CMS
Curious, pioneering, influential.
The Sceptical Chymist (1661)
Thecompositionofmatterand methodsofchemicalanalysis
TheOriginofFormsand Qualities(1666)
SupportingtheCorpuscularian hypothesis
The Father of Modern Chemistry
Refuting outdated theories usingempirical evidence
ROBERT BOYLE
INTRODUCTION
About Robert Boyle
DISCOVERY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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1627 ROBERTBOYLE
Robert Boyle was born in one of the richestriches families in Britain, on January 25, 1627 in Lismore Castle, County Waterforde, Ireland
He was provided with good education and started formal training at eight years old in Eton college, one of the most prestigious schools to start early learning He started his scientific career in 1649 He was interested in learning about nature and the idea of associating it with experiments The school allowed him to approach knowledge, questions and find answers which textbooks couldn t give him
Around that time, he became acquainted with George Starkey, a young immigrant from America Starkey strongly influenced Boyle in experimental chemistry Through conversations with Starkey, Boyle sparked the interest of chemistry, leading him to conduct several experiments Among his scientific contributions Boyle generated Boyle s law, which describes the relationship of pressure and volume of gas He laid the bedrock for modern chemistry Not only did his work advance scientific knowledge, but it also became a forerunner for further generations of scientists in their study of the mystery of the natural world And he also continued to foster his passion up until the date of his death, December 31st 1691, leaving behind history
In addition, Boyle profoundly shook the traditional view of elements incomparably to Aristotelianism by defining elements as nonconjugable matters and thereby providing a base for the future periodic table His experimental process encouraged the systematic classification of matter, which later influenced scientists like Antoine Lavoisier, a scientist whose work was likely to contribute directly to the formation of the final periodic table Boyle’s law also supported the atomic hypothesis established structurally within
Aileen Moon
THE GREAT DISCOVERY
The Skeptical Chymist
4
What?
SeojunLee
OneofthediscoveriesofRobertBoyleisBoyle'slawwhichisstillused nowadays.Thelawstatesthatpressureisinverselyproportionalto volumeforidealgases,andPV(pressurexvolume)isconstant.Healso wroteTheScepticalChymist,abookaboutcorpuscularianism,asetof theoriesthatexplainstransformationduetotheinteractionofparticlesor corpuscles.ItalsoobjectstoAristotleandParacelsus’sdefinitionof elements.
Hereisanextractfromoneofhisfamousworks:
“CorpuscleofGoldandMercury,thoughtheyarenotprimary ConcretionsofthemostminuteParticlesormatter,confessedlymixt Bodies,canconcurplentifullytothecompositionofseveralverydiffering Bodies,withoutlosingtheirNatureorTexture,orhavingtheircohesive violatedbythedivorceoftheirassociatedpartsorIngredients.”
Insimplewords,thishighlightsthattheparticlesofgoldandmercury canmixwithothersubstanceswithoutlosingtheirtextureornature The corpuscleinthetextreferstoanatomorparticle.Thiswentagainst alchemy,theculturaltrendofthattime Boyle'sLawisstilldeemed important.RobertBoyle’sfindingsonuniquepropertiesofindividual substancesbecamethefundamentalbaseoftheperiodictableasthe periodictableisalistofelements:substancesthatareclassifiedregarding itsuniqueproperties.Anexampleiscompressorsinairconditioners. Theycompresstherefrigerantwhichmakesthepressurehigherandthe volumesmaller.Thenintheevaporator,thepressureisloweredandthe refrigerantvolumeincreases.Thiscycleactivatestheairconditioner. In conclusion,RobertBoyleinfluencedbothmoderndayphysicsand chemistrythroughhisdiscoveries.
SophiePyo
Robert Boyle, with a view to investigating the relationship between pressure and volume in ideal gases, now known as Boyle's Law, conducted experiments using a U-shaped glass tube sealed from one end. He trapped a fixed amount of gas and air in the sealed end of the tube, varyingthepressurecarefullybyaddingdifferentamountsofmercury
Keeping the temperature constant and other variables constant, such as the amount of gas, Boyle was able to prove that pressureandvolumeareinverselyproportional
Boyle's findings were crucial to understanding the behavior of matter, which gave rise to the modern periodic table. His theory of matter as consisting of particles was put forth in his book The Skeptical Chymist, and it predicated the discovery of atoms and elements. These particles or corpuscles, which Boyle called them, fit well into our contemporary understandingofatomicstructure,whereelementsintheperiodictableconsistofauniqueatomictype
The periodic table is designed in a way to demonstrate how elements interact under different conditions. In the case of gasses, Boyle's Law reveals that elements such as oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen, when in gaseous states, react to changes in pressure and volume. Nevertheless, understanding how gasses react to changes in conditions is crucial in studying noble gasses such as helium and neon found in Group 18 of the periodic table These elements are noted for their stability and inertness,makingtheirgaseousphasewell-suitedforexperimentsongaslaws
Boyle's early experiments thus connected early theories about matter to the quantitative knowledge of the chemical elementsattheheartoftheperiodictable.
Giventheopportunitytoexploreacademicfields,includingphilosophyand sciences, from an early age, Robert Boyle familiarised with the ideology of Francis Bacon - a belief that inference of laws must be done based on observation or data collected via controlled, objective methods - during his yearsinEtonCollege.
