![]() Portrait of Lavoisier explaining to his wife the result of his experiments on air by Ernest BoardĪt the age of 26, around the time he was elected to the Academy of Sciences, Lavoisier bought a share in the Ferme générale, a tax farming financial company which advanced the estimated tax revenue to the royal government in return for the right to collect the taxes. Funded by the wealthy and noble, the Lycée regularly taught courses to the public beginning in 1793. He founded two organizations, Lycée and Musée des Arts et Métiers, which were created to serve as educational tools for the public. He also pushed for public education in the sciences. It was very difficult to secure public funding for the sciences at the time, and additionally not very financially profitable for the average scientist, so Lavoisier used his wealth to open a very expensive and sophisticated laboratory in France so that aspiring scientists could study without the barriers of securing funding for their research. (It would also contribute to his demise during the Reign of Terror many years later.) Lavoisier gained a vast majority of his income through buying stock in the General Farm, which allowed him to work on science full-time, live comfortably, and allowed him to contribute financially to better the community. Lavoisier had a vision of public education having roots in "scientific sociability" and philanthropy. Once a part of the Academy, Lavoisier also held his own competitions to push the direction of research towards bettering the public and his own work. Lavoisier took part in investigations in 1780 (and again in 1791) on the hygiene in prisons and had made suggestions to improve living conditions, suggestions which were largely ignored. In 1772, he performed a study on how to reconstruct the Hôtel-Dieu hospital, after it had been damaged by fire, in a way that would allow proper ventilation and clean air throughout.Īt the time, the prisons in Paris were known to be largely unlivable and the prisoners' treatment inhumane. This was the project that interested Lavoisier in the chemistry of water and public sanitation duties.Īdditionally, he was interested in air quality and spent some time studying the health risks associated with gunpowder's effect on the air. But, since the construction never commenced, he instead turned his focus to purifying the water from the Seine. The goal was to bring water from the river Yvette into Paris so that the citizens could have clean drinking water. Three years later in 1768, he focused on a new project to design an aqueduct. In 1769, he worked on the first geological map of France. In 1768 Lavoisier received a provisional appointment to the Academy of Sciences. In 1764 he read his first paper to the French Academy of Sciences, France's most elite scientific society, on the chemical and physical properties of gypsum (hydrated calcium sulfate), and in 1766 he was awarded a gold medal by the King for an essay on the problems of urban street lighting. ![]() In collaboration with Guettard, Lavoisier worked on a geological survey of Alsace-Lorraine in June 1767. From 1763 to 1767, he studied geology under Jean-Étienne Guettard. His first chemical publication appeared in 1764. Lavoisier's devotion and passion for chemistry were largely influenced by Étienne Condillac, a prominent French scholar of the 18th century. He attended lectures in the natural sciences. ![]() Lavoisier's education was filled with the ideals of the French Enlightenment of the time, and he was fascinated by Pierre Macquer's dictionary of chemistry. However, he continued his scientific education in his spare time. Lavoisier received a law degree and was admitted to the bar, but never practiced as a lawyer. Lavoisier entered the school of law, where he received a bachelor's degree in 1763 and a licentiate in 1764. In the philosophy class he came under the tutelage of Abbé Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, a distinguished mathematician and observational astronomer who imbued the young Lavoisier with an interest in meteorological observation, an enthusiasm which never left him. In his last two years (1760–1761) at the school, his scientific interests were aroused, and he studied chemistry, botany, astronomy, and mathematics. Lavoisier began his schooling at the Collège des Quatre-Nations, University of Paris (also known as the Collège Mazarin) in Paris in 1754 at the age of 11. The son of an attorney at the Parlement of Paris, he inherited a large fortune at the age of five upon the death of his mother. The Collège des Quatre-Nations in Paris Early life and educationĪntoine-Laurent Lavoisier was born to a wealthy family of the nobility in Paris on 26 August 1743.
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