Advanced search
Publication Cover
Annals of Science Volume 46, 1989 - Issue 5
Submit an article Journal homepage
97
Views
5
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Main articles

Chemical explanation and physical dynamics: Two research schools at the First Solvay chemistry conferences, 1922–1928

Mary Jo Nye History of Science Department, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, 73019, U.S.A.
Pages 461-480 | Received 17 Jan 1989, Published online: 23 Aug 2006

  • On Lavoisier, see Melhado Evan M. Chemistry, Physics, and the Chemical Revolution Isis 1985 76 195 211 on nineteenth-century chemistry, see R. F. Bud and G. K. Roberts, Science vs. Practice: Chemistry in Victorian Britain (Manchester, 1984), e.g., pp. 36–7.
  • On Kant, in the Gesammelte Schriften Berlin 1911 IV 470 471 quoted in Frederick Gregory, ‘Romantic Kantianism and the End of the Newtonian Dream in Chemistry,’ Archives Internationales d'Histoire des Sciences, 34 (1984), 108–23 (pp. 109, 113); and William Paley, Natural Theology, revised American edition (New York, 1854), p. 48. I am indebted to Kwangtai Hsu for this reference.
  • The chemical molecule may be defined as the smallest unit of a unique substance to enter into a chemical reaction or exist independently as a stable entity. The physical molecule is an indivisible unit characterized by mass and motion. For example, see Rocke Alan J. Chemical Atomism in the Nineteenth Century: From Dalton to Cannizzaro Columbus, Ohio 1984 10 13 293–5
  • E. J. Holmyard taught at Bristol in this period. For quotation Coulson Papers, MS 12 Bodleian Library
  • During 1911 and 1912, Ernest Solvay corresponded with William Ramsay and Wilhelm Ostwald about convening a conference in chemistry similar to his 1911 physics conference. In 1913, Solvay, Ramsay, Ostwald, and the French chemist Albin Haller met together in Brussels. Solvay pledged one million francs for the foundation of a chemical institute. Initially this institute was linked with the secretariat of the Association Internationale des Sociétés Chimiques, which approved statutes modelled on the Institut International de Physique Solvay, established in 1912. The First World War, Ramsay's death, and the dissolution of the A.I.S.C. in 1919 delayed the initial meeting of a chemistry conference until 1922. By then, internationalism had broken down among chemists. A few weeks before the first Solvay chemistry conference in 1922, French chemists signed a letter declining to attend a summer meeting in Utrecht to discuss re-establishing relations among chemists of Western and Central Europe. A copy of this letter, dated 3 April 1922, is in the Donnan Papers, Library of University College, London. On the Solvay chemical institute and conferences, see Cinquantenaire de l'Institut Internationale de Chimie fondé par Ernest Solvay. 1913–1963 Weissenbruch Brussels imprimateur du Roi, n.d., unpaginated folio volume with 12-inch × 8-inch photographs of participants in the Solvay conferences of 1922, 1925, 1928, 1931, 1934, 1937, 1947, 1950, 1953, 1956, 1959, and 1962.
  • Mills , W.H. 1953 . Schools of Chemistry in Great Britain and Ireland, IV. The University of Cambridge . Journal of the Royal Institute of Chemistry , 77 : 423 – 431 . 467–73 (p. 471)
  • Institut International de Chimie Solvay . 1925 . Rapports et discussions sur cinq questions d'actualité: Premier conseil de chimie, 21 au 27 avril 1922 Paris [hereafter Solvay I], p. xii
  • Letter from Ocatave Dony-Hénault to F. A. Donnan, 5 Janurary 1910, Donnan Papers. The Solvay physics institute was to concentrate on the ‘progress of physics and physical chemistry.’ Jagdish Mehra suggests that the inclusion of physical chemistry was intended as a tribute to Walther Nernst's role in organizing the 1911 Solvay Conference. See Mehra J. The Solvay Conferences on Physics. Aspects of the Development of Physics since 1911 Dordrecht 1975 xv xv