Why How
MillieLee
Eventually, this contributed significantly to the formation of his own natural philosophy. He believed nature, too subtle and complex to be explored merely depending on theories, should be studied via practical investigations. His attempts to establish and advocate experiment-based, empirical approaches to chemistry rather than pure, speculative theories were derivedfromthis.
Unlike Baconian philosophy, the theories of Aristotle and Paracelsus, which he also was greatly exposed to, did not conform to Boyle’s ideologies. Aristotle stated that all earthly matters were composed of earth, air, fire or water while Paracelsus claimed that the three fundamental constituents of chemical substances are salt, sulfur, and mercury; Boyle noticed that there were myriad phenomena that he observed which both of those theories failed to explain. In an attempt to disprove the traditional concept of elements, Boyle conducted research regarding the decomposability of different substances, eventually coming up with a new definition of elements: the simplest possible substances which cannot be brokendown.
The initial definition of elements by Boyle marked the start of numerous future investigations related to analytical chemistry and elements This laid the groundwork for the Periodic Table also: chemists started exploring chemical propertiesofdifferentelementsonwards,whichthePeriodicTableisallabout,basedon Boyle’stheory
Despite the fact that precedent scientific theories greatly influenced Boyle, religion was always his primary motivation. Throughout his lifetime, he believed glorifying God was his greatest duty. He believed nature, in various ways, displayed the omnipotence of God as well as the complexities of his creation: in pursuit of religious goals, he investigated natural phenomenaandaccordinglypublishedtheresultsandnewmethodshecameupwith
Significance
MelodyJiang
Robert Boyle was an important scientist, especially in chemistry He lived in a time when people focused on old traditional ideas to make guesses about the scientific results One of the biggest things he did was encouraging scientists to do the experiments and analyzing the real results that they deduced. Robert Boyle thought that testing was a more accurate way to check his ideas This kind of idea is called empiricism, which means ideas only come from experiments and tests Robert Boyle also encouraged people to share their discoveries. At the time, many scientists kept their findings secret, but Robert Boyle believed that sharing discoveries will help science grow faster. This is now called collaboration science and open science. This idea is still important to scientists today because nowadays, scientists publish their results in journals for others to read. Additionally, Robert Boyle's work helped study gasses and thermodynamics. He created a famous law called the Boyle’s law (formula: PV=k) that explained how gas pressure and volume are connected. The law states that “The absolute pressure exerted by a g iven mass of an ideal gas is inversely proportional to the volume it occupies if temperature and amount of gas remain unchanged within a closed system.” His discovery contributed to the development of the atomic theory, hence influencing scientists like Isaac Newton His legacy remains: his ideas and methods continuously help scientists make new discoveries
Robert Boyle developed the definition of an element in around 1650. He defined an element as something that could not be broken into smaller parts by a chemical reaction Scientists used this definition until the discovery of subatomic particles. Through his book ‘The Skeptical Chymist’, he said that the elements and matter are made up of basic substances. Boyle’s insights influenced Dmitri Mendeleev, who eventually created the first periodic table Mendeleev relied on Boyle's concept of elements when categorizing them by atomic weight and properties Without Boyle's foundational work in defining and experimenting with elements, the systematic classification of elements into the periodic table may have taken much longer to develop.
Bibiliography
Introduction
Science History Institute (2024). Robert Boyle. [online] Science History Institute. Available at: https://www.sciencehistory.org/education/scientificbiographies/robert-boyle/.
Famous Scientists (2015). Robert Boyle - Biography, Facts and Pictures. [online] Famousscientists.org. Available at: https://www famousscientists org/robert-boyle/ www britannica com (n d ) Robert Boyle summary | Britannica [online] Available at: https://www britannica com/summary/Robert-Boyle
How
Study.com. (2022). Robert Boyle: Discoveries and Inventions. [online] Available at: https://study.com/learn/lesson/robert-boyle-discoveryinventions html
Science Buddies (n d ) Boyle’s Law: Pressure vs Volume of a Gas at Constant Temperature | Science Project [online] Available at: https://www sciencebuddies org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Chem p011/chemistry/boyles-law-pressure-versus-volume-of-a-gas-at-constanttemperature. www.chm.davidson.edu. (n.d.). Gas Laws: Boyle’s Law. [online] Available at: https://www.chm.davidson.edu/VCE/GasLaws/BoylesLawData.html.
What
Principe, L.M. (2019). Robert Boyle | Biography, Contributions, Works, & Facts. In: Encyclopædia Britannica. [online] Available at: https://www britannica com/biography/Robert-Boyle
Why
Eaton, W. (n.d.). Robert Boyle | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. [online] Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at: https://iep.utm.edu/robert-boyle/. dictionary apa org (n d ) APA Dictionary of Psychology [online] Available at: https://dictionary apa org/baconian-method
Significance
Duignan, B. (2024). Enlightenment. In: Encyclopedia Britannica. [online] Available at: https://www.britannica.com/event/EnlightenmentEuropean-history.
Principe, L M (2019) Robert Boyle | Biography, Contributions, Works, & Facts In: Encyclopædia Britannica [online] Available at: https://www britannica com/biography/Robert-Boyle
Science History Institute (2024). Robert Boyle. [online] Science History Institute. Available at: https://www.sciencehistory.org/education/scientific-biographies/robert-boyle/.
