Wilhelm Ostwald

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wilhelm Ostwald
Signature Wilhelm Ostwald.JPG

Friedrich Wilhelm Ostwald ( Russian Ви́льгельм Фри́дрих О́ствальд ; * 21 August July / 2 September  1853 greg. In Riga , Livonia Governorate ; †  April 4, 1932 in Leipzig ) was a German-Baltic chemist , philosopher , sociologist , science organizer, theoretician and historian . He is one of the founders of physical chemistry and taught at the University of Leipzig . He made his laboratory and the Wilhelm Ostwald Institute for Physical and Theoretical Chemistry at the university, which he founded in 1898, a center of the new scientific discipline.

With numerous articles, lectures and publications, the publication of popular textbooks, the establishment of magazines, book series and organizations, he achieved an outstandingly high level of effectiveness as a science organizer.

Ostwald received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1909 for his work on catalysis and his studies of equilibrium relationships and reaction rates .

Life

Complete picture of the tomb
Grave plate for Wilhelm Ostwald and his family in the park of his country estate "Energie" in Großbothen

On September 2, 1853 Friedrich Wilhelm Ostwald, the second of three sons of the master cooper Gottfried Ostwald and his wife in what was then the Russian Empire belonging Riga born (now Latvia ). One brother was the forest scientist Eugen Ostwald . The ancestors came from Hesse and Berlin.

From 1864 to 1871 Ostwald attended the Realgymnasium in Riga and graduated from high school. In 1872 he began studying chemistry at the University of Dorpat . During this time Ostwald was active in the Fraternitas Rigensis student association . In 1875 he finished his studies with the candidate work and became an assistant at the physical institute with Arthur von Oettingen , later at the chemical institute with Carl Schmidt . In 1877 Ostwald submitted his master's thesis on the subject of "Volume chemical studies on affinity". In the following year he finished his dissertation "Volume chemical and opto-chemical studies." In 1880 Ostwald was appointed private lecturer for physical chemistry at the University of Dorpat. From 1880 he also worked as a teacher for physics, mathematics and chemistry at a middle school. In 1881 a professor position was to be filled at the Riga Polytechnic . Ostwald's application was successful. In his recommendation, Carl Schmidt wrote, among other things: “Ostwald is my assistant for many years, previously that of the physical institute; it becomes a star of the first magnitude, on the borderland between chemistry and physics, the treatment of which makes mutual education an indispensable condition for effective success. Ostwald is also a very skilful and skilful experimenter, mechanic and glass blower, etc., who blows and arranges his apparatus in the most ingenious way, despite the best mechanic, a tireless manpower, has excellent oral and written representational skills, clear, concis, strictly logical , also suitable for other circles ... CS "

In 1880 Wilhelm Ostwald married Helene (Nelly) von Reyher; they had five children:

From 1882 Ostwald worked as a professor of chemistry and full professor at the Riga Polytechnic . In 1883 and 1887 he went on study trips through German-speaking Central Europe. Svante Arrhenius and Wilhelm Ostwald met for the first time in Stockholm in 1884 and established a lifelong friendship. During the second trip, the Saxon Minister of Education and Culture appointed Ostwald to the chair of physical chemistry at the University of Leipzig in 1887 . In 1898 he was able to inaugurate his new physico-chemical institute. In 1901 he bought a plot of land with a summer house in Großbothen . In the same year Ostwald announced a lecture on natural philosophy . Due to the great popularity, the event had to be moved to the Auditorium Maximum at Leipzig University. In 1904 he accepted an invitation to the congress for science and art in St. Louis (USA) in the philosophy section . In 1905 a number of long-lasting conflicts between Ostwald and the philosophical faculty came to a head. Ostwald then submitted his resignation. From the fall of 1905 to the summer of 1906, he held lectures on physical chemistry and natural philosophy at Harvard University , MIT and Columbia University in New York .

The color school, Unesma GmbH Leipzig 1924

After his return, Ostwald retired in 1906 and moved his residence to the “Energie” house in Großbothen in order to work as a “freelance researcher”. From 1912 the son Wolfgang Ostwald used the "Waldhaus" on the Großbothener property as a summer apartment. In 1913 Ostwald founded his own publishing house, UNESMA. After the beginning of the First World War, international connections were interrupted and its activities largely came to a standstill. Mainly because of this, he turned to color studies . In 1914 the "Glückauf" house was built for the family of their son Walter Ostwald. In 1916 a laboratory building was built, which was later referred to as the “plant”. It was not until 1927 that all buildings were connected to the local electrical power supply. The autobiography Lebenslinien von Ostwald was published in 1926 and 1927. Wilhelm Ostwald died in 1932 in a Leipzig hospital. His urn is buried in the quarry of the country estate "Energie", since 2009 in Wilhelm-Ostwald-Park in Großbothen.

Working in chemistry

Wilhelm Ostwald developed a pycnometer for density determination with Arthur von Oettingen at the University of Dorpat between 1875 and 1878 in his master's thesis on "Volume chemical studies on affinity". Between 1882 and 1887 he constructed a thermostat, a rheostat and a viscometer in Riga . During this time Wilhelm Ostwald investigated the hydrolysis of methyl acetate by the influence of acids with conductometric measurements. Conductivity measurements with various acids and salts followed as confirmation. Depending on the concentration of the solution, he determined a constant of proportionality, which he called the affinity constant. Between 1884 and 1885 he published the results and was able to determine many affinity constants (K S values) for acids or bases and their proportionality. The result went into Ostwald's law of dilution published in 1888 . for acids in science. Ostwald was able to show in organic acids that only a small proportion of the particles dissociate. At that time there were still no clear ideas about electrolytes and dissociation. The general view was that ions were just very reactive atoms. When Ostwald read a paper by the still unknown Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius in 1884 , he traveled to Uppsala to see him and together with him carried out density measurements with the viscometer. Wilhelm Ostwald writes in a short note: "The author of these treatises, which are among the most important things that have been published in the field of kinship theory, not only have priority of publication, but also that of the idea ..." Both justified in a collegial manner Friendship the theory of dissociation and included the findings of Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff on osmotic pressure. During this time he founded together with Svante Arrhenius, Jacobus Henricus van't Hoff and Walther Nernst the physical chemistry . From 1890 onwards, Wilhelm Ostwald vehemently advocated dissociation theory at international congresses. In 1892 Wilhelm Ostwald translated and published the "Thermodynamic Studies" by Josiah Willard Gibbs , which made his ideas known in German-speaking countries ( Gibbs energy ). As a result of these studies, Wilhelm Ostwald came to the conclusion in 1893 that a perpetual motion machine of the second kind is impossible. One cannot construct a machine that completely converts different forms of energy into one another. From 1893, Wilhelm Ostwald used the calomel electrode developed by one of his students as a standard electrode for potentiometric measurements to determine potential differences between different metals. In the same year Ostwald turned to the dissociation of pure water and the determination of the ion product. In 1897 he described Ostwald ripening , because just as a fine powder must be more soluble than a coarse one, according to the Gibbs-Thomson effect, small drops must have a greater vapor pressure than large ones, because the vapor pressure and concentration differences in a closed system are equalized , therefore the small colloids shrank, but the large colloids continued to grow. The discovery of this effect was u. a. important for the production of ointments and emulsions. The Ostwald rule of steps formulated by him in 1897 and named after him can be applied to chemical reactions as well as to physical processes. It says that in a chemical reaction the system does not go from an energetic state directly to the energetically most favorable state, but usually goes through one or more intermediate stages. In addition, the Ostwald-Volmer rule often applies, according to which, in energetically similar systems, the one with a lower density is preferred. Under certain conditions, however, the possible intermediate stages are skipped.

