Eunice Foote, John Tyndall and a question of priority

Abstract

In 1856, an American woman, Eunice Foote, discovered the absorption of thermal radiation by carbon dioxide and water vapour. That was three years before John Tyndall, who is generally credited with this important discovery—a cornerstone of our current understanding of the greenhouse effect, climate change, weather and meteorology. Tyndall did not reference Foote's work. From a contemporary perspective, one might expect that Tyndall would have known of her findings. But it appears that he did not, raising deeper historical questions about the connections and relationships between American and European physicists in the mid nineteenth century. The discovery is seen as a significant moment in physics generally and in climate science in particular, and demands a proper analysis. This paper explores the argument about priority, and the issues that the episode highlights in terms of simultaneous discovery, the development of science in America, gender, amateur status, the reputation of American science in Europe and the networks and means of communication between researchers in America and Europe in the 1850s.