Shadow of great britain

If you want to criticize and point out the surrounding scenery, you must first climb on the roof.

——Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

In the reception room of the University of Göttingen, researchers from the Royal Society who came all the way from London sat next to each other around a round table.

Each of them holds an English version of "The Calculation of Current" translated by Arthur, and from time to time there will be a few rustling sounds of turning pages in the reception room.

Perhaps for beginners, "Calculation of Current" is enough for them to read carefully for a day, but for these electromagnetic researchers, they can understand Ohm's ideas in the book in as little as half an hour or as much as one hour. the core point to be expressed.

Soon, some scholars put down their books, but no one spoke first. They looked at me and I looked at you, as if they wanted to listen to other people's opinions first.

But it was obviously not a problem to remain in a stalemate like this. After a long silence, someone finally spoke up: "I don't study electromagnetism particularly deeply, but as far as mathematical expressions are concerned, although Mr. Ohm's proof process The writing is messy and confusing at first glance, but the direction and results are correct. ”

Everyone looked up at the source of the sound. The speaker was Mr. Charles Babbage, the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, who represented the highest level of mathematics research at Cambridge University.

Although nominally the University of Göttingen holds a European electromagnetics conference, in early research, various disciplines often overlapped, and researchers usually spanned multiple fields. Or in other words, researchers these days who only specialize in a single field are a rare species. Therefore, many scholars who are not good at electromagnetic research were invited to attend this conference.

For example, Mr. Gauss, the chairman of the academic committee of this Göttingen Conference on Electromagnetics, although he gained most of his reputation in Europe through mathematics, he actually has little interest in mathematics. He studies mathematics purely to help him. Provides research tools for those interested in astronomy, electromagnetism, and geomapping.

After Babbage, Peter Barlow, assistant professor at the Royal Military College in Woolwich, who was close to him, also echoed: "I also think there is no problem with mathematical calculations. The only problem now is that the information given in the book Whether the experimental data is correct or wrong is not difficult to verify, and we can reproduce it in the laboratory at the University of Göttingen today.”

William Sturgeon, a professor at the East India Company's Military Academy sitting next to Barlow, couldn't help but say: "Previously Weber of Göttingen said that German academic circles criticized Ohm because of this book? What if it was just It's just a different academic point of view. Is it necessary to use the words "liar" and "shoemaker's son"? Besides, is there anything to be ashamed of as a shoemaker's son? I am also a shoemaker's son!"

As soon as Sturgeon finished speaking, researchers immediately nodded in agreement.

If the guests in the drawing room today were not from the Royal Society, then Sturgeon’s words probably would not have resonated with so many people. Because compared with the other three major academic institutions in Europe, the composition of the members of the Electromagnetics Department of the Royal Society in the 19th century was obviously very different from that of the French Academy of Sciences, the Berlin Academy of Sciences, and the Roman Academy of Sciences.

As an emerging discipline, the Electromagnetics Department of the Royal Society is almost entirely composed of experimental physicists, and the so-called experimental physicists, as the name suggests, place more emphasis on hands-on work. Therefore, most of the researchers present had worked as technicians or engineers. And engaging in such a profession is destined to have a poor family background.

Because most children of the wealthy class in the UK will become lawyers, judges, military officers or priests when they grow up. Even if they are engaged in research work, they focus on theoretical directions.

The researchers who just spoke have well illustrated this trend among the Royal Society.

Babbage, who was mainly engaged in mathematical research, was born into a wealthy banker family. He went to Trinity College of Cambridge University and was a senior at the same school and college as Charles Darwin.

And William Sturgeon, as he said, was the son of a shoemaker. He helped his father's shoe shop since he was a child. When he became an adult, he joined the army and served in the army, where he taught himself mathematics and physics and invented the world. Get the first electromagnet.

As for Peter Barlow, he is a legendary inspirational figure. He also came from a poor family. He later entered the Royal Navy and became self-taught on the ship. After leaving the army, he was appointed as an assistant professor of mathematics at the Royal Military College in Woolwich. , the new inventions named after him include the "Barlow Mathematical Table", the Barlow Wheel and the Barlow Lens.

In 1823, Barlow also won the Copley Medal, Britain's highest scientific honor, for correcting errors in the ship's compass caused by the iron material of the ship's hull.

Among this group of people, Michael Faraday is the most famous. Needless to say, Faraday has always been proud of his civilian status as the son of a blacksmith, and even refused to be knighted by King William IV for this reason.

Therefore, after listening to the causes and consequences introduced by Weber and reading Ohm's "Calculation of Current", the experimental physicists of the Royal Society will naturally feel that this is the German scientific community joining forces to bully Ohm.

However, this cannot be blamed on them for making too many associations, but similar situations are not uncommon in the European scientific community. Although compared with politics, the battles in the world of natural philosophy are not as life-and-death, but there are still a lot of nasty things in it.

Apart from anything else, wasn't Faraday framed for academic fraud and plagiarism in his early years?

No one can understand how Ohm feels at this time better than him.

The researchers at the Royal Society were filled with outrage, and this was the effect Arthur wanted to see.