  • Cinquantenaire de l'Institut Internationale de Chimie fondé par Ernest Solvay. 1913–1963 , Brussels : Weissenbruch . imprimateur du Roi, n.d., and see, e.g., Georges Dupont, ‘Sur la covalence,’ Bulletin de la Société Chimique de France, series 4, 49 (1930), 453–95.
  • Letter from Svante Arrhenius to F. A. Donnan, 14 August 1921, Donnan Papers. It was not until he heard Langmuir at Edinburgh, Robert Robinson later said, that he saw the importance of Lewis's and Langmuir's ideas. See Saltzmann Martin N. The Robinson-Ingold Controversy: Precedence in the Electronic Theory of Organic Reactions Journal of Chemical Education 1980 57 484 488 (p. 484)
  • Job , André . La mobilité chimique 248 – 319 . in Solvay I (p. 284)
  • See Daub Edward Rudolf Clausius Dictionary of Scientific Biography New York 1971 II 303 311 (p. 307). Also see my discussion in Mary Jo Nye, ‘The Nineteenth-Century Atomic Debates and the Dilemma of an ‘Indifferent Hypothesis’”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 7 (1976), 245–68.
  • Pope , W.J. 1931 . Rapports et discussions relatif à la configuration des molécules organiques. Quatrième conseil de chimie. 9 au 14 avril 1931 Paris following R. Kuhn's paper, in Institut International de Chimie Solvay [hereafter Solvay IV], p. 394
  • See Rocke Chemical Atomism in the Nineteenth Century: From Dalton to Cannizzaro Columbus, Ohio 1984
  • Thomson , William . 1867 . On Vortex Atoms . Philosophical Magazine , 34 : 15 – 24 . series 4 (pp. 16–7); and Ludwig Boltzmann, ‘On the Necessity of Atomic Theories in Physics,’ The Monist, 12 (1901), 65–79 (pp. 73–4).
  • Stewart , A.W. 1908 . Recent Advances in Organic Chemistry 263 – 263 . London
  • Stewart , A.W. 1908 . Recent Advances in Organic Chemistry 266 – 266 . London
  • Stewart , A.W. 1908 . Recent Advances in Organic Chemistry 267 – 267 . London
  • Robertson , R. 1923 . ‘The Electronic Theory of Valency’ symposium . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 483 – 484 . concluding remarks to
  • Lowry , Thomas . 1923 . Applications in Organic Chemistry of the Electronic Theory of Valence . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 485 – 487 .
  • Born , Max . 1923 . The Constitution of Matter: Modern Atomic and Electron Theories , 1st edition Edited by: Blair , E.W. and Wheeler , T.S. London translated from 2nd German 1920
  • On this point, see my argument in Nye Mary Jo Explanation and Convention in Nineteenth-Century Chemistry New Trends in the History of Science et al. Utrecht in the press
  • Lowry . 1923 . Applications in Organic Chemistry of the Electronic Theory of Valence . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 485 – 487 .
  • Lowry, in discussion following Swarts' paper Institut International de Chimie Solvay Structure et activité chimique. Rapports et discussions. Deuxième conseil de chimie. 16 au 24 avril 1925 Paris 1926 244 245 [hereafter Solvay II]
  • Job, in discussion following Sidgwick's paper Institut International de Chimie Solvay Rapports et discussions sur des questions d'actualité. Troisième conseil de chimie. 12 au 18 avril 1928 Paris 1928 412 412 [hereafter Solvay III]
  • Job's Les réactions intermédiaires Solvay II 424 424 note 1; and 443
  • Lowry , Thomas . 1923 . Intramolecular Ionisation in Organic Compounds . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 487 – 496 . (p. 490)
  • See Ihde Aaron The Development of Modern Chemistry New York 1964 413 413
  • See W. A. Noyes's résumé of the development iof the electron theory of valence from the chemical point of view in discussion at the 1923 Faraday Society Symposium Transactions of the Faraday Society 1923 19 476 478
