[meteorite-list] On the Father of Meteoritics (Warning - Original Radical Theory)

From: Michael Gilmer <*meteoritemike_at_meteoritecentral.com*> Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2011 09:42:01 -0400 Message-ID: <CAKBPJW9jA94oBz5RGgwxos5eiWW1GqCoi+VM7VgFP-kxgBzOJA_at_mail.gmail.com> · meteoritemike_at_meteoritecentral.com

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On 10/23/11, Martin Altmann <altmann at meteorite-martin.de> wrote:
> Hi Doug,
>
> not sooo rocking.
>
> Doug, we as meteorite lovers over-emphasize Chladni's occupation with
> meteorites.
> Chladni's epoch-making performance, is his work on acoustics.
> For that he is famous and for that he was recognized by his coevals.
> To recognize, that a theory of sound can't be dealt limited to regard sound
> as a phenomenon of the air.
> To take the earlier works about oscillations and vibrations and to carry it
> over to the sound,
> the first vizualisation of these, his experiments, about pitches and waves,
> the speed of sound in different media - and so on.
> Chladni is first and foremost: The Father of modern acoustics!
>
> Meteorites..was certainly a side-lining for him, but a passion.
> How he became addicted by them? By chance, probably.
> At those times, we had still the ideal of the polymath, occupying themselves
> with all kind of natural sciences and occurrences. (Dilettantes like Goethe,
> up to the last polymath Humboldt (who, yippieh, bought his meteorites from
> the lousy dealer Krantz :-)).
> Chladni, like all others made so many other various, sometimes droll
> observations - like finding the colour of the gas of burned greenery, or his
> very sweet article on the electrical charge of his cat :-)
> (that it's polarized, because when the cat is sitting on a woolen pillow,
> and he pets it, he can take a charge from the bottom of the cat and can
> generate an electric spark in bringing his hand close to the head, and
> inverse, if he strokes the head and but then the finger to the bottom..)
> Where I was?
> Yep. And of course the scientists were densely networked and having a vivid
> correspondence.
> And the phenomenons of shooting stars, falling stones, fireballs - those
> were no new topics, but also topics of scientific discourses. That he came
> to meteorites - very likely by Lichtenberg, - why he got interested in,
> speculation. Maybe cause meteors were partly regarded as meteorological
> events, hence has to do with air.
> Lichtenberg taught also astronomy, two of his students were triangulating
> shooting stars, among them Brandes, Benzenberg, who got the result, that
> shooting stars happens in heights of around 100km and would have hence their
> origin in the atmosphere. There could have been a connecting link, or
> Lichtenberg redacted also all kind of scientific works, some of them also
> mentioning the meteors. Olbers, Chladni had also contact with him, stated
> the stones falling from sky being ejected from volcanoes on the Moon.
> Maskelyne believed them to come from outer space, Halley I believe too, and
> before Hevelius as related to comets. Lavoisier believed the fireballs to be
> gaseous, Beccaria et al. to be electric discharges. Bergman related to
> northern lights. Again others connected them with zodiacal light. And so on.
>
> What makes now Chladni to the father of meteoritics?
>
> He collected all these conflicting hypotheses.
> And then he collected all fall reports of the history and contemporary ones,
> tried to prove their validity, tried to locate the very stones and irons.
> >From that he deducted a descriptive phenomenology of falls. (light, sound
> ect. pp)
> And he described the physical properties of the meteoritic stones and irons.
> Tried even to identify stones as meteorites, where no falls observation
> existed.
>
> With this results he checked the existing theories
> and built his own theory.
>
> And this theory unifies four complexes, which were regarded before as
> independent from each other
> and where to each of them existed many different hypothesises.
>
> He connected the stones with the fireballs.
> He found out, that bolides and shooting stars are the same phenomenon.
> He stated, that these are caused by solid bodies.
> And finally, that the meteorites stem not only from the outer space,
> but that they are fragments of disrupted planetary bodies.
>
> (note only how he correctly suppose, that Pallas iron has to be something
> like the inner core of Earth,
> by some supposed to be metallic too at these times).
>
> And that was new, and...brilliant!
>
> Btw Chladni had strong qualms, to publish his meteoritic theories, as he
> feared to be ridiculed by the scientific community.
>
>
> Ouch, the instruments.
> Doug, Chladni perceived himself as a scientist. Not as an instrument builder
> or even a musician.
> In fact he was even happy, that these instruments worked so slow, as he was
> no virtuoso.
> It's a little bit weird, to believe that he had as a main interest in
> marketing his "euphon" or his "clavizylinder", or to be recognized as an
> inventor
> and that he got frustrated in these instruments not getting canonic.
> Self-affirmation he received more than enough, as his acoustic theories
> found broadly acceptance and he was recognized by the establishment as a
> brilliant scientist.
> The frustration was a different one:  He never found a permanent position,
> although many famous scientists campaigned for him. Therefore throughout all
> his life he was forced to do small time, to find and accept invitations of
> universities and courts, for holding series of lectures - and also to make
> public shows.
> His funny instruments were side-kicks and elements of show for his public
> lectures.
