Abstract
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the core of a typical teaching collection was composed by apparatus, which were very similar to the ones proposed in the eighteenth century by ‘s Gravesande, Nollet, Desaguliers and others lecturer demonstrators and makers. Since 1820 circa, new didactic instruments were introduced. Most of them concerned the fast developing branches of physics such as wave optics, electromagnetisms and acoustics. Instrument makers (and many scientists as well) were extremely prolific in inventing new devices for better demonstrating all the laws of physics and for clearly visualizing all its phenomena. Therefore, around 1900 all the most important German, French and British makers proposed in their thick catalogues thousands of didactic apparatus. But were all these instrument really used? Probably not. Many of them were acquired by schools and universities because they were considered “status symbol” marking the importance and the completeness of a collection. Others were simply shown as “tri-dimensional” illustrations. For various reasons, during the first decade of the twentieth century the number of available didactic instruments was drastically reduced. The introduction of student training laboratory, the increasing cost of labour and of materials after WWI, the needs of a more standardized production, the progresses of physics not only eliminated from the trade catalogues many of the classical but old fashioned instruments but also stimulated the use of modular and simpler didactic apparatus.
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Notes
About the concept of “normal science » see Kuhn (1970).
“It would be difficult to catch the attention of the students without experiments.” Quoted in Hulin (1992, p. 1409).
Brenni (1998).
Galison (1997, pp. 65–141).
Brenni (2004).
In my article I will essentially focus my attention on didactic instruments which were used in teaching physics. However most of my considerations are valid also for other sciences.
See for example Gauvin J. F. and Pyenson L. (2002).
Sutton G. V. (1995).
See the example of the University of Pavia in Bellodi et al. (2002).
For the case of physics teaching in France in the eighteenth century France see Balpe (2001, pp. 39–61).
For the development of laboratory and technical education see for example Fox and Guagnini (1999).
It has to be pointed out that often the lycées had various denomination in the nineteenth century. Following the alternations of various regimes they were also called lycées impériaux (with Napoleon I and again with Napoleon III) or colleges royaux (under the Restauration).
See Balpe (2001, pp. 39–65).
It was compulsory for the écoles centrales but not for the Napoleonic lycées.
Belhoste B. (1995, pp. 98–101).
Belhoste B. (1995, pp. 181–185).
See for example Ruiz-Castell (2008) and the article of Cuenca Lorente and Simon Castel in this volume.
Brock (1996).
D’Alembert considered that “general physics” was the science studying the general proprieties and law commons to all bodies, while the “particular physics” was considering exclusively the bodies themselves. However it is possible to find various definitions of the two terms between the late eighteenth century and 1850 circa.
With the reform of 1852 and the so called bifurcation a scientific baccalauréat was introduced for the first time. With this reform the role of sciences and experimentation in the curricula was increased.
Balpe (2001).
“In fact during the nineteenth century, the apparatus of the high school physics cabinets and the ones which were described in textbooks were mainly demonstration apparatus, often copied from historical instruments. They were shown and their function was illustrated, but the experiments were rarely performed.” See Blondel C., L’impact d la réforme de 1902 sur l’enseignement de l’électricité, in Hulin (2000).
“An entire lesson would not be enough to illustrate the construction of Atwood’s machine and its improvements. One would need several hours to perform with a certain precision all the operations which are necessary for weighing a litre of air or of whatever gas. And also the experiments for verifying the relationship existing between the pitch of a sound and the number of vibrations per second, as well as the determinations of the dilatation coefficient or of the specific heat of a body would be very long. It is evident that in this way, it would be necessary not only to have many hours a week but the entire timetable for teaching of fundamentals of physics…” See Boltshauser (1866, p. 275).
Blondel and Dörries (1994).
See for example de Clercq (1985).
Brennni (2006).
Brenni (2010).
See for example Cahan (1989).
Brenni (2002).
It would be far to long to mention here too many trade catalogues. A large number of them can be seen on line in the reference webpage of the Scientific Instrument Commission: http://www.sic.iuhps.org/refertxt/catalogs.htm.
About the evolution of the instrument industry in the nineteenth century see de Clercq (1985), Brenni P. “La industria de precisión en el siglo XIX Una panorámica de los instrumentos, los constructores y el mercato en diferentes contextos nacionales” in Bertomeu Sánchez and García Belmar (2002, pp. 53–72) (and translated in Enghlish pp. 425–433).
Simon (2008, p. 141).
See note 27.
“Therefore it is very important that science teaching will be accessible thank to appropriate treatises.” See Müller (1844, p. vi).
See Pfaundler (1905–1914). It is curious to note that in spite of the fact that the last editions were completely different from the original Pouillet textbook the title of treatise always remained Müller-Pouillet’s Lehrbuch der Physik and was commonly known as Müller-Pouillet.
Préparateurs were skilful laboratory assistants, who knew very well the instruments and their function. They prepared the experiments, they were responsible of the scientific collections, they preserved the instruments in good conditions and they made the necessary repairs. Sometime they also made simple pieces of apparatus on demand.