Why did he take Ohm's paper to the Royal Society first, rather than to the French Academy of Sciences or the Berlin Academy of Sciences?

It is precisely because there are more experimental physicists here who are born in low-income families.

In Paris and Berlin, although they also study electromagnetism, they focus more on theoretical research, and most of them are from middle class or above, so it is really difficult to make those guys empathize with Ohm's story.

Moreover, in the process of entertaining delegations from various academies of sciences, they must be carefully classified into categories. If you don't understand the grievances and resentments between them, it's easy to please one and offend the other.

As far as Faraday is concerned, although Faraday's character is impeccable, because Faraday's mentor Sir Humphrey Davy offended many people when he visited Paris at the invitation of Napoleon in his early years, so the French Academy of Sciences has not been the best until now. Some people criticized Faraday's achievements.

When David visited Paris, he was warmly welcomed by the Parisian scientific community. One morning, Ampere brought two French chemists to visit David, and they also brought a purple-black crystal as a gift. This thing is a substance that French chemist Courtois accidentally obtained while refining seaweed two years ago.

Although Courtois, Guy-Lussac and others have been studying it for two years, they have never been able to figure out what the ingredients of this thing are.

After David got such a treasure, he immediately began to study this mysterious substance with his young apprentice Faraday. Within a few days, David figured out that the purple gas emerging from this mysterious purple crystal was it. own vapor. It has the properties of chlorine not because it contains chlorine, but because it is an element in itself, and this new element belongs to the same category as chlorine.

Afterwards, David used electrolysis and finally determined that it was not a compound, but a simple substance. David didn't waste a minute when he came to this conclusion.

Because as a veteran in the world of natural philosophy, David knew that he had to announce his discovery first. Sometimes a minute's delay will cause you to lose the opportunity to become an immortal forever.

David immediately wrote a letter to Cuvier of the Paris Academy of Sciences announcing his views.

That afternoon, the letter was read out at the Paris Academy of Sciences.

Then, David wrote a detailed report on his experimental results and sent it back to the Royal Society. The date on the report was December 10, 1813, which was the final identification of iodine as a simple substance using electrolysis. the day before. In order to win this honor, David cunningly moved the report date forward by one day.

It didn't take long for the news to spread in Paris that Sir David had discovered a new element, iodine.

This incident rightly angered his French colleagues.

Because iodine was extracted by the French, the French studied it for a long time and found that the honor of iodine should belong to France.

The most irritating person among them was Guy-Lussac. This great French chemist had done a lot of work. He was about to succeed when he suddenly heard someone announced that iodine had been discovered, and the discoverer was their distinguished guest Dai. Sir Wei.

For this reason, Gay-Lussac angrily cursed: "This man only did one percent of the work, but he demands 100 percent of the honor!"

Because of David's bad thing, Faraday was also hated by the French for a long time. If David hadn't done some disgraceful things to his student Faraday because he was jealous of him later, Guy-Lussac and others would probably still regard Faraday as David's 'accomplice'.

In addition to the battle between the French Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society, the battle between the Berlin Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society is also fierce in some fields.

The hatred between the Germans and the British is actually very easy to understand if we look back. This mainly revolves around Leibniz, the first president of the Berlin Academy of Sciences, and Sir Isaac Newton, the third president of the Royal Society.

Just for the right to discover calculus, the two sides have been fighting for decades. In this protracted battle, the French resolutely sided with their German allies against the domineering British. guy.

However, this does not mean that the relationship between France and the German scientific community is very good.

In the dispute between the "phlogiston theory" and the "oxygen theory" in chemistry, Germany's Starr and France's Lavoisier faced off and fought. In this battle, the Germans first took the advantage, and then France took the initiative, while Britain finally took the French side after swinging left and right.

After Faraday heard the controversy among his companions, he did not express his opinion. Instead, he closed the book and stood up, asking William Webb beside him: "Mr. Webb, where is Mr. Ohm now?"

Weber, who always had a smile on his face, took out his pocket watch from his pocket and looked at it: "At this time, he is probably still in class, right?"

"Do you know which classroom?"

"Of course." Weber said with a smile: "I often go to his place these days. It's fun to do experiments with Ohm."

"Then please lead the way."

Weber was stunned when he heard this: "Aren't you waiting here for Superintendent Hastings?"

Faraday smiled and said, "No need. From what I know about him, he doesn't like such occasions as much as I do. Instead of gathering together like this, saying meaningless words and shirking each other's responsibilities in a hypocritical manner, it is better for us to go to the laboratory and classroom more often."

…

On the campus of Göttingen, classrooms are not a scarce resource. Students are the ones who need to be fought for.

The number of students in the classroom means how much income the lecturer will get, and how much extra money he can allocate to scientific research after life, which is one step closer to his dream of a formal teaching position.

Among the lecturers at the University of Göttingen, Ohm's class does not have many students, but it is not too few either.

He stood on the podium, holding the class handouts that he had carefully prepared last night in one hand, and writing on the blackboard with chalk in the other hand.

"In the experiment, we change the voltage in the circuit..."

