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Robert Hunt
(6 Sep 1807 - 17 Oct 1887)
English physicist, geologist and author who also did some work in chemistry and took up an interest in photography. Later in life he is remembered for producing of the annual Mineral Statistics of the United Kingdom.
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Science Quotes by Robert Hunt (2 quotes)
All things on the earth are the result of chemical combination. The operation by which the commingling of molecules and the interchange of atoms take place we can imitate in our laboratories; but in nature they proceed by slow degrees, and, in general, in our hands they are distinguished by suddenness of action. In nature chemical power is distributed over a long period of time, and the process of change is scarcely to be observed. By acts we concentrate chemical force, and expend it in producing a change which occupies but a few hours at most.
— Robert Hunt
In chapter 'Chemical Forces', The Poetry of Science: Or, Studies of the Physical Phenomena of Nature (1848), 235-236. Charles Dicken used this quote, with his own sub-head of 'Relative Importance Of Time To Man And Nature', to conclude his review of the book, published in The Examiner (1848).
When the 1880s began. Maxwell’s theory was virtually a trackless jungle. By the second half of the decade, guided by the principle of energy flow. Poynting, FitzGerald, and above all Heaviside had succeeded in taming and pruning that jungle and in rendering it almost civilized.
— Robert Hunt
In The Maxwellians (2008), 128.
See also:
- 6 Sep - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Hunt's birth.