Wilhelm Ostwald (left) with Svante Arrhenius (1904)
Wilhelm Ostwald (right) with Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff in the laboratory (1905)

From 1894 Wilhelm Ostwald researched catalytic processes. He worked on both inorganic, organic and biochemical issues and defined the majority of life processes as catalytic processes. The scientist published a first definition of the term catalysis in the same year: The chemist Friedrich Stohmann defined catalysis in an essay with the words: “Catalysis is a movement process of atoms in the molecules of unstable bodies, which occurs with the addition of one from another body emitted force takes place and leads to the formation of more stable bodies with loss of energy. "Wilhelm Ostwald critically examines this in a discussion of this work and explained:" This acceleration takes place without changing the general energy ratios, because the foreign substances are reassigned after the reaction has ended can think away from the reaction area, so that any energy consumed in the addition is recovered during the removal or vice versa. However, like all natural processes, these processes must always take place in the sense that the free energy of the entire structure decreases. ”Wilhelm Ostwald later wrote that the catalyst is a substance that increases the speed of a chemical reaction without consuming it itself and without changing the final position of the thermodynamic equilibrium in this reaction. However, the catalytic influence sometimes leads to coupled reactions that do not always form the most stable product, but rather the closest product. The catalytic influence of the reaction of phosphorus with oxygen forms the energetically higher ozone. This reaction is even possible in an aqueous medium due to the formation of hydrogen peroxide. Individual reaction intermediates can take on a thermodynamically higher energy in a reaction if, in the further course of the reaction, the end product leads to a reduction in the free energy compared to the starting material. From 1900, together with Brauer, he investigated the catalytic conversion of ammonia to nitric acid under laboratory conditions and developed the Ostwald process for the production of nitric acid through the oxidation of ammonia. Wilhelm Ostwald turned primarily to catalytic processes that were of great economic importance for the chemical industry. Wilhelm Ostwald's assistant and son-in-law Eberhard Brauer built a test facility in 1901 on the site of an abandoned powder factory in Niederlehme near Königs-Wusterhausen, in which acid production began in February 1902. In 1905, production in Gerthe near Bochum was continued on a larger scale. As early as 1906, 300 kg of nitric acid could be produced daily in this plant. The preliminary work of Wilhelm Ostwald and his students Eberhard Brauer and Max Bodenstein favored the development of the Haber-Bosch process . In 1909 Wilhelm Ostwald received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his work on "catalysis and the conditions of chemical equilibrium and the rates of chemical reactions". With this highest recognition for a natural scientist, the Nobel Prize Committee recognized not only this achievement, but also his decades of work as a researcher and university professors. The honor was linked to the right to propose the Nobel Prize in subsequent years. He used it around 1910, and again later, to propose Albert Einstein for the Nobel Prize in Physics, which finally received the Nobel Prize in 1921.

Theorems of Catalysis

"Catalysis is the acceleration of a slow chemical process through the presence of a foreign substance."

- 1894

"A catalyst is any substance that changes its speed without appearing in the end product of a chemical reaction."

- 1901

Textbooks (selection, first editions)

Wilhelm Ostwald (1903)
  • Textbook of general chemistry in two volumes . Engelmann. Leipzig 1885 and 1887.
  • General Chemistry Floor Plan . Engelmann. Leipzig 1889.
  • Manual and auxiliary book for carrying out physico-chemical measurements . Engelmann. Leipzig 1893.
  • The scientific foundations of analytical chemistry: presented in an elementary way . Engelmann. Leipzig 1894. Ostwald introduces the terms dissociation constants, solubility product, ion product, hydrogen ion concentration and indicator equilibria into analytical chemistry in this book.
  • Electrochemistry: its history and teaching . Veit, Leipzig 1894-1896.
  • Basics of Inorganic Chemistry . Engelmann, Leipzig 1900.
  • The school of chemistry: first introduction to chemistry for everyone. Vieweg, Braunschweig 1903. Vol. 1. General ; Vol. 2. The chemistry of the most important elements and compounds. 1904.
  • Chemistry guidelines: 7 general lectures from the history of chemistry . Academic Publishing Company, Leipzig 1906.
  • Principles of chemistry: an introduction to all chemistry textbooks . Academic Publishing Company, Leipzig 1907.
  • Introduction to Chemistry: a textbook for self-teaching and higher education . Franckh, Stuttgart 1910.
  • Development of electrochemistry in a commonly understood representation . Barth, Leipzig 1910.
  • The mill of life: physico-chemical foundations of life processes . Thomas, Leipzig 1911.
  • The chemical literature and the organization of science . Academic Publishing Company, Leipzig 1919.

Popular scientific and philosophical literature (selection)

Magazines

In 1887 Wilhelm Ostwald founded the "Journal for Physical Chemistry, Stoichiometry and Relationship Theory". He won Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff as co-editor and other internationally known scientists. Ostwald published the magazine by 1922, which up to that point comprised 100 volumes.

Rows

In 1889 the first volume in the series Ostwald's Classics of Exact Sciences was published . By December 1893, 43 volumes had appeared, 11 of which were edited by Wilhelm Ostwald. After 1893 Wilhelm Ostwald published five issues. So far, more than 280 titles have been published. The series Great Men: Studies in the Biology of Genius began in 1909 . The second volume in the series appeared in 1911, volume 3 a year later, and was dedicated to Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff. In 1932 the 11th and final volume was a biography of Svante Arrhenius.

Employees (selection)

Between 1887 and 1906, 352 scientists from 30 nations worked at Wilhelm Ostwald. 148 doctoral procedures and ten habilitations took place under Wilhelm Ostwald's direction.

