The collected works of Sir Humphry Davy /

Abstract

This nine-volume collection brings together the major writings of the pioneering chemist, Sir Humphrey Davy (1778-1829). Davy was responsible for many major discoveries in electrochemistry (a term he coined), discovering the elements sodium and potassium and in 1815 he invented the miner's safety lamp, the Davy lamp. Volume 1 of the Works contains Davy's Researcher, Chemical and Philosophical, Chiefly concerning Nitrous Oxide, a work which secured his reputation as a chemist. It contains innovative research carried out at Thomas Beddoes's Medical Pneumatic Institution in Bristol, including the discovery that pure nitrous oxide (laughing gas) could be safely inhaled, a practice that become fashionable in the literary and scientific world. This discovery and others brought both Davy and the Pneumatic Institution into prominence. Other volumes gather Davy's Bakerian Lectures (volume 5) and other miscellaneous papers which illustrate his great talent both as a lecturer and as a great chemist. His lectures were so popular that during his time at the Royal Institution and the Royal Society he could boast an audience of around 1000. The works collected here reflect Davy's science which was fuelled by questions about life, matter, God, thought and immortality. As one of the leading promoters of the scientific method this set should be a valuable asset to scholars of chemistry and historians of science.

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