Discussing Chemistry and Steam: The Minutes of a Coffee House Philosophical Society 1780-1787

This book transcribes and comments on the manuscript Minutes of the meetings in a London coffee house of a group of 18th century scientists, natural philosophers, and industrialists who discussed some of the key scientific issues of the day. Their debates offer a rare authentic contemporary account of the scientific and social thinking of their time.
This volume transcribes and comments on the manuscript minutes of the meetings in London coffee houses of a group of 18th century scientists, who discussed practical aspects of chemistry and technology. This coffee house society provided a group of natural philosophers with the opportunity to discuss the topics that most interested them. Though the minute books deal with some practical and procedural matters, they mostly record the discussions, which centred around chemistry, and in particular the phlogiston theory. Contemporary accounts of such meetings are extremely rare, and the survival of the manuscript copy, made by William Nicholson, a member and secretary of the society is remarkable. This book, reproduces the original and includes an account of the membership, 55 in number and of whom 33 were Fellows of the Royal Society of London. Background essays by Jan Golinski and Larry Stewart are also incorporated. Many of the members were medical, and some were lawyers and clergymen, but all shared a fascination for practical science and technology.