  • Lapworth , Arthur . 1898 . A Possible Basis of Generalization of Intramolecular Changes in Organic Compounds . Journal of the Chemical Society. Transactions , 73 : 445 – 459 . Lapworth, ‘The Form of Change in Organic Compounds and the Function of the α-meta Orientating Groups’, Journal of the Chemical Society, 79 (1901), 1265–84. On Lapworth, see Saltzmann (footnote 10), and Saltzmann, ‘Arthur Lapworth. The Genesis of Reaction Mechanism’, Journal of Chemical Education, 49 (1972), 750–2.
  • Thomson , Joseph John . 1904 . Electricity and Matter New York
  • On Thomson's lectures and the immediate reaction of American chemists, see Stranges Anthony Electrons and Valence: Development of the Theory, 1900–1925 College Station, Texas 1982 58 60 108–39
  • Stranges , Anthony . 1982 . Electrons and Valence: Development of the Theory, 1900–1925 110 – 110 . College Station, Texas
  • Stranges , Anthony . 1982 . Electrons and Valence: Development of the Theory, 1900–1925 60 – 60 . College Station, Texas It is not the aim of this paper to give a thorough history of the electronic theory of valence. On this topic, especially with regard to Lewis and Langmuir, see Robert Kohler, ‘The Origins of G. N. Lewis' Theory of the Shared Pair Bond’, Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences, 3 (1971), 343–76; and ‘The Lewis-Langmuir Theory of Valence and the Chemical Community, 1920–1928,’ idem., 6 (1976), 431–68. Also, Colin Russell, A History of Valency (New York, 1971); J. Shorter, ‘Electronic Theories of Organic Chemistry: Robinson and Ingold’, Natural Product Reports: Royal Society of Chemistry, 4 (1987), 61–6; and Martin Saltzmann's articles, cited above.
  • Stranges . 1987 . Electronic Theories of Organic Chemistry: Robinson and Ingold . Natural Product Reports: Royal Society of Chemistry , 4 : 66 – 66 .
  • Stranges . 1987 . Electronic Theories of Organic Chemistry: Robinson and Ingold . Natural Product Reports: Royal Society of Chemistry , 4 : 201 – 201 .
  • Bloch , Léon . 1911 . Recherches sur les actions chimiques et l'ionisation par barbotage . Annales de Chimie et de Physique , 22 : 370 – 471 . 441–95; and see Stranges (footnote 33), 174–5.
  • Langmuir , Irving . 1922 . “ The Structure of Molecules ” . In BAAS: Report of the 89th Meeting. 1921. Edinburgh 468 – 469 . London
  • Lewis , G.N. 1923 . Valence and the Electron . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 452 – 458 . (p. 453)
  • Lowry . 1923 . Intramolecular Ionisation in Organic Compounds . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 487 – 487 . Arthur Lapworth, ‘Latent Polarities of Atoms and Mechanism of Reaction, with Special Reference to Carbonyl Compounds’, Memoirs and Proceedings of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, 64 (1919–1920) 1–16 (pp. 3–5). Arthur Lapworth and Robert Robinson, ‘Remarks on Some Recent Contributions to the Theory of Induced Alternate Polarities in a Chain of Atoms’, Transactions of the Faraday Society, 19 (1923), 503–5; Robinson, ‘Octet Stability in Relation to Orientation and Reactivity in Carbon Compounds,’ idem, 506–7.
  • Solvay , I 132 – 133 .
  • Solvay , I 161 – 161 .
  • Solvay , I 278 – 278 .
  • Solvay , I 281 – 281 .
  • Solvay , II 139 – 140 .
  • Lowry , Thomas M. Le mécanisme de la transformation chimique . Solvay , II 135 – 178 . discussion, 179–98 (pp. 191–3).
  • Solvay , II 186 – 186 .
  • Solvay , IV 331 – 331 .
  • Swarts , Frédéric . Les relations interatomiques dans les composés organiques . Solvay , II 199 – 238 .
  • On this see Shorter Electronic Theories of Organic Chemistry: Robinson and Ingold Natural Product Reports: Royal Society of Chemistry 1987 4 61 66 The February 1987 issue of Natural Product Reports is a centenary tribute to Sir Robert Robinson, and includes articles by Colin Russell, ‘Theoretical Organic Chemistry before Robinson’, and Martin D. Saltzmann, ‘The Development of Sir Robert Robinson's Contributions to Theoretical Organic Chemistry’.
