Conservation and Innovation : Helmholtz's Struggle with Energy ...

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Helmholtz himself, starting in 1854, was playing a major role in popularising the new view, but, surprisingly, almost hiding his initial conceptual model of central Newtonian forces and stressing instead the other assumption, the impossibility of perpetual motion. This shift, which again demonstrates Helmholtz's control of the various interacting elements, is in my view the result of Clausius' criticisms, but also of a growing interest in potential theory and in its applications, for instance in hydrodynamics (1858 and 1868) 19. Also relevant are the difficulties created for Newtonian forces by the growing field of electromagnetic phenomen. The debates of the seventies underline the methodological relevance of the 'energy principle', now a main tool for comparison of experimentally equivalent alternative theories, but at the same time outline the problem of identifying 'the' principle: various versions were, as usual, competing. Helmholtz's version reveals some limits of the original 1847 assumptions. In these years Helmholtz faced the challenge of the nativists and the metaphysicians and, also as a result of his work on physiology and the foundations of geometry, shifted towards a more empirical side of his methodological approach on many issues. A strict adherence to Kantian categories and Kantian conceptual models was abandoned, for instance the central Newtonian forces, while the methodological Kantian structure of the Erhaltung is preserved, in particular the need for a regulative principle that fulfils the "intelligibility of nature". In the last two decades of the nineteenth century the history of energy conservation entered a new phase: the differences between the original versions of the principle grew into different research programs. The mechanical view of nature and the belief in the reversibility of natural phenomena championed by Helmholtz were challenged by other, competing views. The energetist movement took off, with its attempts to overthrow the mechanical worldview, while the electromagnetic and the thermodynamic approach, both deeply connected with energy problems, were actively pursued. Since energy conservation had become one of the basic chapters of physics, the champions of the different research programs dedicated a great deal of logical and historical analysis to an understanding and framing of the various contributions and developments of energy theory. Given that a specific version of the conservation principle played a great role in each research program, a series of works started to analyse in detail 19 Helmholtz "Integrale" and " Flüssigkeitsbewegungen".
the origin and meaning of the principle, from different perspectives, of course. Helmholtz was a leader in the spread of theoretical physics in the second half of the century, and it is interesting to find out what was the judgement of his fellow scientists on his approach to the principle of energy conservation. At the turn of the century the great debates of the "now mighty theoretical physics" showed the progress achieved in this field: the mechanic, energetic, thermodynamic and electromagnetic views of nature were the frameworks within which basic studies on the history of energy conservation were written. But already in the eighties new interpretations of electromagnetic energy had opened the way to Helmholtz's shift towards Maxwell's theory of contiguous action and to the abandonment of the traditional continental direct action at a distance approach (even if Helmholtz always translated Maxwell in his own terms of action at a distance plus dielectric). At the same time Helmholtz renounced the principle of energy conservation as the main basic tool in physical research and substituted it with the principle of least action (1886) 20. But after almost fifty years since the Erhaltung the basic aspects of his methodology were explicitly reasserted in a discussion of the foundations of theoretical physics 21. Helmholtz's latest results will have an influence almost exclusively on Hertz, but his continuous struggle shows a great methodological consistency. The "Einleitung" to the Lectures on Theoretical Physics of 1894 strongly resembles the methodology expressed in 1847. A few years later philosophers took an interest in the problems of the history and foundations of energy conservation, and again Kantian influences were at issue. In recent times, towards the end of the neo-positivist trend historians again started to offer contributions on this important topic: perhaps it is time to try to put these latest efforts in historical perspective. From Physiology to Physics (1845-46) 20 Helmholtz, Hermann. "Über die physikalische Bedeutung des Princips der kleinsten Wirkung." In Crelle's Journal 100 (1886) :137-166 and 213-222; Repr. in WA 3. Pp.203-248. 21 Helmholtz Einleitung
Page 1 and 2: Fabio Bevilacqua Conservation and I
Page 3 and 4: different formulations 4 and priori
Page 5 and 6: and interesting results, despite th
Page 7 and 8: principle of correlation is express
Page 9: principle to the existing empirical
Page 13 and 14: Whether physiological research, apa
Page 15 and 16: In a discussion on the origins of a
Page 17 and 18: his "Wärme" that one of the differ
Page 19 and 20: generate a determined equivalent of
Page 21 and 22: "Bericht", despite the application
Page 23 and 24: experiments in the most disparate b
Page 25 and 26: The premise reveals that the struct
Page 27 and 28: intelligible if it can be referred
Page 29 and 30: elevant consequence of the deductio
Page 31 and 32: Needless to say the plan was to be
Page 33 and 34: and from here that the direction an
Page 35 and 36: since Leonardo 113; the "ad nihilum
Page 37 and 38: But unfortunately for the whole str
Page 39 and 40: The principle of conservation of vi
Page 41 and 42: different from the one joining the
Page 43 and 44: "The equality that exists between e
Page 45 and 46: In virtue of its limitations to New
Page 47 and 48: Helmholtz, while asserting that lig
Page 49 and 50: the temperature of 1 Kg of water ca
Page 51 and 52: In his search for a mechanical equi
Page 53 and 54: had already been achieved in the Be
Page 55 and 56: approach is discussed at length and
Page 57 and 58: and unaware of Green's results190,
Page 59 and 60: potential function 201. It is worth
Page 61 and 62:
and judged unreliable, despite prov
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The relevance of the first question
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principle taking this potential int
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Finally we get to the real conclusi
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conservation 234, on the theory of
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for the mechanical equivalent of he
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The controversy started with some r
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where μ are immovable masses, m th
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demonstration criticised by Clausiu
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directions that join them and whose
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quotes 288 and criticises a proposi
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motion to all natural forces, the k
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measure this expenditure and compar
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" ...the quantity of force in natur
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forces is constant: but it relates
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experiences in general laws of unli
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"a series of important and difficul
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the Discontinuous Movements of Flui
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methodology. Dühring claimed the c
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The first history of the conservati
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while in Britain for the above talk
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apply it to acoustics (1859), hydro
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magnetic intensity. Maxwell realize
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and the electrostatic In modern not
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of conservation of energy: it is re
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efuted. But again in 1881 Helmholtz
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But was important here is that desp
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The second (1892-94), follows the i
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while the electromagnetic and the s
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can modify its specific theoric for
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considered relevant. In Poincarè
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meaning left is: "There is somethin
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interpretations at the beginning of
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while fighting metaphisicians, he w
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literature 456. There is an intrins
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assertion is surprising: it has lon
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Kant was a Naturphilosophe 480. The
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condition that work done by the for
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histories cites these (Hirn's) arti
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) the experimental determinations o
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force principle 522. Elkana tried t
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Blüh, Otto. "The Value of Inspirat
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Graetz, L. "Das Mechanische Wärme
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Helmholtz, Hermann. "Bericht über
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Helmholtz, Hermann. Wissenschaftlic
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Madison: Wisconsin U.P., 1959. Pp.
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Poincarè, Henry. Electricité et O
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Yagi, Eri."Clausius's Mathematical
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