>
> Btw. they are somewhat different than Franklin's armonica, glass dished
> rotating through water, the vine glass principle, as you explained. The
> Euphon uses longitudinal vibrations, hence glass pipes are stroked, and the
> vibrations are conferred to metal sheets for the resonnace. And the
> clavizylinder is a rotating cylinder of metal or glass, where different
> metal bars are brought in contact with....   hence funny gadgetry,
> underpinned by the knowledge of the best theoretical acoustician of his
> epoch.
>
>
> Soooo...I fear, your psychologizing ansatz to kick Chladni off the throne is
> too weak.
>
> Best!
> Martin
>
>
> PS: Chladni playing his show in front of Napoleon. (From the cash he earned
> there, he published his "Acoustics" in French)
> http://www.chladnis-heirs.com/Bilder/ChladniBonaparte.jpg
>
> Original collection label by Chladni (for an Alais specimen)
> http://www.chladnis-heirs.com/Bilder/chladni1.jpg
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht-----
> Von: meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com
> [mailto:meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com] Im Auftrag von
> MexicoDoug
> Gesendet: Sonntag, 23. Oktober 2011 10:08
> An: Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Betreff: [meteorite-list] On the Father of Meteoritics (Warning - Original
> Radical Theory)
>
> Dear List, an account of the coming of age of Chladni which may rock
> the boat a bit:
>
> "When in the course of scientific endeavors it becomes necessary for
> one scientist to dissolve the bonds which have connected them with
> another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and
> equal station to which the God-given phenomenon of meteoritics entitle
> them, a decent dignity for one's inventions requires that they should
> declare the causes which impel them to the separation...."
>
> Such was the case for Ernst F. F. Chladni, who quite abruptly focused
> his interest in "fathering" meteoritics in the early 1790's: an
> accomplished musician and musical instrument designer with an interest
> in waves, electricity, and physics. He suddenly dedicated some time to
> a radical theory of meteoritics; the question is....What *sparked* his
> sudden and intensive, obsessive-compulsive interest?  No one really
> knows, excepts, perhaps the Shadow.  Read on please, for my theory
> after a discusson wih my Shadow...
>
> First we must define what exactly was on Chladni's mind during those
> years and more importantly what was his mindset?  Well, he was
> recovering from a failed attempt to promote his musical instrument
> which he toured playing in hope to gain some recognition.  His
> instrument never became popular.  The reason was not because it was bad
> ... but rather because there was a superior instrument that displaced
> it in public events all the time.  By 1790, he gave it up, and quite
> frustrated he was with his extensive efforts.
>
> Chladni's first love was music and acoustics.  It is often cited that
> his interest in meteoritics was suddenly fomented by conversations with
> Georg Christoph Lichtenberg in 1791-1793.  But Lichtenberg himself had
> nothing to say about it, despite making notes of the meetings and
> commenting that Chladni was working on a new musical instrument to
> supplant his previous failed one.
>
> A world away lived the bane of Chladni's existence, until his death in
> 1790: one Dr. Benjamin Franklin, American genius, and the antithesis of
> everything Chladni socially was...  Franklin was the model of an
> brilliant human being, even able to have the French aristocracy eat out
> of his hand while founding the United States of America, all in his
> spare time while he pursued intellectual pursuits of everything and
> frequently made great scientific advancements with a sort of Midas'
> Touch with only a wit that could beat them.  Such was the case with the
> armonica, a musical instrument that was a clever adaptation of sound
> waves produced by utilizing friction like the rubbing on a wine glass
> which allowed the simultaneous playing of nearly a dozen notes.  This
> musical instrument precisely was the one that displaced Chladni's who
> otherwise might have found more success.  Franklin's instrument was an
> American contribution to Europe that even the great composers wrote
> parts for as Chladni's own foundered.  How frustrating it must have
> been.
>
> At heart, Dr. Franklin was truly a scientist and had managed some of
> the most truly remarkable experiments and even was credited as being
> the father of electricity after harnassing the meteorological
> phenomenon of lightning and proving exactly what it was: electricity.
> There was nothing he couldn't do and yet, he always got all the women,
> fame and power he wished.
>
> On the other hand Chladni was forced into a career he had no interest
> in doing by an overpowering father, had absolutely no luck with the
> woman and was spurned by his contemporaries when he initially tried to
> present his ideas to his peers.  Bummer to be Chladni in 1790.
>
> But Franklin died in 1790.  Chladni didn't waste a moment, dropping his
> failed instrument and immediately appropriated Franklin's armonica a
> step further and redesigned a new instrument in 1791 he named,
> immodestly CHLADNI'S EUPHONIUM (basically a synonym for armonica but
> addiding his name for recognition) he hoped would be superior - and
> finally, Franklin was dead and unable to wittily comment or compete.
> It was a prototype of that instrument he was playing for Lichtenberg.
>
> After all those years of playing second fiddle, it was only natural
> that Franklin's scientific triumphs were a subject of discussion; after
> all the new instrument was a direct improvement on Franklin's intended
> to supplant it at best... and victory would be as sweet as waking among
> the muses, especially for Chladni who was trained as a lawyer with all
> the benefits and vices that the practice of law breeds.
