Technical Concepts and Contexts of Olfaction: c.1700-c.1900

Virginia Polytechnic Institute And State University, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

This project is an historical investigation into scientific and technological approaches to the sense of smell in the 18th and 19th centuries. Five interrelated trends in this history will be examined: (1) the influence of pre-Enlightenment understandings of olfaction on later technical endeavors; (2) natural philosophical inquiry into the sense of smell in the British and French Enlightenment and its impact on the growth of the human sciences; (3) disciplinary developments related to olfaction in the natural sciences, especially chemistry; (4) the craft traditions involved in-and subsequent industrialization of-the production of odoriferous substances; and (5) interest in olfaction in the context of the life sciences. These topics have received sparse treatment in the critical literature on conceptual and practical approaches to sensation and perception. Technical approaches to olfaction and odor will be approached in the same spirit as recent STS work in the genre known as biography of scientific objects. The object in question smell (here meaning both the sensory mode and the phenomenon itself) will be characterized using a series of six important historical vantage points, each emphasizing a particular aspect of the same ongoing story. These episodes will illuminate, in context, the work of such important figures in olfactory science as Linnaeus, Fourcroy, Cloquet, Zwaardemaaker, and Ramon y Cajal. In addition, institutional trends in the various disciplines and enterprises related to smell will be examined, using this set of discrete vantage points to highlight different perspectives. This study will emphasize both philosophical and historical themes in conjunction. The philosophical aspect will accentuate the role attributed to olfaction as a potential and actual source of knowledge, and the consequences of this role for theories of knowledge production. The detailed historical account will demonstrate the abiding technical interest in smell in the past three centuries and describe the gradual development of related theories, practices, and techniques. A better understanding of past developments related to smell has the potential to influence a number of fields. While experientially and emotionally powerful, olfaction has often been ignored or derided in both technical and philosophical circles. Recently, new work in STS has begun to redress some of this inattention, but the base of expertise in the United States remains underdeveloped given the many potential areas of impact. Smell provides a valuable perspective from which to approach questions about the fundamental role of epistemic instruments in the sciences, and the possible distinctions between representation and reality and between subjective and objective experience. Furthermore, the material-chemical nature of olfaction makes it of special interest in historical and conceptual studies of chemistry, helping to connect this area of inquiry quite directly to issues of epistemology, ontology, and the philosophy of technology. Thus, broader impacts of funding this work will include: (1) fostering of interdisciplinary connections among different perspectives on science and technology; (2) significant contributions to under-examined topics in STS; and (3) promotion of international dialogue on important historical and conceptual issues that have, until lately, been disregarded in this country.