1785 in science

The year 1785 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Astronomy

• Dunsink Observatory established near Dublin.^[1]

Aviation

• January 7 - Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England to Calais, France in a gas balloon, becoming the first to cross the English Channel by air.
• January 19 – Richard Crosbie successfully flies in a hot air balloon across Dublin, the first ascent in Ireland.

Biology

• Antoine François and Étienne Louis Geoffroy publish Entomologia Parisiensis, sive, Catalogus insectorum quae in agro Parisiensi reperiuntur ....
• John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, publishes Botanical Tables, containing the different families of British plants.

Earth sciences

• March–July - James Hutton's Theory of the Earth is first presented, at the Royal Society of Edinburgh.^[2]

Exploration

• André Michaux is sent by the French government to North America to look for new plants.

Mathematics

• The Marquis de Condorcet publishes Essai sur l'application de l'analyse á la probabilité des décisions rendues á la pluralité des voix including his voting paradox, the Condorcet method of voting and his jury theorem.

Medicine

• William Withering publishes An Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses.

Awards

• Copley Medal: William Roy

Births

• January 15 - William Prout, chemist (died 1850)
• February 26 - Anna Sundström, chemist (died 1871)
• March 22 - Adam Sedgwick, geologist (died 1873)
• April 26 - John James Audubon, naturalist, illustrator (died 1851)
• July 6 - William Jackson Hooker, botanist (died 1865)

Deaths

• January 23 - Matthew Stewart, Scottish mathematician (born c. 1717)
• June 2 - Jean Paul de Gua de Malves, French mathematician (born 1713)
• November 16 - Johan Gottschalk Wallerius, Swedish chemist and mineralogist (born 1709)
• December 12 - Edmé-Louis Daubenton, French naturalist (born 1730)
• Pierre Le Roy, French clockmaker (born 1717)

References