Scientific experiments [ Politics & Society / Science ]
… showed demonstrations of mechanics in coffeehouses. Later, Benjamin Martin commercialized experiments with static electricity, and Joseph Priestley and his associates introduced new gases in public lectures. Experiments were both commodities … and began a career of public lecturing that lasted until the middle of the century. During his first few years in the city, he offered lectures at several coffeehouses, including Button’s in Covent Garden , Douglas’s in St. Martin’s Lane, … Philosophy in Newtonian Britain, 1660-1750 (Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 123. The effects of static electricity were among the phenomena translated from the circles of scientific virtuosi to a wider audience. Desaguliers and the …
Audience | Coffeehouses | Conversation | Public sphere | Science
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