3 - The Geomagnetic Project: Internationalism in Science between the French Revolution and the Franco-Prussian War

Summary

Internationalism in this chapter refers to the communication, cooperation, and fundamental consent between scientists of different nations with respect to the study of the natural world. I focus on the first half of the nineteenth century, using the French Revolution and the Franco-Prussian War as bookends. My intention is not to offer a catalogue raisonné of the many and varied instances of scientific relationships between European countries that occurred across the evolving spectrum of the scientific disciplines; instead, I select for special attention terrestrial magnetism, a subject that was at the cutting edge of science and required large-scale data collection on a global scale.