Among other things, studied with Wilhelm Ostwald:

  • Georg Bredig (1868–1944), professorships in chemistry at several universities.
  • Theodor Paul (1862–1928), professorship for pharmacy in Munich, head of the “German Research Institute for Food Chemistry”.
  • Paul Walden (1863–1957), professorships for chemistry in Riga, St. Petersburg, Rostock.
  • Max Le Blanc (1865–1943), professorships in Leipzig, Karlsruhe. He determined the decomposition voltage of electrolyte solutions.
  • Arthur Amos Noyes (1866–1936), Professor of Theoretical Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Boston.
  • Theodore William Richards (1868–1928), professor, Nobel Prize winner from 1914.
  • Robert Luther (1868–1945), professorships for photochemistry in Leipzig, Dresden.
  • Werner von Bolton (1868–1912), head of the central laboratory at Siemens & Halske. He discovered the benefits of tantalum in the manufacture of filaments.
  • Mordko Herschkowitsch (1868–1932), chemist at Carl Zeiss Jena.
  • William Lash Miller (1866–1940), Canadian chemist and professor in Toronto
  • Alwin Mittasch (1869–1953), professor, head of research at BASF Ludwigshafen.
  • Fritz Pregl (1869–1930), professor, Nobel Prize winner from 1923.
  • Frederick George Donnan (1870–1956), professorships in physical chemistry in Liverpool, London. At Ostwald he designed the first glass electrode.
  • Max Bodenstein (1871–1942), professorships for physical chemistry in Leipzig, Hanover, Berlin.
  • Eugene C. Sullivan (1872–1962), Corning – Glaswerke. He invented the PYREX glass.
  • Carl Benedicks (1875–1958), professorships for chemistry in Uppsala, Stockholm.
  • Eberhard Brauer (1875–1958), assistant to Wilhelm Ostwald.
  • Oscar Gros (1877–1947), professorships in Leipzig, Halle, Cologne, Kiel.
  • Iwan Stepanowitsch Plotnikow (Johannes Plotnikow, 1878–1955), professor of photochemistry in Moscow and Zagreb.
  • Niels Bjerrum (1879–1958), professor of chemistry at the Copenhagen School of Agriculture.
  • Hans Kühl (1879–1969), professor for chemical technology of building materials at the TU Berlin.
  • Herbert Freundlich (1880–1941), professorships at the TH Braunschweig, Aachen, Berlin. Basic research in colloid chemistry.
  • Alfred Genthe (1882–1943), industrial chemist Worms, Goslar.

At Ostwald completed their habilitation or worked as a post-doc:

Ostwald's specialist colleagues in Leipzig included:

  • Ernst Otto Beckmann (1853-1923), professor. Director of the Laboratory for Applied Chemistry in Leipzig, from 1912 director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in Berlin-Dahlem. He developed the Beckmann thermometer and molecular weight determination with cryoscopic measurements.
  • Robert Behrend (1856–1926), professor at the TH Hannover. He performed the first potentiometric titration.

Participation in scientific organizations

From 1894 to 1898 Ostwald was chairman of the German Electrochemical Society, which was co-founded in 1894. The society was later renamed after Robert Bunsen and still exists today as the German Bunsen Society for Physical Chemistry . In his lecture "The scientific electrochemistry of the present and the technical of the future" he propagated the future use of fuel cells and in the article "The energy sources of the future" the use of solar energy.

From 1906 to 1916 Wilhelm Ostwald was involved in the international commission for determining atomic weights.

From 1912 Wilhelm Ostwald was President of the "International Association of Chemical Societies" which between 1911 and 1913 held several international conferences.

Wilhelm Ostwald as a philosopher, opponent of the atomic concept and energetic

House energy in Wilhelm-Ostwald-Park

Wilhelm Ostwald called his philosophy energetics . It emerged on the one hand as a reaction to the mechanically understood atomic hypothesis and as a conclusion from our own research, on the other hand from the influence of the philosophical views of Ernst Mach and the positivism of Auguste Comte on Wilhelm Ostwald.

The foundations of the "energetic" way of thinking are, according to Wilhelm Ostwald's view, the following principles:

  • Everything that happens is ultimately nothing but a change in energy.
  • Two structures that are individually in energy equilibrium with a third are also in equilibrium with one another.
  • A perpetual motion machine of the second kind is impossible.
  • The types of energy are linked to one another according to fixed rules, expressed in equations, so that one cannot be changed without affecting the other.
  • The importance of the dissipation phenomena is that they give a clear direction to most natural processes.
  • The energy sentences are necessary, but not sufficient for the description of phenomena. As a rule, they have to be supplemented by task-specific sentences.

In 1895, Wilhelm Ostwald presented his natural-philosophical considerations for the first time in a coherent form and advocated the thesis that matter is only a special form of energy that can therefore be considered primary. Ostwald had already emerged before (from 1893) as a critic of the atomic concept , which he wanted to replace with his energetics, although as a chemist he constantly used the atomic concept (in 1897, for example, he became a member of the Atomic Weight Commission). At the meeting of naturalists in Lübeck in 1895, both Ostwald and his student Georg Helm gave lectures. There was a heated argument with the physicist Ludwig Boltzmann , who had invited the two for this purpose and who took the opportunity to publicly put the helmet in its place, which was surprised by the devastating reaction. The attack was also intended on Ernst Mach , who was not present , also a philosophical opponent of the concept of the atom, albeit for different reasons. According to Arnold Sommerfeld, who was present, the dispute was like a bullfight, in which the bull (Boltzmann) won. There were hardly any publicly expressed reactions among chemists to Ostwald's philosophy of energetics and his expressed rejection of atoms. In a letter to Svante Arrhenius , however, Walter Nernst clearly spoke of megalomania and abstruse ideas. In his correspondence with his teacher Ostwald himself, however, Nernst avoided these topics.

For a long time Wilhelm Ostwald refused to consider the approaches of thermodynamics also at the atomic level. A direct relation between energetics and his research in physical chemistry resulted for him from the second law of thermodynamics. According to this, mechanical work can be converted back into heat, but heat cannot be completely converted back into mechanical work, because heat cannot pass from a body of lower temperature to a body of higher temperature without supplying energy, i.e. the heat flow from a hotter to a colder body is irreversible and associated with the increase in entropy.

Wilhelm Ostwald was convinced that it would lead to the final dissipation (dispersion) of the energy and its even distribution in space. Just comply with the energetic imperative Don't waste energy - use it! could therefore delay the expected heat death as much as possible. Without exception, every activity, including culture, science and politics, would have to satisfy the energetic imperative , because only with it could "... the guidelines for all appropriate or sensible action, from threading a needle to the government of a state ..." be determined.