>
> One noteable subject of Franklin's successes was in meteorology, and
> especially legendary, regarding the proof that lightning bolts were
> composed of electricity.  Franklin also went on record saying meteors
> were probably an electrical phenomenon as well.  Well, these strange
> rocks were turning up at that time and there were murmurs that they
> came from the sky.  Chladni became obsessed with making his mark (and
> in the process showing Franklin was wrong) by choosing the other light
> phenomenon - meteors - just as Franklin had chosen a phenomenon, just
> as Franklin had inspired his instrument - in hopes finally making a
> reputation for himself and perhaps a dab of revenge for all those years
> lost with his instrument due to Franklin superior design.
>
> Motive in any investigation is always sought.  Need Chladni more
> motive? ;-)  He released his first improved design utilizing Franklin's
> armonica concepts directly, suddenly became obsessed with with proving
> meteors were not electrical phenomena but rather rocks; immersed
> himself in the library for a couple of months in a mission (much like
> many contemporary meteorite folk we've seen battle it out on the list
> when one scoops the other on a new fall), published his book and in the
> process of his madness made the assertion that the rocks came from
> space, a true contribution; and then was immediately ridiculed and
> mocked ... his contemporaries new what he was up to and this attenuated
> the believability of his work.
>
> Then immdiatey after publishing, he dropped meteorites, never to return
> again to the field and gort to work building a new second generation
> musical instrument.  Both instruments he designed and built in the
> 1790's met with success and Chladni finally could gain some respect he
> earned after a lifetime of brandishing by fire.
>
> The above theory would explain motivation and why Chladni's work in
> meteoritics was as efemeral as the meteors themselves.
>
> We should say a little more about Ben's beliefs and how they
> potentially influenced Chladni, as clearly, the American Philosophical
> Society, founded by Franklin who was the first president published a
> Journal just like the Liondon Society, and the Journal was undoubtably
> read by Chladni.  The first president of the Society was Franklin, and
> he was followed by the great Astronomer Early American astronomer David
> Rittenhouse, as the second president, who predated much of Chladni's
> idea on cosmic origins and as the successor of Franklin, undoubtably
> would have been an interesting subject of study for Chladni as he
> studied those late nights in the library for that intriguingly brief
> period of time.  As a matter of fact, Chladni himself said Lichtenberg
> told him to immerse himself reading Philosophical Transactions in the
> library.  What were the Americans saying about meteors that might tip
> off Chladni and that Lichtenberg definitely read as well?
>
> Let me quote a passage of a post I made to the List in 2006 excerping a
> letter from Rittenhouse to Franklin, and to comment that Franklin
> likely had a friendly rivalry with Rittenhouse as to the cosmic origin
> of meteorites and predated Chladni's "original" contribution by a
> number of years:
>
> "Ben believed for a time that meteors were also caused by electricity,
> however his contemporary, the great Astronomer Early American
> astronomer David
> Rittenhouse, had other thoughts and most obviously discussed them at
> length with
> Franklin. They were both founders and officers in the American
> Philosophical
> Society - the Innovative and incomparable Academic Ivory Tower in the
> unique
> American tradition of their time responsible for adding scientific
> thought
> to the American Revolution and much beyond...Upon Franklin's death,
> Rittenhouse became the second president of the Society until his own
> death five years
> later.
>
> Eleven years before Ben's death, On "All Hallow's Eve", October 31,
> 1779,
> Rittenhouse had witnessed a 30-second bolide accompanied by sonic booms
> near
> Philadelphia, where he was the head of the University of Pennsylvania's
> Astronomy department...as the war of American Independence was still in
> Gear...
>
> Rittenhouse described the event in a letter purportedly to Franklin:
> "Leaving behind it a bright trail of light of a fine Silver Color,
> which
> continued Visible about 20 minutes, altho' but half an hour after
> Sunset, and
> then gradually disappeared, after changing from a Strait line to a very
> crooked
> one. [Meteors are] bodies altogether foreign to this Earth, but meeting
> with
> it, in its Annual Orbit, are attracted by it, and on entering our
> Atmosphere
> take fire and are exploded, something in the manner Steel filings are,
> on
> passing thro' the flame of a Candle. [It made a] glorious appearance at
> the
> distance of a few miles, yet from its prodigious Magnitude it must have
> been
> quite terrible. [Had the] Cataract fallen on the plain where on
> Philadelphia
> stands, half its inhabitants would probably been [sic] drowned."
>
> In the absence of the word "bolide", a cataract most certainly is the
> best
> word choice available to describe the phenomenon. It was brighter than
> the
> Sun, "a half hour after Sunset". "
>
> Chladni clearly couldn't make it on his own, and found it easier to But
> I could be wrong - though I don't mind championing the theory though
> there may be a few hole in it that doesnt mean it isn't a very good
> explanation ;-), I just wish I had more time to research my logical
> assertations.
>
> PS  Franklin actually must have a smile in his grave now that we know
> meteors in fact are an electrical phenomenon.
>
> Kindest wishes
> Franklin's Heirs
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