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Genevae : Apud Samuelem de Tournes, 1694, 4°, (16), 144 pp., Pappband. Second Latin Edition of 'Mechanical Qualities'! Full title: Experimenta nec non observationes circa variarum particularium qualitatum originem, sive productionem mechanicam quibus accesserunt tractatus quo imperfecta chymistarum doctrina de qualitatibus detegitur, et quaedam in hypothesin de alcali et acido animadversiones "The collection is important because the tracts on magnetism and electricity. The term electricity is said to have been introduced into English by Charleton in his translation of Van Helmont's 'A Ternary of Paradoxes', London 1650. This is clearly wrong since Sir Thomas Browne used and defined the noun in 1646 (Pseud. Epidem. Ii, p.51, line 42). He also used both adjectival forms, electric and electrical. Though the noun was employed sporadically in England before 1675, it was Boyle who brought the term into common usage, and his tract is the first work on electricity in the English language." "The tracts on taste and smell are the first monographs in the history of physiological literature to be devoted to these special senses. They ere often reprinted, and one cannot pretend to have found aöö of the French and Italian editions of these popular tracts." Fulton, pp.87-88 "In "Experiments and Notes about the Mechanical Production of Magnetism," Robert Boyle (1627-1691) thus arrives at the conclusion that the change of the magnetism, communicated to iron, may be produced, at least, in good part, by mechanical operations, procuring some change of texture in the iron. It is clear from the above that Boyle, like Power, accepts without alteration the Cartesian model according to which magnets and iron have pores; and that he believes, again following Power, that what flows through those pores is "the magnetical effluvia of the earth." Like Descartes's "grooved particles," in this theory the "magnetical effluvia" circulate through and around the Earth via its poles, and their impact opens up the pores in red-hot iron and gives directionality to magnets. Thus, once one accepts the existence of things like "magnetical effluvia" and "pores in iron," it seems plausible to attribute magnetization to mechanical alteration of the iron's internal structure, without having to describe magnetism in terms of either the "substantial forms" of Scholasticism or the "hidden virtues" of Renaissance magic." Yamamoto Yoshitaka, Pull Of History, The: Human Understanding Of Magnetism And Gravity Through . (2018), pp.723-24 Fulton No. 126. Seller Inventory # 62876
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