Most of the critics were aware that Wilhelm Ostwald described some physical and ideological questions correctly in their development, but answered contradictory and inadequate answers. Max Weber and other economists criticized Ostwald for expanding the concept of energy. Even with the elevation of the energetic imperative to an exclusive principle to be followed under all circumstances, the question of where waste of energy begins or ends in the social world was not answered .

After the First World War, energetism was hardly present in the standard works on philosophy. Recently, however, some scientists have resorted to Wilhelm Ostwald's introduction of thermodynamics into the economic and cultural sciences, such as Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen , Hermann Scheer and Friedrich Reinhard Schmidt .

From 1901 to 1921 the Annalen der Naturphilosophie appeared as a quarterly publication . Wilhelm Ostwald wanted to promote the application of the results and methods of natural science and the discussion of natural-philosophical problems. A total of 14 volumes were published. The sociologist Rudolf Goldscheid was jointly responsible for the 12th and 13th year . In 2008 the Saxon Academy of Sciences completed a reconstruction of the discussions held there with the project At the borders of science - At the borders of science .

“So here ( note: in the use of coal reserves ) we are dealing with a part of our energy industry that behaves somewhat like an unexpected inheritance, which causes the heir to temporarily disregard the principles of a sustainable economy , and to live into the day. (...) The sustainable economy must be based exclusively on the regular use of annual radiation energy . "

- Wilhelm Ostwald : The raw energies, third lecture. In: Energetic Basics of Cultural Studies, published by Dr. Werner Klinkhardt, Leipzig 1909, p. 44 (p. 58), n57  - Internet Archive

Color theory

In connection with his practical painting experience, Wilhelm Ostwald also dealt with a scientifically based color system. From 1914 on, he carried out color theory studies from a regulatory, physical, chemical, psychological and physiological point of view on behalf of the Deutscher Werkbund. For Wilhelm Ostwald, the development of experimental methods for measuring color theory was a way of applying the energetic imperative and his scientific convictions. Not only did he want to create a scientifically based color system, but his investigations should also be of use to industry and trade. Wilhelm Ostwald arranged triangles of the same color to form the Ostwald double cone with the upper white tip and the lower black tip.

Ostwald double cone

The position of any color was determined by the number of the full color and two letters for the black and white components. Wilhelm Ostwald used the term color standard for this . He made several so-called color organs . The largest consisted of 2520 measured colors. This corresponds to a 24-part color wheel, a gray axis with 15 levels and 105 colors in each triangle of the same color.

In Ostwald's opinion, a color organ with 680 colors was sufficient for many practical applications . The color standard formed the starting point for a color standard atlas, color scale, color scales, coloring and special color overviews. In 1917 the color primer appeared , which by 1930 had a total of 14 editions and in autumn of the same year the first color atlas with 2500 colors.

At the 9th annual meeting of the German Werkbund , which took place from September 6th to 9th, 1919 in Stuttgart and which received its "outstanding importance" ( Swabian Mercury ) from the "First German Color Day" carried out at the end, Ostwald's views met the he summarized in his lecture "The basics of color science and color art", on contradiction. From the point of view of the creative artist, the opposite position was mainly taken by the second keynote speaker of the “Color Day”, the Stuttgart painter and university professor Adolf Hölzel , with his held under the title “On the theory of color theory”, a little later in a revised form with the heading “Some about the Color in its picture harmonic meaning and use ”in a Werkbund brochure published lecture. “Art and learned science are,” says Hölzel, “even if we think of art as science, they are never the same thing. As a matter of feeling, art will always remain something approximating, incidental, since feeling excludes the exact from the start. ”The first German Teachers' Color Day with around 400 participants in Dresden in 1920, on the other hand, declared itself in favor of the color standardization by Wilhelm Ostwald, who thereupon the energy -Werke GmbH, color theory department in Großbothen for the production and sale of teaching aids and color products, which existed until 1923.

Wilhelm Ostwald also supported the establishment of the workshop for color science in Dresden in 1920 with branches in Meißen, Reichenbach (Bohemia) and Chemnitz. From 1921 Wilhelm Ostwald published the magazine Die Farbe . During the Color Days in Munich in 1921, Wilhelm Ostwald's color standardization was again rejected and in 1923 a custody was distributed. On May 5, 1925, the Prussian Minister for Science, Art and Education forbade the use of Ostwald colors in drawing lessons in schools. Despite his age, Ostwald explained his color theory in a series of lectures at the Bauhaus Dessau in 1926 and 1927, spoke at the World Advertising Congress in Berlin in 1929 and participated in the design of the Werkbund exhibition Apartment and Workroom in 1929 in Breslau. Wilhelm Ostwald appeared in public for the last time during the 15th Glass Technology Conference in November 1931 in Berlin and gave a lecture on the development and use of transparent colors.

Science Organization, Theory and History - The Bridge and the Paper Format

Since his studies in Dorpat, Wilhelm Ostwald has been concerned with the rational organization of intellectual work according to scientific and effective criteria. From Wilhelm Ostwald's point of view, the increasing differentiation in the scientific disciplines and the division of functions in the sciences require a science organizer in order to avoid wasting energy.

He himself achieved a high level of effectiveness as a science organizer when he made a significant contribution to establishing physical chemistry against much resistance as a new scientific discipline, and he increasingly dealt with the science of science and with the history of science, which he e.g. B. introduced the series "Ostwald's Classics of Exact Natural Sciences" and analyzed it in some writings.

Wilhelm Ostwald's presentation of the relationship between age and productivity in science was primarily due to his own experience. He said that every great scientific achievement caused a profound reduction in life potential . In 1905 Wilhelm Ostwald presented a typology of scientists. He distinguished between classics and romantics . The classics attached great importance to the completion of their scientific work, romantics , on the other hand, were good teachers, only they could establish and maintain a scientific school .

Ostwald dealt in detail with the relationships between the scientific disciplines and presented his "pyramid of the sciences", the basis of which was formed by maths (logic, set theory, mathematics), on top of which first physics, then chemistry, biology, medicine, psychology, sociology , Technology and, at the very top, ethics with the “energetic imperative”. For him, philosophy is paramount and creates unity. This system is also the subject of more recent considerations.

In 1911 Wilhelm Ostwald, as chairman, and Karl Wilhelm Bührer and Adolf Saager founded the association Die Brücke - International Institute for the Organization of Intellectual Work with the aim of cataloging and organizing all known knowledge. For a world registry as a general bibliography of all existing human knowledge, the Decimal Classification developed by Melvil Dewey in the USA was used . The bridge also propagated the world format for print products. It later formed the basis for the paper format specified in DIN 476 . The bridge also advocated the standardization of weights and measures, the introduction of world money based on gold, a calendar reform and the simplification of German spelling.