After Ohm finished copying the blackboard, he turned around and was about to continue his explanation, but suddenly found that there seemed to be more students in the class today than usual.

At the back of the classroom, seven or eight mature-looking students came, as if they had made an appointment. Each of them wore a bowler hat, a dark tailcoat and a white shirt.

Bismarck, who was sitting in the middle of the classroom and daydreaming, also noticed these uninvited guests. He held a pen in one hand and supported his chin with the other, muttering to himself that this year's freshmen looked like they were about to be buried.

Ohm looked at this group of new students and didn't care much. He just smiled and nodded to a few freshmen, and then started to teach hard again. In Ohm's opinion, these students were probably here for a trial class. In order to get them to sign up for the class, he had to show them 200% of his strength today.

Thinking of this, Ohm's tone of lecture became much louder. He first introduced various basic concepts, and then left a few questions on the blackboard.

"In today's class, we talked about the phenomenon of electromagnetic induction. So the first question, which is also the simplest question, is who discovered electromagnetic induction?" Ohm looked at the silent classroom, his eyes searched around, and finally fixed on several new students in the back row. He raised his hand and called out the name: "The student next to the aisle in the back row, please answer the question." Although Faraday did not understand German, fortunately Ohm taught in French and German, and the other party's gestures were already very obvious, so Faraday had to stand up: "Sorry, can you ask questions in French?" Ohm suddenly realized: "You are an international student, right? It doesn't matter, can you tell me who discovered electromagnetic induction?" Sturgeon, Barlow and others on the side saw Faraday being called out, and they couldn't help but raise their hands to cover their mouths. For electromagnetic researchers, there is no scene more ridiculous than this. Even Faraday himself couldn't help laughing: "Report, I discovered it."

"Hahaha!!!!"

The class burst into laughter. Bismarck lay on the table with one hand covering his stomach and punching the table. He laughed so hard that tears came out: "This French guy is really humorous!"

"What?!" Ohm looked a little angry. He didn't expect this new student to be so naughty: "Forget it, you sit down, the gentleman next to you, please stand up and answer, who discovered electromagnetic induction?"

Sturgeon, who was called by name, tried to hold back his laughter, stood up and said loudly: "Report! Electromagnetic induction was discovered by the gentleman next to me!"

When Ohm heard this answer, he felt that his eyes went dark, and he was so angry that he almost wanted to hit them with chalk.

He asked with a dark face: "Are you serious?"

Barlow next to Sturgeon stood up uninvited and said: "Report! I testify that electromagnetic induction was indeed discovered by the gentleman next to the aisle!"

Ohm covered his chest and felt that he was really unlucky today. How could he run into so many second-generation rich people?

Weber, who had been standing outside the door, covered his mouth and laughed secretly. The sharp-eyed Ohm immediately caught the new friend he had just made: "William, when did you come?"

Weber smiled and stepped aside, letting Arthur, who was hiding behind him, come out: "I've been here for a while, and Hastings is also here."

Ohm felt a little embarrassed when he saw Arthur was there. The supervisor came to inspect the teaching situation with great difficulty, but he ran into the worst class of the semester.

Ohm held his forehead with one hand and muttered: "It seems that even if I come to Göttingen, my bad luck is not over yet."

The class has become like this, Ohm can only find a way to get the teaching back on track. The students are unreliable, so he can only put his hope on his colleagues.

Ohm said, "Students, you are lucky today. We are teaching electromagnetic induction and Provost Hastings is here. He, as an eyewitness, will tell you who discovered electromagnetic induction. You should be able to have a deeper impression."

Arthur didn't expect that he would be drafted by Ohm just for taking a walk, but fortunately, this question was not difficult for him.

Arthur glanced at the Royal Society scholars in the back row who were shaking their shoulders and trying not to laugh. He could only sigh and said, "Mr. Ohm, I suggest you believe those gentlemen just now, because electromagnetic induction was really discovered by the gentleman in the aisle."

After speaking, Arthur shrugged his shoulders, shook his head and walked away along the corridor.

Ohm stood in the classroom for a long time, and he still didn't understand what was going on.

Babbage in the audience saw this, stood up with a smile and said: "Nice to meet you, Mr. Ohm, Charles Babbage, Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University."

Barlow, Sturgeon and others also stood up.

"Saville Chair of Astronomy, University of Oxford, Peter Barlow."

"William Sturgeon, Chief Professor of Natural Philosophy, East India Company's Military Academy."

"University of Edinburgh, Experimental Physics..."

Names famous in Europe hit Ohm's head like cannonballs one after another. The sun shone on Ohm's eyes, making him feel as if he was in a dream in the clouds.

"This... if you say so..."

Ohm's eyes focused on the gentleman by the aisle. His calves were weak and he was walking towards the aisle. After standing still, Ohm took a deep breath and asked solemnly: "Are you?"

Faraday stood up with a smile and extended his hand to him: "Although you have already introduced me in class. But for the sake of politeness, please allow me to introduce myself: Michael Faraday, Director of the Laboratory of the Royal Society and the discoverer of electromagnetic induction. . Your lecture was very good, Mr. Ohm.”