author
Joseph Priestley
1733–1804
A restless thinker of the Enlightenment, he helped change both science and public debate. Best known for experiments on gases, he is often linked with the discovery of oxygen, while also writing boldly about religion, education, and liberty.
3 Audiobooks
Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air
by Joseph Priestley
About the author
Born in Yorkshire in 1733, Joseph Priestley was an English chemist, minister, teacher, and political writer whose interests ranged across science, theology, language, and education. He became well known in the 1760s and 1770s for work on electricity and on what he called different kinds of “air,” part of the research that made him one of the most important experimental chemists of his age.
His most famous scientific work came in 1774, when he isolated the gas later named oxygen. Priestley understood the result through the older phlogiston theory, but his experiments still played a major part in the chemical changes that followed. He also wrote influential books on grammar, history, religion, and politics, showing how closely ideas about science, learning, and public life were connected in his world.
Priestley’s religious and political views made him a controversial figure. After anti-dissenting riots in Birmingham destroyed his home and laboratory in 1791, he eventually emigrated to the United States, where he spent his final years in Northumberland, Pennsylvania, and died in 1804. His life remains a striking example of how curiosity, conviction, and controversy could meet in one person.