Wilhelm Ostwald criticized the arbitrary use of terms in chemistry and repeatedly suggested improvements in the international specialist societies. The planned projects could only be partially implemented, as the bridge was insolvent in 1914.

World language - Esperanto - Ido

Ostwald spoke German, English, French and an understandable but not very good Russian.

He was familiar with problems of international communication, not least because of his international group of students and employees. Paul Walden later recalled: “The laboratory had a very international stamp; The sons of America and Japan, Old England and France, Scandinavia and Russia, Italy and the Balkans ... worked peacefully side by side ... "

From 1901, Ostwald systematically dealt with linguistic questions. In the summer semester he spoke in his lectures on natural philosophy with reference to musical notation and chemical formula language about the "question of general artificial language" as a "scientific-technical problem", the solution of which will bring "an unpredictable relief" to "working mankind" referred to the "Delegation for the adoption of an international auxiliary language" founded by the French scientists Louis Couturat (1868-1914) and Leopold Leau (1868-1943) as a result of the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900 .

In a lively exchange of ideas, especially with Couturat, but also with Wilhelm Förster (1832–1921), Adolf Schmidt (1860–1944), Ludwig Zamenhof (1859–1917) and others, Ostwald was publicly committed to the goals of the “delegation”, the idea a neutral world auxiliary language for science as a worldwide standard and until 1907 for the international planned language Esperanto , e.g. B: 1903 in Munich in front of the Bavarian District Association of the Association of German Engineers, 1906 in Rome on the VI. International Congress for Applied Chemistry, in the same year in Berlin in front of scientific and commercial circles in the newly opened commercial college and in 1907 at the 2nd German Esperanto Congress in Dresden. Ostwald dedicated a 75-page chapter in his book The Demand of the Day , a collection of his speeches and articles, to the topic of “The international auxiliary language” .

Between 1905 and 1906 his lectures on Esperanto quickly led to the establishment of around 100 Esperanto clubs in the USA, where he was the first German exchange professor to teach (Harvard University).

By 1907, more than 300 societies and 1000 scholars had joined the "delegation", which now proposed the decision on the international language to be chosen at the conference of the "Association of Academies" in Vienna. This declared itself not competent, so that a committee of the "delegation" was formed, which was chaired by Ostwald and with the participation of the linguists Jan Baudouin de Courtenay (1845-1929), Otto Jespersen (1860-1943) and Hugo Schuchardt (1842–1927) met in Paris in October 1907 and, after assessing various world auxiliary language projects, decided in favor of Esperanto, with some changes in the direction of the Reform Esperanto ( Ido ) presented to the committee of Louis de Beaufront (1855–1935 ), whose author, like later research revealed that Louis Couturat himself was.

Ostwald found himself now between Couturat, who wanted to enforce Ido as a whole, and the Lingva Komitato (language committee) of the Esperantists and Zamenhof (1859-1917), who rejected a reform of Esperanto and insisted on the "Fundamento de Esperanto" as an unchangeable language base.

In Esperanto, Ostwald mainly criticized the diacritical marks of the alfabet, which he wanted to replace, as well as the accusative and correspondence of adjective and noun, which he wanted to abolish. On the other hand, he criticized the “Romance overweight” of the Ido. He called for uniqueness in the auxiliary world language (no polysemy, no homonymy, no synonymy), maximum internationality and a phonetic spelling. Primarily he had a language for science in mind.

Ostwald did not succeed in mediating between the “delegation” and the Esperanto movement. He resigned from the delegation in February 1908, disappointed on both sides, withdrew completely from the matter for some time, but then consistently committed himself to the spread of the international auxiliary language Ido to facilitate the exchange of scientific information until the end of his life.

In 1909 the Ido organization Uniono dil Amiki di la Linguo Internaciona (Association of Friends of the International Language) was founded with Ostwald as Honorary President, Leopold von Pfaundler (1839–1920) as President of the Executive Committee and Otto Jespersen as President of the Ido Academy, participated in the Ostwald, and it appeared the text "World Language and Science" with contributions from Couturat, Jespersen, Lorenz (1863-1929), Ostwald and Pfaundler. Ostwald supported the publication of the technical Ido dictionaries by Alfred Schlohmann (1878-1952) and presented the Ido, its use for chemistry and a chemical nomenclature on its basis in the Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie, which he also used in the Ido magazine "Progreso" published, the appearance of which goes back to Ostwald's initiative.

In “Progreso” in 1931 he propagated the auxiliary language and Pan-Europe as important for economic and cultural progress and became honorary president of the new Ido Academy under the chairmanship of Stefan Bakonyis (1892–1969).

Ostwald's and others' criticism of Esperanto and the Esperanto movement contributed to the development of the philology of Esperanto in the confrontation with Ido, from the sluggishly working Lingva Komitato the Esperanto Academy emerged in 1908 and in the same year the Esperanto World Federation ( UEA) was founded.

In 1915, Wilhelm Ostwald proposed Weltdeutsch , a simplified German, as a world language, a nationalistic episode during the First World War to which he never came back.

Political commitment

From 1911 to 1915 Wilhelm Ostwald was chairman of the German Monist Association founded by Ernst Haeckel in 1906 and was in closer contact with other organizations of the same school of thought during this time. The organization advocated a scientifically justifiable worldview, which it called monism . Ostwald propagated energetism and demanded, among other things, the abolition of the state church , he rejected the interference of the churches in the freedom of research and teaching and turned against the compulsion to participate in denominational religious instruction. The high point of his presidency was the organization of the 1st International Monist Congress in September 1911 in Hamburg. In 1912 and 1913 he supported the work of the non-denominational committee , which advocated leaving the church.

Until the beginning of the First World War, Ostwald campaigned for the preservation of peace , because the war was a huge waste of energy. In January 1910, Ostwald met the co-founder of the German Peace Society, Bertha von Suttner , in Vienna. In August 1910 he took part in the 18th World Peace Congress in Stockholm and gave a lecture on the subject of culture and peace . In the following years Wilhelm Ostwald spoke in the local groups in Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, Mannheim and Stuttgart. During his stays in Vienna, he visited Bertha von Suttner several times and intensified contacts with members of the Peace Society. At the beginning of the First World War, however, Ostwald, like most German scientists, defended German participation in the war. He was one of the 93 signatories of the appeal to the world of culture .

Even before the turn of the century, Ostwald spoke more frequently about the deficits in school education in Germany and was one of the supporters of the bourgeois school reform movement . Discipline is primarily required of the students. The nine-year high school tuition would keep the gifted youth in a state of mental imprisonment. Ostwald also made a front against the classical humanistic Latin high school, it did not take into account the progress of the natural sciences. In order to guarantee scientific and social progress, talented people must be discovered and promoted, because “genius” is not hereditary. Instead, a more or less stubborn acquisition of knowledge is required. The overwhelmed teacher sees himself as a "kind of pedagogical sergeant in the classroom". In 1909 Wilhelm Ostwald gave a much-noticed programmatic lecture Against the school misery - an emergency call . In 1920 he took part in the Reich School Conference.