  • Lowry . Solvay , II 181 – 181 .
  • Stranges . 1982 . Electrons and Valence: Development of the Theory, 1900–1925 21 – 22 . College Station, Texas Saltzmann (footnote 10), 485; Alfred Werner, Beiträge zur Theorie der Affinität und Valenz (Zurich, 1891).
  • 1923 . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 19 : 531 – 533 .
  • See the accounts by Saltzmann The Robinson-Ingold Controversy: Precedence in the Electronic Theory of Organic Reactions Journal of Chemical Education 1980 57 and Shorter (footnote 35)
  • Saltzmann . 1980 . The Robinson-Ingold Controversy: Precedence in the Electronic Theory of Organic Reactions . Journal of Chemical Education , 57 : 485 – 488 .
  • Ingold , C.K. and Ingold , E.H. 1926 . The Nature of the Alternating Effect in Carbon Chains. Part V. A Discussion of Aromatic Substitution with Special Reference to the Respective Roles of Polar and Non-Polar Dissociation; and a further Study of the Relative Directive Efficiencies of Oxygen and Nitrogen . Journal of the Chemical Society , 129 : 1310 – 1333 .
  • Grignard , Victor . Solvay , III 394 – 394 . in discussion
  • See Charles Moureu's remarks in Solvay II 600 601 Moureu's ninth edition (1928) of the Notions fondamentales de chimie organique contains only two references to the electron, both in footnotes. These enumerate work through the early 1920s, including that of Langmuir and Lowry. Moureu, Notions, first published 1902 (Paris) 5th edition (1917), 27, note; and 9th edition (1928), 34, note. In the Bibliothèque Nationale copy of the 1928 volume, there are pencilled brackets beside the second long footnote.
  • Prévost , Charles and Kirrmann , Albert . 1931 . Essai d'une théorie ionique des réactions organiques . Bulletin Societé Chimique Memoirs , 49 : 194 – 243 . series 4 1309–68 (p. 197)
  • Christine King , M. and Laidler , Keith J. 1984 . Chemical Kinetics and the Radiation Hypothesis . Archives for History of Exact Sciences , 30 : 45 – 86 . (p. 47). I am indebted to John Servos for bringing this to my attention. Laidler is a distinguished chemist at the University of Ottawa, with special areas of interest in kinetics and photochemistry.
  • Solvay , I 150 – 150 . Also, Job, ‘La mobilité chimique’, Solvay I, 284–319, on which also was based ‘Mécanismes chimiques’, pp. 125–64 in Formes chimiques de transition, edited by J. Perrin and G. Urbain (Paris, 1931); J. Perrin, ‘Radiation and Chemistry’, translated by H. Borns, Transactions of the Faraday Society, 17 (1921–1922), 546–75, which is almost identical in its main arguments to Perrin's ‘Matière et lumière’, Annales de Physique, 11 (1919), 1–108.
  • Perrin , J. 1923 . Atoms , 2nd English edition 104 – 104 . New York translated by D. L. Hammick
  • Marcelin , R. 1914 . Contribution à la cinétique photochimique Paris Nilratan R. Dhar, Coefficient de température de réactions catalytiques (Paris, 1916); ‘Catalysis. Part IV. Temperature Coefficients of Catalysed Reactions’, Transactions of the Chemical Society, 111 (1917), 707–62; and The Chemical Action of Light (London, 1931). Alfred Lamble and William C. McCullagh Lewis, ‘Studies in Catalysis. Part I. Hydrolysis of Methyl Acetate, with a Theory of Homogeneous Catalysis’, Transactions of the Chemical Society, 105 (1914), 2330–42; and McC. Lewis, ‘Studies in Catalysis. Part VII. Heat of Reaction, Equilibrium Constant, and Allied Quantities, from the Point of View of the Radiation Hypothesis’, idem, 111 (1917), 457–69.
  • Arrhenius's formulation is based on a prior idea and equation of Van't Hoff in the Etudes de dynamique chimique (1884). See Arrhenius Zeitschrift für physikalische Chemie 1889 4 partially translated in Selected Readings in Chemical Kinetics, edited by M. H. Back and K. J. Laidler (Oxford, 1967), pp. 31–5; also see Keith Laidler, ‘Chemical Kinetics and the Origins of Physical Chemistry’, Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 32 (1985), 42–75 (pp. 55–7).
