Johann Karl Friedrich Zöllner

Johann Karl Friedrich Zöllner ( born November 8, 1834 in Berlin, † April 25, 1882 in Leipzig ) was a German physicist and astronomer.

Life and work

Publican studied in Berlin and Basel physics and natural sciences. In 1860 he discovered the publican Illusion. Since 1862 he worked in Leipzig and completed his habilitation in 1865 at the university. In 1866 he was appointed associate and in 1872 a full professor of physical astronomy ( astrophysics ).

Publican worked mainly in the field of photometry. For this purpose he constructed a Astro photometer which Zöllnersche photometer called. For the first time he had described this instrument in his work outlines a general photometry of Heaven ( Berlin 1861). It thus measures the light and color of the celestial bodies. In addition, he built spectroscopic instruments for measuring the solar prominences and for more precise localization of the spectral lines.

His teacher in Leipzig opened publican with an inaugural lecture "On the universal significance of mechanical principles " (1867 ). In 1869 he became a member of the Royal Saxon Society of Sciences.

Zöllner wrote a work about the nature of comets, contributions to the history and theory of knowledge ( Leipzig, 1872), which contains not only a physical theory of comets, but also conveys a critical- philosophical account of the nature of knowledge based on Immanuel Kant and Arthur Schopenhauer. He tried to establish a uniform natural law of physics and led, among others, the general gravity of the basic electrical forces of matter from. In addition, he represented after Hermann von Helmholtz considers that an extension from three-dimensional to four-dimensional space was needed for physics.

In 1877 a number of spiritualist séances held publican, to which he invited other eminent scientists such as Gustav Theodor Fechner and Wilhelm Wundt and about which he published extensive reports in the following years. From these meetings he hoped evidence for the existence of a fourth dimension, and he interpreted apparent telekinetic phenomena during the sessions in this sense. This met with sharp criticism and sparked heated debate in his last years of, in the course of customs officers was called by various parties as mentally ill and he himself expressed anti-Semitic views.

Karl Friedrich Zöllner died on 25 April 1882 in Leipzig.

Works

• About photometry. In: Poggendorff's Annalen, 1857.
• Outlines of a general photometry of the sky. Leipzig 1861.
• Photometric investigations. Leipzig 1865.
• Theory of four -dimensional space. Leipzig 1867.
• The nature of comets. Leipzig 1870.
• Scientific treatises. Vol 1-4. Leipzig from 1878 to 1881.