John
Tyndall, FRS, DCL, LLD
John Tyndall was born on Aug 2 1820, at
Leighlin Bridge, County Carlow, Ireland, the son of a member of the Irish
Constabulary. Although he only received a common school education and was denied
the advantages of a university education until his 30's, he became one of the
great scientists of the 19th century. Among his friends he numbered Louis
Pasteur, Michael Faraday, Charles Lister, Thomas Huxley, Leslie Stephens, Thomas
Carlyle and Tennyson. Just a few years before his death, the 1888 edition of
Prominent Men and Women of the Day noted: "… in a life of the duration of
nearly three score and ten this able man has wielded his pen in the cause of
science with a steadiness of purpose and a persistency of will that is worthy of
praise and emulation".
Tyndall left school at the age of 17, with a firm background in basic
mathematics, surveying and English composition. In 1839 he joined the Irish
Ordnance Survey where he spent three years becoming an accomplished practical
surveyor and draftsman. When the Irish survey finished in 1842 he was
transferred to the English Survey. In 1843, however, he was dismissed following
a formal protest about the efficiency of the service and its treatment of the
Irish. He temporarily returned to Ireland until the next year when a position
arose in a private surveyors office in England. For the next three years Tyndall
was caught up in the railroad boom and travelled extensively in the UK for the
construction of the railway network. When this boom waned in 1847 he sought new
employment as a mathematics master at Queenwood College Hampshire. After
striking up a friendship with the science master - a young chemist called Edward
Frankland - both men decided to go to Germany together for a formal science
education the next year.
Tyndall's Education 1848-
Tyndall's Discussions
Tyndall contributed over the years to science
columns in a number of popular middle class periodicals and did much to interest
an important element of the Victorian public in the progress of science. His
greatest audience was gained ultimately thorough his books and he published more
than 16 books and 145 papers in his lifetime.
As well as trying to improve the quality of science education and scientific
knowledge, Tyndall's youthful interest in theology had turned into open
opposition of what he regarded as the anti-intellectual and anti-scientific
tenets of Christianity. He was thus an early defender of Darwinian evolution
and, like Huxley, he was freely denounced as a proponent of materialism and
atheism. Tyndall had many clashes with orthodoxy, the most notorious incident
was in Belfast in 1874 when he gave his British Association Presidential
address. As a result of his opinions Tyndall was denounced from the pulpits, and
pamphlets attacking the 'Belfast address' continued to appear for years
afterwards.
Tyndall's Experiment's
A role less frequently mentioned is that of a civic scientist or government
consultant. Like many other scientists, Tyndall was called on from time-to-time
to give expert advice. Areas he covered included investigation of accidents in
coalmines and the determination of the causes of boiler explosions in steam
engines. His most significant civil labours were in the cause of safe marine
navigation. He was on the Board of Trade from 1867 for 14 years, which included
lighthouse boards under its jurisdiction and had a profound effect on the safety
of navigators around the coasts of England and Ireland.
In 1872, Tyndall made a highly profitable lecturing tour throughout the United
States which resulted in increased fame as a man of great learning. The proceeds
from this tour were put into trust for the advancement of American science.
Tyndall remained a bachelor until he was 56, when in 1876 he married Louisa
Hamilton. Their marriage, although childless, was an extremely happy one.
Although the major part of Tyndall's scientific work was completed by the time
he married, he continued his research on spontaneous generation, the germ theory
and the propagation of science for many years after and his lectures and essays
continued to preach the cause of science.
In 1881 he delivered the final blow to the long held idea that germ free air
does not lead to food decay. His discovery of organic germ spores in even the
most carefully cleaned and filtered air propelled into the current dispute over
spontaneous and the germ theory of disease. Tyndall was an outspoken advocate of
the work of Louis Pasteur. Tyndall's meticulous research in the laboratory not
only refuted the arguments of Pasteur's opponents, but also extended and refined
the work of Pasteur himself.
The Final Years