Honors (selection)

Nobel Prize Certificate for Wilhelm Ostwald 1909 - Chemistry
Wilhelm Ostwald Monument in Riga

Ostwald schools

  • The "Wilhelm Ostwald" primary school in Grimma
  • The Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gymnasium (WOG) in Leipzig
  • The Wilhelm Ostwald School of the Upper School Center (OSZ) color technology and interior design in Berlin
  • The Rigaer Ostwald-Mittelschule (Latvian Rīgas Ostvalda vidusskola )

The estate

In the archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW archive) in Berlin, Jägerstraße 22, there are 24 running meters (running meters) files in the NL W. Ostwald inventory , which are made accessible by 9 finding aids. This includes: personal documents, manuscripts, working materials, documents about political activities, business documents, correspondence, documents about Ostwald's involvement in various organizations, photo collection, notes from Grete Ostwald. About Wilhelm Ostwald, collection of pamphlets and the partial bequests: Grete Ostwald, Eugen Ristenpart, Gerhard Streller, Paul Krais and Hans Hinterreiter.

Letters from Ostwald from the years 1890–1913 have been preserved as copies in 8 copy books of 500 pages each. In 1969, the research assistant in the Wilhelm Ostwald Archive, Hans-Günther Körber, estimated the number of letters and copies of letters to be 60,000 and the number of correspondence partners to be 5500.

In addition to the current signature (NL W. Ostwald), each document also bears the stamp of the Wilhelm Ostwald Archive in Großbothen with the old signature (WOA). From 1966 to 1980, the collection gradually came to Berlin from Großbothen.

The former Energie Landsitz, Ostwald's residence in Großbothen, today Wilhelm-Ostwald-Park with a conference center and museum, has belonged to the non-profit Gerda and Klaus Tschira Foundation since 2009. This is where Wilhelm Ostwald's scientific library (approx. 14,000 titles in 22,000 volumes; 10,000 special prints, including 1,300 dissertations), his work utensils (historical laboratory equipment, landscape paintings, Ostwald double cones, 3,000 color theory study sheets for practical testing of his color theory, etc.) are looked after.

In 1953 the Ostwalds family donated the entire estate to the GDR and, after the University of Leipzig had rejected the trusteeship, the Academy of Sciences of the GDR (AdW) set up the Wilhelm Ostwald Archive (WOA) and the research facility. The color research institute, which from 1960 was subordinate to the physical-technical institute of the AdW, became the administrator of the estate; In 1968 the site and building were handed over to the "Laboratory for color formulation", the Institute for Paints and Varnishes Magdeburg, and thus to the industry.

The WOA, founded by Grete Ostwald (1882–1960) in 1936, was affiliated to the Central Archive of the AdW as a branch office in 1960, the Wilhelm Ostwald Memorial, set up in 1974, from 1984 looked after by the Institute for Biotechnology of the AdW. On January 1st, 1988 the VEB Chemieanlagenbaukombinat Leipzig-Grimma took over the site. In 1994, the Saxon state took over the grounds and houses retroactively from 1990. The Ministry of Science and Art was now responsible for the museum / archive. Finances were provided by the Staatsbetrieb Sächsisches Immobilien- und Baumanagement (SIB).

The non-profit association “Friends and sponsors of the Wilhelm Ostwald memorial 'Energie' Großbothen”, renamed in 1995 to Wilhelm Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen e. V. (WOG), has been taking care of the preservation, maintenance and use of the Ostwald estate since it was founded in 1990. The descendants of Ostwald, who retained a right of residence after 1953, especially Ostwald's daughter Grete Ostwald, son Carl-Otto Ostwald, Ostwald's granddaughter Margarete (Gretel) Brauer (1918–2008) and her daughter Anna-Elisabeth, also made great contributions Brauer and her husband Karl Hansel (1942–2006). As the initiator and managing director of the WOG, he took care of the renovation of the country estate and, as editor and publisher of the series Mitteilungen der Wihelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft from 1996 to 2006, promoted the development and publication of the scientific legacy; he continued to seek the continuation of the Großbothen talks that had been going on since 1975.

Memorial events

1953

Celebration and honor of Wilhelm Ostwald on the occasion of his 100th birthday in Großbothen and in the Physikalisch-Chemisches Institut (PCI) of the University of Leipzig

Opening: Institute Director  Herbert Staude , keynote lecture: Rudolph Zaunick (Halle).

1978

Festive colloquium of the Chemistry Section and the Chemical Society of the GDR on the occasion of Ostwald's 125th birthday on 12./13. September in the PCI .

Lecturers: GK Boreskov (Novosibirsk), I. Haber (Krakow), K. Schwabe (Meinsberg), H. Gerischer (Berlin-Dahlem), G. Kelbg (Rostock), I. Stradins (Riga), L. Rathmann (Leipzig ).

1982

27th Berlin History of Science Colloquium on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the death of Wilhelm Ostwald on April 6, 1982 on the topic: Problems of scientific communication around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Century.

Lectures: Hubert Laitko (AdW der GDR, Institute for Theory, History and Organization of Science, Berlin): Problems of scientific communication at the turn of the century. / Luboš Novy (AdW of the ČSSR, Institute for Czechoslovak and World History, Prague): On some conceptual problems of analyzing the development of scientific communication. / Regina Zott (AdW of the GDR, Institute for Theory, History and Organization of Science, Berlin): Wilhelm Ostwald - theoretician and practitioner of scientific communication. / Wolfgang Liebscher (AdW of the GDR, Central Institute for Organic Chemistry, Berlin): The nomenclature of chemical elements and compounds and their significance for scientific communication. / Wolfgang Göbel (AdW der GDR, Institute for Fiber Technology, Dresden): August Kekulé as a scientific communicator: The international chemists' congress in Karlsruhe in 1860 - starting point for the triumphant advance of the valence theory. / Uwe Niedersen (Humboldt University Berlin): Ostwald and the emergence and communication of the idea of ​​the time-directedness of natural events. / Gretel Brauer (Ostwald Memorial Großbothen, Ostwald's granddaughter): Some remarks on the relationship between diversity of interests and scientific productivity of W. Ostwald.

1996

Interlinguistics colloquium for Wilhelm Ostwald of the Society for Interlinguistics , the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen and the Esperanto League Berlin with an Ostwald exhibition of the archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences in November 1996 in the economics faculty of the Humboldt University to Berlin .

