Observations on some of the physical, chemical, physiological and pathological phenomena of malarial fever / by Joseph Jones.

  • Jones, Joseph, 1833-1896.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on some of the physical, chemical, physiological and pathological phenomena of malarial fever / by Joseph Jones. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    The fixed stars, although analogous to our sun, are at so great distances that it seems unreasonable to attribute to them any influ- ence over the changes going on upon the surface of our globe. When, however, we consider that scarcely a line can be projected into space from any point upon our globe without eventually striking one of these suns—when we consider that in some places many thousands appear to be gathered into a space no greater than that occupied by the disk of the full moon, it will be no longer a matter of surprise that they should exert a decided influence upon the temperature of our globe. M. Pouillet,1 from an elaborate series of experiments upon solar and stellar heat, finished in 1838, drew the following remarkable conclusions:— 1. That the actual temperature of space in which the earth and planets move lies between —175° and —283° Fahr. 2. That the sun supplies the earth annually with as much heat as would melt a layer of ice 100 feet thick, covering the entire globe. 3. That the fixed stars supply as much heat as would melt a layer of ice 85 feet thick, covering the whole globe. According to this calculation, the solar heat alone constitutes only two-thirds of the entire quantity of heat supplied to the earth, to repair its losses by radiation into space. If this calculation be true,2 it is evident that if the heat supplied by the fixed stars be 1 Memoir on the Solar Heat, on the Radiating and Absorbing Powers of the Atmospheric Air, and on the Temperature of Space, by M. Pouillet, Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Paris, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the Faculty of Sciences, &c. Comptes Rendus des Seances de FAcademie des Sciences, July 9, 1838. See Translation in Taylor's Scientific Memoirs, 1846, vol. iv., article iii. pp. 44—90. 2 Whether these conclusions of Pouillet be true or false, they are sustained by the researches of the best observers, in that they agree in assigning to the regions of space a definite temperature. Thus, Fourier,* from a careful series of investi- gations, estimates the temperature of space at from —58° to —76° ; Arago,f from polar observations, at —70°, and Pictet at —76° ; Saigey, from 367 observations made by Humboldt in the chain of the Andes and in Mexico, at —85°, and from thermometrical measurements at Mount Blanc and during the aeronautic ascent of Gay-Lussac, at —107 ; Sir John HerschelJ at —132, and Poisson§ at only 8Q.6. * Th£orie Analytique de la Chalcur, 1822, p. ix. (Annales de Chimie et de Physique, torn, iii., 1S16, p. 350; torn, iv., 1817, p. 128; torn, vi., 1S17, p. 259; torn, xiii., 1820, p. 418.) f Arago, Sur la temperature du pule et des espaces celestes, Annuaire du Bureau des Long, pour 1S25, p. 189, et pour 1834, p. 192; also Saigey, Physique du Globe, 1832, pp. 60—76. J Edinburgh Review, vol. 87, 1848, p. 223. § Poisson, Th6orie Mathematique de la Chaleur (§ 196, p. 436, § 200, p. 447, and § 228, p. 521, § 227, p. 520). See Analysis of the Mathematical Theory of Heat, by S. D. Poisson, in Taylor's Scientific Memoirs, vol. i., article vi., 1837, p. 122.