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Hermann von Helmholtz

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Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von Helmholtz (31 August 1821 – 8 September 1894; "von" since 1883) was a German physicist and physician who made significant contributions in several scientific fields, particularly hydrodynamic stability. The Helmholtz Association, the largest German association of research institutions, was named in his honour. Helmholtz is remembered for at the time groundbreaking work in natural science linking theory and practical research work. He was given the von in his surname by Emperor William II.

In the fields of physiology and psychology, Helmholtz is known for his mathematics concerning the eye, theories of vision, ideas on the visual perception of space, colour vision research, the sensation of tone, perceptions of sound, and empiricism in the physiology of perception. In physics, he is known for his theories on the conservation of energy and on the electrical double layer, work in electrodynamics, chemical thermodynamics, and on a mechanical foundation of thermodynamics. Although credit is shared with Julius von Mayer, James Joule, and Daniel Bernoulli—among others—for the energy conservation principles that eventually led to the first law of thermodynamics, he is credited with the first formulation of the energy conservation principle in its maximally general form.

As a philosopher, he is known for his philosophy of science, ideas on the relation between the laws of perception and the laws of nature, the science of aesthetics, and ideas on the civilizing power of science. By the late nineteenth century, Helmholtz's development of a broadly Kantian methodology, including the a priori determination of the manifold of possible orientations in perceptual space, had inspired new readings of Kant and contributed to the late modern neo-Kantianism movement in philosophy.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

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Now, we propose in the first place to show, that this law of organic progress is the law of all progress. Whether it be in the development of the Earth, in the development of Life upon its surface, in the development of Society, of Government, of Manufactures, of Commerce, of Language, Literature, Science, Art, this same evolution of the simple into the complex, through successive differentiations, holds throughout…
Herbert Spencer, Illustrations of Universal Progress
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Others maintain that there are no laws at all in the mental sphere. They say that the essential difference between natural and mental sciences consists in the fact that only the former can be reduced to definite laws, whereas the latter are absolutely wanting in any arrangement of phenomena according to law. The first of these opinions, that of materialistic psychology, can be passed over rapidly. It is contradicted…
Wilhelm Max Wundt, An Introduction to Psychology Translated from the Second German Edition
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Hooke’s discovery of the law of gravitation, and the reference of so many important phenomena to this one law, was the work of immediate apprehension by the understanding; and such also was the proof of Newton’s calculations, and Lavoisier’s discovery of acids and their important function in nature, and also Goethe’s discovery of the origin of physical colours. All these discoveries are nothing more than a correct…
Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea
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Hermann von Helmholtz

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