  • Job . 1982 . “ Mécanismes chimiques ” . In Electrons and Valence: Development of the Theory, 1900–1925 145 – 157 . College Station, Texas
  • Perrin . 1921–1922 . Radiation and Chemistry . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 547 – 548 . translated by H. Borns citing Marcelin, 555, and 555 note 1
  • Perrin . 1921–1922 . Radiation and Chemistry . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 553 – 553 . translated by H. Borns
  • Perrin . 1921–1922 . Radiation and Chemistry . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 551 – 551 . translated by H. Borns 560–1
  • Letter from Perrin to Einstein, 28 August 1919; Einstein to Perrin, 5 November 1919, Einstein Collection, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, cited originally in Nye Mary Jo Molecular Reality. A Perspective on the Scientific Work of Jean Perrin London and New York 1972 177 note 93. See Philosophical Magazine, 39, (1920), 21–5, cited in King and Laidler (footnote 63), 55. Also, discussion, Solvay I, 320–34, and Solvay II, 399–416.
  • 1921–1922 . Discussion . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 598 – 598 .
  • 1921–1922 . Discussion . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 598 – 598 . written communication from Dhar, 603–4; and King and Laidler (footnote 63), 56–9. H. Austin Taylor and Hugh S. Taylor were brothers who took Ph.D, degrees in McC. Lewis's department at Liverpool. Robert Robinson taught in that same department from 1915 to 1919.
  • 1921–1922 . Discussion . Tranactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 598 – 598 .
  • See Perrin Solvay II 336 336 note 2
  • Perrin . Lumiére et réactions chimiques . Solvay , II 322 – 398 . Berthoud in discussion, p. 401.
  • Solvay , I 325 – 325 .
  • Solvay , II 404 – 404 .
  • Perrin . 1921–1922 . Radiation and Chemistry . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 556 – 556 . translated by H. Borns
  • Perrin . 1921–1922 . Radiation and Chemistry . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 557 – 557 . translated by H. Borns
  • 1921–1922 . Discussion . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 601 – 601 .
  • 1921–1922 . Discussion . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 605 – 605 .
  • Lowry , Thomas . 1921–1922 . Is a True Monomolecular Action Possible? . Transactions of the Faraday Society , 17 : 596 – 597 .
  • Discussion . Solvay , II 414 – 415 .
  • G. N. Lewis and D. F. Smith promised, but did not publish, a demonstration that a range of frequencies of radiation affecting degrees of freedom in a molecule is responsible for chemical reaction. King and Laidler Christine King M. Laidler Keith J. Chemical Kinetics and the Radiation Hypothesis Archives for History of Exact Sciences 1984 30 77 77 82, and citing Lewis and Smith, Journal of the Chemical Society, 47 (1925), 1508–20. Also see remarks by R. G. W. Norrish at the 1923 Faraday Symposium on valency in Transactions of the Faraday Society, 19 (1923), 520.
  • Job , André . Les réactions intermédiaires dans la catalyse . Solvay , II 172 – 173 . especially 168–9 174, 193
  • See Perrin Solvay II 336 336 note 2
  • See Radiation and Chemistry Transactions of the Faraday Society 1921–1922 17 154 154 translated by H. Borns note 2; 156 note 2; and pp. 160–4
  • For example, see Burton Milton Radiation Chemistry Annual Reviews of Physical Chemistry 1950 1 113 132 (pp. 113–116)
  • Lowry . Le mécanisme de la transformation chimique . Solvay , II 135 – 135 .
  • Sedgwick , Nevil . Valence variable . Solvay , III 389 – 404 . discussion, 405–30 (p. 391)
  • Longuet-Higgins , H.C. 1957 . Proceedings of the Chemical Society , : 158 – 158 . quoted by Colin Russell (footnote 35), 305–6
  • Prévost , Charles . 1951 . La valence et l'enseignement . L'Information Scientifique , 6 : 14 – 18 . (p. 16)