The occasion was Ostwald's lecture "The international auxiliary language and Esperanto", held in 1906 in the newly opened Berlin School of Commerce in the same building on Spandauer Str.

Lectures: Bengt-Arne Wickström (Humboldt University): Opening speech / Ralf Dyck (Upper School Center for Color Technology and Interior Design Berlin-Neukölln): Wilhelm Ostwald - his life and his scientific achievements. / Detlev Blanke (Society for Interlinguistics): Wilhelm Ostwald, Ido and Interlinguistics. / Fritz Wollenberg (Esperanto League Berlin): The correspondence of Wilhelm Ostwald on interlinguistic problems. / Wolfgang Liebscher (Society of German Chemists): Nomenclature and terminology of chemistry under the aspect of the work of Wilhelm Ostwald.

1998

Festive colloquium for the 100th anniversary of the inauguration of the Physico-Chemical Institute at the University of Leipzig on 9-11. January.

Lecturers: R. Szargan, HC Papp, H. Baumgärtel, K. Krause, G. Ertl, M. Winnewisser, J. Schwuger, W. Fratzscher, W. Lorenz / A. Meisel / K. Quitzsch, Habili-tanden: K. Möhle / K.-H. Hallmeier / G. Wittstock, Großbothen: R. Schmidt, M. Brauer, W. Höflechner.

2004

Wilhelm Ostwald Symposium of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and the Saxon Academy of Sciences in Leipzig, supported by the Estonian Academy of Sciences and the Latvian Academy of Sciences on November 26th and 27th, 2004 in Berlin on interdisciplinary and international aspects Ostwald.

Moderation: Eberhard Knobloch , Berlin and Wolfgang Fratzscher , Halle. Lectures: Ortrun Riha , Leipzig: Child of his time: Ostwald from a scientific-historical perspective / Erki Tammiksaar, Tartu : Wilhelm Ostwald and Tartu / Klaus Mainzer , Augsburg: Catalysis and energy - Wilhelm Ostwald's natural philosophy yesterday and today / Wolfgang Fratzscher, Halle: Technical energetics or General energy technology / Jan Koenderink , Utrecht: Ostwald and the Theory of Colors / Frank-Michael Matysik, Leipzig: Physical chemistry and electrochemistry: Ostwald's milestones and accents / Regina Zott, Berlin: Management of the mind - Wilhelm Ostwald on learning, studying and reforming.

literature

  • Hans-Georg Bartel:  Ostwald, Wilhelm. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 19, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-428-00200-8 , p. 630 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Jan-Peter Domschke, Hansgeorg Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 .
  • Carl Gerhard Spilcke-Liss: The sphere of activity of Wilhelm Ostwald's Leipzig school of physical chemistry . 313 S. Freiberg 2009. ISBN 978-3-936980-31-8
  • Jan-Peter Domschke, Peter Lewandrowski: Wilhelm Ostwald - life, work and conceptions of society . Dissertation. Karl Marx University Leipzig, 1977.
  • Jan-Peter Domschke: The reception of the philosophical and epistemological conceptions of W. Ostwald in the Marxist-Leninist philosophy . Habilitation thesis, Karl Marx University Leipzig, 1989.
  • Jan-Peter Domschke: Wilhelm Ostwald: chemist, scientific theorist, organizer . Pahl-Rugenstein, Cologne 1982, ISBN 3-7609-0662-1 .
  • Society of German Chemists (ed.): Historic sites of chemistry: Friedrich Wilhelm Ostwald . Frankfurt am Main / Leipzig / Großbothen 2005.
  • Markus Krajewski : Complete absence. World projects around 1900 . Fischer Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 3-596-16779-5 .
  • Wilhelm Ostwald: Lectures on natural philosophy . Published by Veit & Comp., Leipzig 1902.
  • Wilhelm Ostwald: Energetic foundations of cultural studies . Leipzig 1909.
  • Grete Ostwald: Wilhelm Ostwald. My father . Berlin 1953.
  • Ulrich Becker , Fritz Wollenberg: A language for science . Humboldt University, Berlin 1996 (contributions and materials from the interlinguistics colloquium for Wilhelm Ostwald).
  • Lothar Dunsch: The portrait: Wilhelm Ostwald . In: Chemistry in Our Time . 1982, 16, pp. 186-196. doi: 10.1002 / ciuz.19820160604 .
  • Paul Walden: Wilhelm Ostwald. In: Reports of the German Chemical Society. 1932, A, No. 8-9, pp. 101-141.
  • Arnher Lenz, Volker Mueller (ed.): Wilhelm Ostwald: Monism and energy . Neu-Isenburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-933037-84-8 .
  • JI Solowjew, NI Rodnyj: Wilhelm Ostwald. BG Teubner Verlag , Leipzig 1977, OCLC 251441170 ( Biographies of outstanding natural scientists, technicians and medical professionals - Volume 30).
  • Andreas Braune: Progress as Ideology: Wilhelm Ostwald and Monism. Leipziger Universitätsverlag , 2009, ISBN 978-3-86583-389-1 .
  • Constantine v. Freytag-Loringhoven: Adolf von Harnack (1851-1930) and Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932). Living and learning in Dorpat as a lifelong reference for two Baltic German scientists . Einst und Jetzt , Vol. 59 (2014), pp. 41–90.
  • Albrecht Pohlmann: From Art to Science and Back. Color theory and aesthetics with Wilhelm Ostwald (1853 - 1932) . Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, dissertation 2010: University and State Library Saxony-Anhalt 2012 ( http://digital.bibliothek.uni-halle.de/urn/urn:nbn:de:gbv:3:4-8878 )
  • Frank Hartmann (Ed.): Wilhelm Ostwald. Color theory, form theory. A critical reconstruction . Bauhaus University Weimar, Research on Visual Culture, Volume 4. Avinus Verlag, Hamburg 2017. ISBN 978-3-86938-090-2
  • Regine Zott (eds.): Wilhelm Ostwald and Walther Nernst in their letters and in those of some contemporaries , Berlin: Verlag für Wissenschafts- und Regionalgeschichte Engel 1996, ISBN 978-3-929134-11-7
  • Carola L. Gottzmann / Petra Hörner: Lexicon of the German-language literature of the Baltic States and St. Petersburg . 3 volumes; Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 2007. ISBN 978-3-11019338-1 . Volume 3, pp. 991-1001.
  • Erwin N. Hiebert, Hans-Günther Körber: Ostwald, Friedrich Wilhelm . In: Charles Coulston Gillispie (Ed.): Dictionary of Scientific Biography . tape 15 , Supplement I: Roger Adams - Ludwik Zejszner and Topical Essays . Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1978, p. 455-469 .