Fau was the author of a famous illustrated book of anatomy.
“…the only pretention of introducing the instruments, which are necessary to the physicists, forgetting all theoretical considerations.” See Fau and Chevalier (1853, p. 2).
Frick (1856).
“Also the best apparatus is useless for the school, if it is in the hands of an unpractical, also if learned teacher and many good instruments were deteriorated because they were manipulated in a wrong way.” Schmid (1867, p. 61).
Lehmann (1904–1909).
“…[it is] not a textbook, but it essentially deals with the technique of experiments in the frame of the teaching demonstrations.” See Weinhold (1881, p. III).
“Recently optical projections find more frequent and proper applications in order to profitably enable a large number of peoples of doing simultaneous observations…” ibidem, p. IV.
Molteni (1900).
Heering (2008).
“It would be desirable to get rid of many imperfect and old instruments, which today can be substituted by others which are more suitable to the development of physics.” See Catalogue (1900).
See Zwei Normalverzeichnisse… (1896).
“Physical teaching can be done only if a sufficient collection of apparatus and a special lecture room are available” See Grimsel (1911, p. X, 39).
“Scientific studies must contribute, as the others, to the formation of man.” A statement of Louis Liard quoted in Hulin (2000, p. 11 and 248). Louis Liard (1846–1917) was a French philosopher and administrator. He founded the École pratique des hautes etudes in 1886 and became vice-rector of the Académie de Paris in 1902.
In France, the idea of introducing experimental exercises and manipulation for students in physics and chemistry was not new, but in the second half of the nineteenth century, they could be realized only for the classes following some special advanced curricula.
“It is not enough to observe the experiments performed by the professor during the lesson. One has to personally repeat them.”Quoted by Hulin (2007, p. 66).
“The old instruments generally they are not suitable anymore for the new teaching method. They had been conceived for being displayed on a table during the lecture of the professor and they were not intended to be used for experiments.” See Lemoine (1907).
“The elementary treatises are strange collections of old fashioned instruments. One has the feeling of being in an antiquity museum in which the heritage of the past’s heritage has been accumulated without selection. (…) There are instruments which are not justified in practice nor in theory. (…) These apparatus seem absurd. Once, they represented progress, in the sense that they replaced other apparatus which were even more absurd. Today they are a scandal. There are apparatus which in the past produced good results, but they are unpractical, they were abandoned, and have disappeared from the trade catalogues. (…) There are instruments which have double usage, one is just an improved version of the other, or presents only a minor modification. (…) There are instruments which are useful in practice, but they do not have any pedagogical interest. Their theory is complicated and their graduated scales are empiric and not very rational. (…) There are apparatus which present a dubious historical interest. The ordinary pneumatic machine bore the students and oblige them to study even the memorable Babinet’s improvement. The general Morin’s fall machine of primitive construction which obstinately refuses to work, etc. etc.… There are demonstration apparatus crystallized in an archaic, absurd and inconvenient design. They do not work and the professor does not even think to use them. (…) I am not kidding. All the professors know so well that these instruments are useless, but they spend three quarters of their time to show them to the students . One can say, and it is not a paradox, that an elementary physics course is a methodic catalogue of the apparatus which do not have to be used.” See Bouasse (1901).
I have shortened the text of Bouasse. Where I inserted the brackets (…), he mentioned several apparatus, which he considered useless and absurd. Among them there were for example the Laplace and Lavoisier calorimeter, the hygrometers of Daniel, Régnault and Alluard, Armstrong’s electrical machine, the Wheatstone photometer, Gambey’s magnetic compass, the magneto-electric machines of Pixii and Clarke, Morin’s fall machine, Bourbouze’s galvanometer, Wedgwood’s pyrometer and many others. (The bold font in the quotation is in italic in Bousse’s text) .
“I think that today it is wrong to insist of using in the teaching the mirror galvanometer which is related with the old type of Scwheigger’s multipicator… In the same way the presence in the school collections of many other apparatus is only justified by the fact that they were made and recommended many years ago by an outstanding teacher, whose name remained attached to them. I am convinced that today the same practical man would not use such apparatus, if he knew the newer ones.” See Grimsehl (1911, p. X,70).
In the very last years I visited many school collections and I still met teachers, who like to use some of the apparatus which had been acquired a century ago!
“Since the beginning of the war, the development of the firm entered in the third phase. The experience made during the war opened new ways for producing and controlling the apparatus and a new series of instruments became available beside the existing ones.” See Schmidt (1926, p. 24).
Zoller (2009).
“If we compare this catalogue with the previous editions, it is easy to see that many apparatus have been improved and that several new ones have been created. On the other hand, we have eliminated all the apparatus which only had an historical interest or were not suitable for a living teaching.” See Leybold (1938)
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Brenni, P. The Evolution of Teaching Instruments and Their Use Between 1800 and 1930. Sci & Educ 21, 191–226 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-010-9326-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-010-9326-z