• Humphry Davy and the Problem of Analogy

    Author(s):
    Gregory Tate (see profile)
    Date:
    2019
    Group(s):
    Victorian Studies
    Subject(s):
    Romanticism, Literature and science, Literature--Philosophy, Poetry
    Item Type:
    Article
    Tag(s):
    British Romantic poetry, Literature and philosophy
    Permanent URL:
    http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/dngj-0753
    Abstract:
    Analogy, the comparison of one set of relations to another, was essential to Humphry Davy’s understanding of chemistry. Throughout his career, Davy used analogical reasoning to direct and to interpret his experimental analyses of the chemical reactions between substances. In his writing, he deployed analogies to organise and to explain his theories about the relations between physical processes and between the properties of different chemical elements and compounds. But Davy also regularly expressed two concerns about analogical comparison: first, that it was founded not on the rational interpretation of facts but on imaginative speculation; and second, that it was a kind of rhetoric, the persuasiveness of which depended not on material evidence but on misleading figures of speech. This article discusses the influences that informed Davy’s ambivalent assessment of the value of analogy, and it examines the distinct yet overlapping ways in which this assessment was expressed in his notebooks, his lectures and treatises on chemistry, his philosophical writings, and his poetry.
    Metadata:
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    Published as:
    Journal article     Show details
    Pub. DOI:
    https://doi.org/10.1080/00026980.2019.1616944
    Publisher:
    Informa UK Limited
    Pub. Date:
    2019-5-22
    Journal:
    Ambix
    Volume:
    66
    Issue:
    2-3
    Page Range:
    140 - 157
    ISSN:
    0002-6980,1745-8234
    Status:
    Published
    Last Updated:
    4 years ago
    License:
    All Rights Reserved
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