Jeremias Benjamin Richter

Jeremias Benjamin Richter ( born March 10, 1762, Hirschberg, Silesia, † April 14, 1807 in Berlin) was a doctor of philosophy, chemistry, mining expert and independent scholar.

Life

Judge was the son of a Breslau merchant. At age 13, he was succeeded by his uncle, who was the city architect in Breslau, teaches. At sixteen he joined in a military engineer corps, but was not promoted because he neglected his duties. He came out after seven years and dealt with science, and chemistry. Richter studied at Immanuel Kant Philosophy and acquired in 1789 a doctorate in mathematics and chemistry. In 1792 he made his important work on chemical stoichiometry. However, his literary works brought him no economic benefits. His desire for a teaching position at the University failed. Finally, he got a job in Mining Office in Wrocław. In 1798 he got a job in colors Laboratory of the Royal Porcelain Manufactory. His scientific work that has not been paid, he now held, in the morning and evening hours. In later years, he was appointed by the scientific societies as a foreign member, such as 1796 by the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. However, the scientific fame was denied him during his lifetime.

Scientific achievements

The philosophical and methodological model for the mathematization of chemistry took judges from the Leibniz pupil Christian Wolff and his work " rudiments of algebra ." In this work, Wolff's the universal scientific Ars- inveniendi method is described and explained with the help of many natural laws can be found more quickly and effectively through the algebraization mathematical models in all individual sciences. The dissertation judge from 1789 with the Latin title " DE USU matheseos IN CHEMISTRY " should not, therefore, as already translated into German on the usefulness of mathematics in chemistry, but rather with on the usefulness of MATHEMATICAL METHOD in chemistry or. on the usefulness of ARS inveniendi METHOD Christian Wolff in chemistry. Judge applies with this philosophical- theological work as the founder of stoichiometry. He postulated 1791/92 the law of equivalent proportions, which is an important part of theoretical chemistry today. The Stöchiometriegesetz the equivalent proportions was integrated by Richter in 1792 in a universal cosmology, which presented its original Stöchiometriegesetz in a mathematical relationship with astronomical constellations. Judge stoichiometry experiments are not reproducible in his opinion, because gravity conditions, for example, are variable due to the lunar and planetary movements, which he feels may have affected the outcome of an experiment.

The law of equivalent proportions states that elements always combine in the ratio of certain compound masses ( mass equivalent ) or integral multiples of these masses to chemical compounds.

Judge directed his first law of certain mixtures of two salts in water ( calcium and potassium tartrate ). The solution remained neutral, this was not self-evident at that time. When the mixture became a precipitate on ( calcium tartrate ). Judge concluded that a salt mixture of A1B1 A2B2 can form combined with four mixed salts in certain mathematical combinations ( A1B1, A1B2, A2B1, A2B2 ). From the ratios A1/B1 = x, y = A2/B1, etc. all individual salt mixtures can be calculated according to the neutrality of the resulting solution.

More fully understood, the connection, when metal hydroxides ( e.g., iron ( II) hydroxide ) can be mixed with dilute hydrochloric acid. The solution is prepared by the addition of hydrochloric acid only when all iron hydroxide has converted to iron (II ) chloride. Acid could even then detected with litmus. When the concentration of the acid is known and the initial weight of the metal oxides was carried out exactly, also the atomic weight of the metal can be derived. The determination of the atomic masses of the hydroxides or oxides was used in later years by Jöns Jakob Berzelius in atomic weight determination of over 40 elements.

" The mathematics expects all those sciences to their areas, where it only gives sizes, and a science is thus more or less in the Kreiße the art of measurement, the more or less quantities are to be determined. By this truth I was bey chymical experiments often occasioned to the question of whether and in how far probably the Chemistry more a part of applied mathematics sey; especially it was bey the ordinary experience so brisk, that Zwey neutral salts, unless they cut each other in turn make neutral compounds. The immediate consequence, so I moved therefrom, could no other be, than that there must be certain proportions between the constituents of the neutral salts. "

John Dalton knew proven the important work of judges and was able to formulate the theory of the atom. Why judge has overlooked the link to the stoichiometry of atomic theory, remains enigmatic. Presumably he thought for philosophical reasons ( according to Kant ) to another structure of matter.

Works (selection)

• Over the more recent objects of Chemistry more, Bresslau and Hirschberg, 1791 (series )
• Rudiments of Stöchyometrie or art of measuring chymischer elements, First, Zweyter and third part, Bresslau and Hirschberg, 1792-93