HERMANN VON HELMHOLTZ

1821-1894

PDF

BY

LEO KOENIGSBERGER

TRANSLATED BYFRANCES A. WELBY

WITH A PREFACE

BY

LORD KELVIN

 

IN the historical record of science the name of Helmholtz stands unique in grandeur, as a master and leader in mathematics, and in biology, and in physics. His admirable theory of vortex rings is one of the most beautiful of all the beautiful pieces of mathematical work hitherto done in the dynamics of incompressible fluids. In 1843, when he was only twenty-two years old, and barely emerged from his undergraduate course as a medical student, he showed, in his first published scientific paper, a clear appreciation of the necessity of distinguishing vital from non-vital phenomena: and he gave experimental evidence tending to prove that putrefaction and fermentation are essentially vital actions : and thus led the way to Pasteur's splendid and beneficent discoveries. His Erhaltung der Kraft, published in 1847, was a guide to his own countrymen, and to the rest of the world, in the doctrine of energy through the whole range of dynamic action in dead and living matter, then despised and rejected by nearly all the high priests of science ; now cherished by all as a most fruitful result of modern research. His Tonempfindungen, and his Physiological Optics, are not mere textbooks: they are ever memorable PrinCipia of the perception of sound, and of light, by living creatures.

The professional career of Helmholtz was unparalleled in the history of professions. He was Military Surgeon in the Prussian army five years; Teacher of Anatomy in the Academy of Arts in Berlin one year ; Professor of Pathology and Physiology in KCnigsberg six years; Professor of Anatomy in Bonn three years ; Professor of Physiology in Heidelberg thirteen years ; Professor of Physics in the University of Berlin about twenty years, till he became Director of the new 'Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt'. He occupied this post during the last years of his life, still continuing to give lectures as Professor of Physics.

Beginning with the generous aid and co-operation of Werner von Siemens, and ultimately supported by the financial resources of their country, Helmholtz created the Reichsanstalt, which has already conferred inestimable benefits, not only on Germany, but on the whole world. It is an example, tardily and imperfectly fol-lowed by Great Britain and other countries only now beginning to learn that scientific research yields results which are valuable, not merely for the discovery of truths appreciated only by scientific workers, but for contributing in many ways to the welfare of the whole people.

The Faraday Lecture, delivered by Helmholtz before the Fellows of the Chemical Society in the theatre of the Royal Institution on Tuesday, April 5, 1881,was an epoch-making monument of the progress of Natural Philosophy in the nineteenth century, in virtue of the declaration, then first made, that electricity consists of atoms. Before that time atomic theories of electricity had been noticed and rejected by Faraday and Maxwell, and probably by many other philosophers and workers; but certainly accepted by none. Now in the beginning of the twentieth century we all believe that electricity consists of atoms.

How far-reaching is this theory, and how much science is enriched by it, is splendidly illustrated by Becquerel's discovery of radioactivity, and the magnificent harvests of new and astonishing truth which have been gathered by the numerous and brilliant workers in the field of investigation thus opened to the world.

I cannot conclude this short preface without re-ferring to the great debt which the world owes to Helmholtz, in having given to Hertz the inspiration to find experimental proof of Maxwell's electric waves; and giving him, in the Physical Institute of the University of Berlin, the apparatus and appliances by means of which he carried out the investigation. To this we owe the first practical demonstration of progressive electric waves, and of stationary waves, in air, and therefore inferentially in ether undisturbed by ponderable matter. Thus in Helmholtz we find a prime factor in the grand series of theoretical and experimental researches through which wireless telegraphy has been achieved.

The Oxford University Press has earned the gratitude of all English-speaking scientific workers in giving to them this English version of the very valuable and interesting Life of Helmholtz, by Dr. Konigsberger.

L. KELVIN.