Research Paper On Lavoisier

Lady Ranelagh’s chemistry book, like Lavoisier, demonstrates a direct interaction with substances. Lavoisier criticizes relying on “suppositions handed down from one age to another [which] acquire additional weight from the authorities by which they are supported, until at last they are received even by men of genius, as fundamental truths.” Lavoisier is keen to usurp the Aristotelian elements which plagued the Universities teaching of chemistry. His solution to the mistakes made by relying on authorities, like Aristotle, is to “trust nothing but facts... [which] are presented to us by nature.” Lavoisier’s “revolutionary” chemistry is marked by an attention to nature over the assertion of academic authorities. Lady Ranelagh’s work is also marked …show more content…
While Tenney and Sarton, by emphasising Boyle, successfully dismantle the idea that Lavoisier alone is the Father of Modern Chemistry, they continue to prop up a single individual as the revolutionary impetus of the ‘new chemistry’. Likewise, it would be easy to prop up Lady Ranelagh as the Mother of Chemistry. Lady Ranelagh, in her recipe books, display the same characteristics -- a focus on, nature, quantity, and systematic repetition -- that made Lavoisier revolutionary. Additionally, her influence on Boyle and his intellectual successors is undeniable. But, examining Lady Ranelagh, not only as a scientist, but as a woman demands that we contextualize Ranelagh and her work. Lady Ranelagh is not the only women to utilize chemical recipes, but, rather, emerges from a long, intergenerational, tradition of female recipe keepers. Lavoisier is not the father of Chemistry; Boyle is not the father of chemistry; Ranelagh is not the mother of chemistry. All three chemists are products of their time. Each, in their own way, give an account of nature and, by virtue of their emphasis on direct experience, push up upon the boundaries of chemical thought. This does not diminish the significance of Lavoisier's work. It does, however, re-contextualizes his work. Precaution should be taken concerning debates, like the one contesting the father of chemistry, which seek to name an individual as a sole revolutionary figure. Lady Ranelagh is not widely known for her significance. Examining Ranelagh’s recipe book shows that the “new chemistry’ emerges from a continuum, not a revolution, and it gives the modern chemist reason to consider how it is their own practices are the accumulation of both the male laboratory and the female