MAGNETIC CRUSADE - SCIENCE AND POLITICS IN EARLY VICTORIAN BRITAIN
MAGNETIC CRUSADE - SCIENCE AND POLITICS IN EARLY VICTORIAN BRITAIN
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作者：
CAWOOD, J
19世纪30年代是英国科学史上最动荡的时期之一，爱德华·萨宾（Edward Sabine）、汉弗莱·劳埃德（Humphrey Lloyd）、约翰·赫歇尔（John Herschel）和一小群支持者发起了一场运动，并最终发起了他们的同事、当代历史学家威廉·休厄尔（William Whewell）所说的”迄今为止世界上最伟大的科学事业“。“这场运动被称为磁力十字军东征，代表了维多利亚时代早期蓬勃发展的数据收集热情，并最终建立了一个全球地磁观测站网络，该网络由向南极地区派遣地磁探险队而开创。威廉·弗农·哈考特（William Harcourt）也许最好地表达了整个计划的目标，他在1839年的英国科学促进会年会上说，这一计划可能会导致”一种基于已知事实的合理表述的理论”的构建，这种理论将把迄今难以解决的地球磁场变化表达为简单的定律。这些定律在航海领域具有直接的实用价值，但是，正如他接着说的，该项目还可能产生“这一现象的真正原因--并在其中完成牛顿开始的事情--新宇宙定律的揭示--无法估量的力量的本质和联系的发现--所有这些都是在可能被证明是最容易接近和可测量的一面上接近理论高度的可能结果。[2]哈考特的预测清楚地表明了磁力十字军东征的直接科学和实际目标，这对协会成员和海军部都有吸引力，但也揭示了推动其赞助者的长期理论目标。一旦启动，企业被证明是一个开放式的项目，它的支持者能够一次又一次地回到英国协会和皇家学会，为它的继续和进一步的财政支持的请求的论据。本文是爱德华萨宾来在英国协会和皇家学会内领导的运动的组织检查，以确保必要的支持，为海-和陆基观测站以及系统建立后的后续开发。因此，这在很大程度上要归功于苏珊·坎农的工作，她对维多利亚时代早期科学的研究首先使我意识到这场运动的复杂性，而内森·莱因戈尔德则证明了这一点。
D URING ONE OF THE MOST TURBULENT PERIODS in the history of British science-the 1830s-Edward Sabine, Humphrey Lloyd, John Herschel, and a small group of supporters campaigned for and eventually launched what their colleague and contemporary historian William Whewell described as" by far the greatest scientific undertaking the world has ever seen."'The campaign, which became known as the Magnetic Crusade, typified the enthusiasm for data collecting which flourished in the early Victorian era and culminated in the establishment of a global network of geomagnetic observatories which was inaugurated by the dispatch of a geomagnetic expedition to the southern polar regions. The objectives of the whole enterprise were perhaps best expressed by William Vernon Harcourt, who told the 1839 annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science that the scheme might lead to the construction of" a theory based on a legitimate representation of known facts" which would express the hitherto-intractable variation of the earth's field as simple laws. These laws would be of immediate practical value in the field of navigation, but, as he went on to say, the project might also yield" the true cause of the phenomena-and therein a completion of what Newton began-a revelation of new cosmical laws-a discovery of the nature and connexion of imponderable forces-all these the possible results of approaching the heights of theory on what may prove to be their most accessible and measurable side." 2 Harcourt's predictions make clear the immediate scientific and practical goals of the Magnetic Crusade which appealed to both the Association's membership and the Admiralty but also reveal the longer-term theoretical objectives which motivated its sponsors. Once launched the enterprise proved to be an open-ended project, and its supporters were able to return again and again to the British Association and the Royal Society with arguments for its continuation and requests for further financial backing.This paper is an examination of the organization of the campaign which Edward Sabine came to lead within the British Association and the Royal Society to secure the necessary support for both the sea-and land-based observatories and the subsequent development of the system once established. As such it owes much to the work of Susan Cannon, whose study of early Victorian science first made me aware of the intricacies of the campaign, and to that of Nathan Reingold, who has demonstrated