  • Among British chemists, little attention was paid to French chemical literature bearing on an electron or polarization theory of valence and reaction mechanisms. This continued to be true long after the 1920s, when Christopher Ingold's Structure and Mechanism in Organic Chemistry Ithaca 1953 was the principal handbook of organic chemists, including French chemists, despite the failure of Ingold to note French contributions. I am grateful to Constantin Georgoulis for these insights. From the British point of view, the Germans similarly made no contributions. Robinson was said to be perplexed that distinguished German organic chemists paid little attention to theories of electron mechanisms and Alexander Todd complained in 1957 that in general the German organic chemists ‘were on the whole unsympathetic to the young and growing science of physical chemistry … German chemistry was by 1900 becoming a top-heavy factual structure’. See J. C. Smith, The Development of Organic Chemistry at Oxford, 2 parts, typescript in the Robinson Papers, Royal Society of London; and Alexander Todd, in The Perkin Centenary (1958), p. 91, quoted by Russell (footnote 35), 269.
  • Duhem , Pierre . 1974 . The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory 69 – 71 . New York translated by Philip P. Weiner
  • Robert Robinson, pp. ix–x, in Henry Edward Armstrong, 1848–1937. The Doyen of British Chemists and Pioneer of Technical Education Eyre J. Vargas London 1958 x x
  • Allsop , C.B. and Water , W.A. 1947 . “ Thomas Martin Lowry ” . In British Chemists Edited by: Findlay , Alexander and Mills , William Hobson . 402 – 418 . London
  • Perrin , Jean . 1903 . Traité de chimie physique. Les principes Paris and ‘La fluorescence’, Annales de Physique, 10 (1918), 133–59 (p. 133). The radiation hypothesis fit within a long-standing tradition in France of empirical and mathematical studies of heat and light, including, especially in the 1920s, studies of X-rays and the photoelectric effect, spectroscopy, magneto-optics and the magnetic properties of bodies. See the résumé of strengths in French physics, which also include radioactivity, in Dominique Pestre, Physique et physiciens en France, 1918–1940 (Paris, 1984), pp. 66–103. Perrin was generally cautious about both wave mechanics and quantum mechanics in the 1920s. Had he and Lowry both survived to the 1950s, they probably would have agreed in deprecating the emerging gulf between chemical laboratory practice and quantum descriptions of electrons orbitals. Archive for History of Quantum Physics: interviews with Edmond Bauer and Louis de Broglie, respectively, 8 January 1963 (T. S. Kuhn and T. Kahan), and 7 January 1963 (T. S. Kuhn, A. George, and T. Kahan). Courtesy of the Office for the History of Science and Technology, Berkeley, California.
  • 1949 . Colloque internationale de la liaison chimique . Journal de Chimie Physique , 46 : 185 – 312 . 497–542, 675–713
  • Ingold , C.K. 1948 . “ Les réactions de la chimie organique. Quatre conférences ” . In Actualités Scientifiques et Industrielles Paris No. 1037
  • Discussion . Solvay III , 382 – 383 .

Reprints and Corporate Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:

Order Reprints Request Corporate Permissions

Academic Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:

Request Academic Permissions

If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.

Supercharge Your Next Research Paper: Research and write your next paper with Jenni AI.

Related research

People also read lists articles that other readers of this article have read.

Recommended articles lists articles that we recommend and is powered by our AI driven recommendation engine.

Cited by lists all citing articles based on Crossref citations.
Articles with the Crossref icon will open in a new tab.