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

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formulation there were a number competing 460. Thus it is difficult to apply for what happened at the middle of last century the historiographical categories of "simultaneous discovery" 461 of "energy conservation". As a consequence Kuhn's three "trigger" factors have to be discussed as well. Dealing with the first factor, "the concern with engines", Kuhn focusses on the concept of work and on three traditions related to it: the older engineering practice 462, the analytical tradition 463, dealing with vis viva conservation, where the stress was on what was later to be called the potential function, a theoretical engineering tradition starting with Lazare Carnot 464. Kuhn discards the last two 465 and asserts that the older tradition is the one that was really effective 466. This 460 For different versions of the principle in the history of electromagnetism see Bevilacqua, Fabio. The Principle of Conservation of Energy and the History of Classical Electromagnetic Theory. Pavia: La Goliardica Pavese, 1983. 461Winters criticises the same passage of Kuhn but with a different example: the evolution of Helmholtz's ideas on energy shows that there was not a " conservation of energy" to be discovered. Winters, Stephen. "Hermann von Helmholtz's Discovery of Force Conservation." Dissertation. The John Hopkins University, 1985. Pp. 11-12. 462 "a century of engineering practice where its use had been quite independent of both vis viva and its conservation". Kuhn Sim Disc P. 84. 463 Here the concept of work was not recognized as a conceptual entity: "the integral of a force times differential path elements occurs only in the derivation of the {vis viva} conservation law. The law itself equates vis viva with a function of position coordinates". Ibid P.86. 464 Here work is the "fundamental conceptual parameter". Ibid. P.87. 465 For the analytical tradition see ibid. P.83 (on this point he was immediately criticised by Hiebert: Hiebert "Commentary" P. 393). For the theoretical engineering see ibid. P.88: "then almost none of the pioneers used it. Instead they returned to the same older engineering tradition in which Lazare Carnot and his French successors had found the concepts needed for their new versions of the dynamical conservation theorem.". Also : "That source within the engineering tradition is all that the pioneers of energy conservation required and as much as most of them used". Ibid. P. 84. 466 Ibid. p.90. Hiebert Commentary P.394 underlines that a first concept of work meant to explain the five simple machines goes back to Hero's of Alexandria Mechanica. But according to Cassirer the connection of the concept of work with "energy" conservation history goes back to Leibniz. Cassirer, Ernst. Leibniz' System in seinen wissenschaftlichen Grundlagen, Marburg: Elwert, 1902; Substanzbegriff Chapt 4, Sect 7, Pp.226-48; Das
assertion is surprising: it has long been known that even the third, more recent, approach had problems with the conservation of work 467. Only a fourth tradition, not mentioned in Kuhn's paper, of scientists dealing with the physicomathematical potential theory, identified the concept of work with the one of potential 468, opening the way for a mathematical expression of "energy" conservation. Thus if the concept of work is taken, as Kuhn does, in a loose sense it could derive from anybody from Hero of Alexandria to Leibniz more than from the engineering tradition of the 18th century; in any case it would be much more a prerequisite than a trigger factor. A more stringent trigger factor or, better, a close influence is linked with a more technical concept of work, is connected with the emergence of the potential theory and is strictly related to vis viva conservation. The French theoretical engineering tradition mentioned by Kuhn has always received special attention: Ruhlmann 469 dedicated two volumes of history to the subject, Hoppe already noted 470 the influence of Carnot on Lagrange, Auerbach 471 is aware of this tradition, Cassirer 472 even discussed Poncelet's approach to projective geometry in a philosophical context. Helm Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der Neueren Zeit , Berlin: B.Cassirer, vol 2. 467 Helm Energetik P.12. Haas Entwickl. P.81. See also: Grattan-Guinness, Ivor. "Work for the Workers: Advances in Engineering Mechanics and Instruction in France, 1800- 1830". In Annals of Science 41 (1984):1-33. P. 32. 468 Wise noted the lack of mathematical factors in Kuhn's paper: Wise, Norton. "W.Thomson's Mathematical Route to Energy Conservation: a Case Study of the Role of Mathematics in Concept Formation." In HSPS 10 (1979) : 49-83. P. 5O, and attributed to Poisson the joining of the concepts of work and potential: P.64; but a different view is espressed in Wise, Norton and Smith, Crosbie. "Measurement, Work and Industry in Lord Kelvin's Britain." In HSPS 17 (1986): 147-73, P.154. 469 Rühlmann Maschinenlehre 470 Hoppe, E.. Histoire de la Physique . Paris: Payot,1928. P.96; compare with Kuhn Sim Disc n.44 p.86. 471 Auerbach, F."Feld, Potential, Arbeit, Energie und Entropie.", in "Grundbegriffe". In Handbuch der Physik. A.Winkelmann ed.2nd ed. Leipzig: Barth, 1908. 1st vol. Pp.68-91. 472 Cassirer, Ernst. Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der Neueren Zeit , Berlin: B.Cassirer. 4th vol tr by William Woglom and Charles Hendel. The Problem of Knowledge. New Haven: Yale U.P., 1950. Pp.49-50 and P.72. He discussed Poncelet's Traité des Propriétés Projectives des Figures of 1822.
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Fabio Bevilacqua Conservation and I
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different formulations 4 and priori
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and interesting results, despite th
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principle of correlation is express
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principle to the existing empirical
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the origin and meaning of the princ
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Whether physiological research, apa
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In a discussion on the origins of a
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his "Wärme" that one of the differ
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generate a determined equivalent of
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"Bericht", despite the application
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experiments in the most disparate b
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The premise reveals that the struct
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intelligible if it can be referred
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elevant consequence of the deductio
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Needless to say the plan was to be
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and from here that the direction an
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since Leonardo 113; the "ad nihilum
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But unfortunately for the whole str
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The principle of conservation of vi
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different from the one joining the
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"The equality that exists between e
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In virtue of its limitations to New
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Helmholtz, while asserting that lig
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the temperature of 1 Kg of water ca
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In his search for a mechanical equi
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had already been achieved in the Be
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approach is discussed at length and
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and unaware of Green's results190,
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potential function 201. It is worth
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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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Page 145 and 146: Graetz, L. "Das Mechanische Wärme
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Page 151 and 152: Madison: Wisconsin U.P., 1959. Pp.
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