph Tissot publishes Gymnastique médicinale et chirurgicale, ou, essai sur l'utilité du mouvement, ou des différens exercices du corps, et du repos dans la cure des malades in Paris, the first text on the...
) - July 31 - Gabriel CramerGabriel CramerGabriel Cramer was a Swiss mathematician, born in Geneva. He showed promise in mathematics from an early age. At 18 he received his doctorate and at 20 he was co-chair of mathematics.In 1728 he proposed a solution to the St...
, Swiss mathematician (died 17521752 in scienceThe year 1752 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Chemistry:* Thomas Melvill delivers a lecture entitled Observations on light and colours to the Medical Society of Edinburgh, a precursor of flame emission spectroscopy....
) - (c. 1704) - William BattieWilliam BattieWilliam Battie , 1 September 1703–13 June 1776, was an English physician who published in 1758 the first lengthy book on the treatment of mental illness, A Treatise on Madness, and by extending methods of treatment to the poor as well as the affluent, helped raise psychiatry to a respectable...
, English psychiatrist (died 17761776 in scienceThe year 1776 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Botany:* William Withering publishes The botanical arrangement of all the vegetables naturally growing in Great Britain, the first flora in English based on Linnaean taxonomy....
) - undated - Richard PocockeRichard PocockeRichard Pococke was an English prelate and anthropologist. He was Protestant Bishop of Ossory and Meath , both dioceses of the Church of Ireland...
, English anthropologist and explorer (died 17651765 in scienceThe year 1765 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Technology:* James Watt makes a breakthrough in the development of the steam engine by constructing a model with a separate condenser.-Births:...
)
Deaths
- February 2 - Guillaume François Antoine, Marquis de l'Hôpital, French mathematician (born 16611661 in scienceThe year 1661 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Biology:* Marcello Malpighi is the first to observe and correctly describe capillaries when he discovers them in a frog's lung.-Environment:...
) - March 17 - Menno, Baron van CoehoornMenno van CoehoornMenno, Baron van Coehoorn was a Dutch soldier and military engineer of Swedish extraction. He made a number of influential weaponry innovations in siege warfare and fortification techniques...
, Dutch military engineer (born 16411641 in scienceThe year 1641 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Technology:* The sealed thermometer is developed with Ferdinand II, Grand Duke of Tuscany, using a glass tube containing alcohol, which freezes well below the freezing point of water....
) - April 15 - Johann van Waveren HuddeJohann van Waveren HuddeJohannes Hudde was a burgomaster of Amsterdam between 1672 – 1703, a mathematician and governor of the Dutch East India Company....
, Dutch mathematician (born 16281628 in scienceThe year 1628 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Medicine and physiology:* William Harvey publishes his findings about blood circulation in Exercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Animalibus.-Births:...
) - July 7 - Pierre-Charles Le SueurPierre-Charles Le SueurPierre-Charles Le Sueur was a French fur trader and explorer in North America, recognized as the first known European to explore the Minnesota River valley....
, French fur trader and explorer (born c.16571657 in scienceThe year 1657 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Mathematics:* Christiaan Huygens writes the first book to be published on probability theory, De ratiociniis in ludo aleae .-Medicine:...
)