The digester, invented by Denis Papin in the 1680s, was a rudimentary pressure cooker used to soften hard bodies by boiling them at high pressure. In this paper, I propose a reassessment of Papin's work on the digester, arguing that his research was located at the intersection of the chemical laboratory and cooking practice. I then examine cases from the eighteenth-century European circulation of the instrument in Sweden, Italy and the Netherlands in order to showcase the different practices in which the digester was embedded, including chemical research, philanthropic projects to feed the destitute, and proposals for the improvement of home cooking. The digester's history represents a key episode for demonstrating the intertwined nature of natural-philosophical research and the practice of economy or ‘thrift’. All users of the digester engaged in a rationalization of its functions through quantification, not only to fulfil a concern for precision but also to display the device's potential to reform practical daily life. The digester could save time and fuel, reduce material waste, make cooking easier and foster collective meal preparation for the needy.
Le premier mémoire académique de Pierre-Louis
Moreau de Maupertuis (1698-1759), intitulé Sur la
forme des instruments de musique (1724), a été souvent négligé
par les historiens. Cela est d’autant plus étonnant si l’on considère
les difficultés évidentes qu’il pose d’un point de vue à la fois
historique et théorique. Pour essayer de résoudre ces problèmes
d’interprétation, dans la présente contribution nous avons approfondi
les étapes principales de la première formation intellectuelle de
Maupertuis, aussi bien que les sources possibles de quelques-unes de
ses doctrines. Nous sommes bien conscients que cette opération ne nous
livrera rien d’absolument certain. Dans le pire des cas, toutefois,
nous aurons esquissé un cadre historico-philosophique à l’intérieur
duquel le savant malouin a débuté sa carrière : une préhistoire de
l’activité savante de Maupertuis qui, à ce jour, reste encore
largement inexplorée.
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