This
history of the thermometer, from its invention in the early seventeenth
century (an achievement attributed to at least four scientists,
including Galileo) through various changes and applications over
the next three centuries, includes controversy about its invention,
the story of different scales, from Fahrenheit and Celsius to the
now-forgotten Reaumur, Delisle, and Christin scales, and the history
of the gradual scientific then popular understanding of the concept
of temperature. Not until 1800 did people interested in thermometers
begin to see clearly what they were measuring, and the impetus for
improving thermometry came largely from study of the weather --
the liquid-in-glass thermometer became the meteorologist's instrument
before that of the chemist or physicist. This excellent introductory
study follows the development of indicating and recording thermometers
until recent times, emphasizing meteorological applications.
268
pages. 6 x 9. Soft cover. $25.00. (2002 reprint of 1966 edition)
ISBN 0801871530
