1672 in science explained

The year 1672 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Astronomy

• February 6 – Isaac Newton submits his first paper on optics to the Royal Society of London.^[1]
• December 23 – Giovanni Cassini discovers Rhea, a satellite of Saturn.
• John Flamsteed determines the solar parallax from observations of Mars.

Botany

• Robert Morison publishes Plantarum Umbelliferarum Distributio Nova, per Tabulas Cognationis et Affinitatis, ex Libra Naturae observata et detecta, the first monograph devoted to a specific group of plants, the Umbelliferae.^[2]

Mathematics

• Georg Mohr publishes the Mohr–Mascheroni theorem, that any geometric construction that can be performed by a compass and straightedge can be performed by a compass alone.^{[3] [4]}

Medicine

• Paul Barbette publishes Opera omnia medica et chirurgica.
• Richard Lower publishes De Catarrhis, the first scholarly attempt by an English physician to take a classical doctrine (the theory that nasal catarrh is caused by secretions overspilling from the brain) and to disprove it by scientific experiment.
• Dutch physician Regnier de Graaf describes the female reproductive system.^[5]
• Isbrand van Diemerbroeck publishes the first edition of his Anatome corporis humani in Utrecht.
• Thomas Willis publishes the earliest English work on medical psychology, Two Discourses concerning The Soul of Brutes, Which is that of the Vital and Sensitive of Man.^[6]

Technology

• Dutch painter Jan van der Heyden improves the fire hose, with his brother Nicolaes, a hydraulic engineer.

Institutions

• January 11 – Isaac Newton is elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London^[7] and it then demonstrates his reflecting telescope to King Charles II of England.

Births

• February 13 – Étienne François Geoffroy, French chemist (died 1731)
• August 2 – Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, Swiss natural historian (died 1733)
• Ann Baynard, English natural philosopher (died 1697)

Deaths

• March – Peter Blondeau, French-born pioneer of mechanised minting of coin
• April 26 – Lionel Lockyer, English quack doctor (born c. 1600)
• July 3 – Francis Willughby, English ornithologist and ichthyologist, pleurisy (born 1635)
• November 19 – John Wilkins, English bishop and natural philosopher, co-founder of the Royal Society (born 1614)
• late – Semyon Dezhnev, Pomor navigator who in 1648 made the first recorded voyage through the Bering Strait (born c. 1605)

Notes and References

1. A Letter of Mr. Isaac Newton, Professor of the Mathematicks in the University of Cambridge; Containing His New Theory about Light and Colors: Sent by the Author to the Publisher from Cambridge, Febr. 6. 1671/72; In Order to be Communicated to the R. Society. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. London. 1672-02-19. The Original or primary colours are, Red, Yellow, Green, Blew, and a Violet-purple, together with Orange, Indico, and an indefinite variety of Intermediate gradations..
2. Book: Oliver, Francis Wall. Makers of British Botany. Cambridge University Press. 1913. 15–16. Robert Morison 1620–1683....
3. Book: Mohr, Georg. Euclides Danicus. Amsterdam. Jacob van Velsen. 1672.
4. Book: Crilly, Tony. 50 Mathematical Ideas you really need to know. London. Quercus. 2007. 978-1-84724-008-8. 80.
5. De mulierum organis generationi inservientibus tractatus novus: demonstrans tam homines & animalia caetera omnia, quae vivipara dicuntur, haud minus quàm ovipara ab ovo originem ducere.
6. Web site: Thomas Willis. Whonamedit?. 2011-03-15.
7. Web site: 2015. Fellowship of the Royal Society 1660-2015. Royal Society. London. https://web.archive.org/web/20151015185820/https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1RVVZY00MZNrK2YCTTzVrbTFH2t3RxoAZah128gQR-NM/pubhtml. 2015-10-15. dead.