Web links

Commons : Wilhelm Ostwald  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Wilhelm Ostwald  - Sources and full texts

The lifelines are at Zeno.org : Wilhelm Ostwald Lebenslinien. A autobiography accessible.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Lifelines - a self-biography. First part. Riga-Dorpat-Riga 1853–1887. Klasing & Co., Berlin 1926, pp. 1-9
  2. Wilhelm Ostwald: Volume chemical studies on affinity. Treatise on obtaining the title of Master of Chemistry, Laakmanns Buchdruckerei, Dorpat 1877.
  3. Wilhelm Ostwald: Volume chemical and optical-chemical studies. Dissertation to obtain the degree of Doctor of Chemistry. Laakmanns Buchdruckerei, Dorpat 1878.
  4. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Lifelines - a self-biography. First part. Riga-Dorpat-Riga 1853–1887. Klasing & Co., Berlin 1926, pp. 73-98.
  5. ^ S. Roß, K. Hansel (eds.): Carl Schmidt and Wilhelm Ostwald in their letters. Großbothen 2000, p. 35 f. ( Communications from the Wilhelm Ostwald Society , special issue 9).
  6. ^ Jan-Peter Domschke, Peter Lewandrowski: Wilhelm Ostwald - life, work and conceptions of society. Dissertation. Karl Marx University Leipzig, 1977, pp. 366-368.
  7. ^ Jan-Peter Domschke, Hansgeorg Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel laureate Wilhelm Ostwald (1853–1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 19–45.
  8. J.-P. Domschke, H. Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 46–54.
  9. ^ Journal for Practical Chemistry. 2, 31, 433 (1885).
  10. ^ W. Ostwald: "Note on the electrical conductivity of acids." J. f. Prakt. Chem. New Volume 30 (1884), pp. 93-95.
  11. ^ Paul Ferchland: Outline of pure and applied electrochemistry. Verlag Wilhelm Kapp, 1903, p. 182.
  12. Journal Phys. Chem. 11, 521 (1893).
  13. ^ W. Ostwald: Presentation on: F. Stohmann: "About the warmth of the constituents of food". Z. f. physics. Chem. 15 (1894), pp. 705-706.
  14. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald - Facts . Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. October 7, 2014.
  15. L. Dunsch: The portrait: Wilhelm Ostwald . In: Chemistry in Our Time . 1982, 16, pp. 186-196.
  16. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Big men. Studies on the biology of genius. First volume . Academic Publishing Company, Leipzig 1909.
  17. Carl G. Spilcke-Liss: The scope of Wilhelm Ostwald's Leipzig school of physical chemistry. Editor Horst Remane. Drei Birken, Freiberg 2009 (Contributions to the History of Pharmacy and Chemistry 2).
  18. ^ Wagner in the Leipzig professor catalog
  19. List of the first chairmen of the society since its foundation in 1894 on the homepage of the German Bunsen Society , accessed on December 26, 2017.
  20. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The scientific electrochemistry of the present and the technical of the future . 1st chapter. In: Arthur Wilke, Wilhelm Borchers (Hrsg.): Journal for electrical engineering and electrochemistry . tape 1 , no. 3 . Wilhelm Knapp, Wiley-VCH Verlag, Halle June 15, 1894, p. 81-84 , doi : 10.1002 / bbpc.18940010302 ( wiley.com ).
  21. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The scientific electrochemistry of the present and the technical of the future . Part 2. In: Journal for electrical engineering and electrochemistry . tape 1 , no. 4 . Wilhelm Knapp, Wiley-VCH, Halle July 15, 1894, p. 122-125 , doi : 10.1002 / bbpc.18940010403 ( wiley.com ).
  22. ^ Friedrich Wilhelm Ostwald: The scientific electrochemistry of the present and the technical of the future . Lecture given to the 2nd annual meeting of the Association of German Electrical Engineers on June 8, 1894 in Leipzig. In: Wilhelm Ostwald and J. H. van't Hoff (ed.): Journal for physical chemistry, stoichiometry and kinship theory . tape 15 , no. 4 . Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig 1894, p. 409-421 ( online at Internet Archive [accessed November 11, 2016]).
  23. Energy sources of the future. In: Technische Rundschau , vol. 36 (1930), No. 25 of June 18, p. 226; also in: Research and Use: Wilhelm Ostwald on scientific work. Edited by G. Lotz, Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1978 (contributions to research technology, special volume 1), pp. 206–208; 2., ext. and revised Ed. 1982, pp. 276-278.
  24. ^ W. Ostwald: Studies on energetics. 2. Basics of general energetics. Reports. Negotiations of the Kgl. Saxon Society of Sciences. Math. Phys. Cl. 44 (1892), pp. 211-237.
  25. W. Ostwald: The overcoming of scientific materialism. In: Negotiations between German naturalists and doctors. 67th Assembly in Lübeck. 1st part. The general meetings. Vogel, Leipzig 1895
  26. Britta Görs: Atomist or anti-atomist? The relationship between the German chemical community and Ostwald, in: Britta Görs, Nikolaos Psarros, Paul Ziche (Eds.): Wilhelm Ostwald at the Crossroads Between Chemistry, Philosophy and Media Culture, Leipziger Universitätsverlag 2005, p. 85
  27. ^ W. Ostwald: The energetic imperative. First series, Akad. Verlagsgesellschaft, Leipzig 1912, p. 346.
  28. Max Weber: Energetic cultural theories. In: Collected essays on science. 1909, pp. 400-426.
  29. ^ Jan-Peter Domschke: The reception of the philosophical and epistemological conceptions of W. Ostwald in the Marxist-Leninist philosophy . Habilitation thesis. Karl Marx University Leipzig, 1989, pp. 117-120.
  30. P. Stekeler-Weithofer, H. Kaden, N. Psarros (Ed.): At the borders of science. The “Annals of Natural Philosophy” and the natural and cultural philosophy program of their editors Wilhelm Ostwald and Rudolf Goldscheid. The lectures of the conference, organized by the Saxon Academy of Sciences and the Institute for Philosophy of the University of Leipzig in November 2008. (Treatises of the Saxon Academy of Sciences, Philological-Historical Class 82, 2011)
  31. Adolf Hölzel: Something about color in its pictorial meaning and use. About the color . With an introduction by Wolfgang Kermer . Stuttgart: State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart, 1997 (= WerkstattReihe , edited by Wolfgang Kermer; 3).
  32. ^ Albrecht Pohlmann: From art to science and back: The theory of colors and aesthetics with Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932). Abstract for the philosophical dissertation. Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Institute for Art History and Archeologies of Europe). Halle (Saale) 2010.
  33. J.-P. Domschke, H. Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 66–75.
  34. J.-P. Domschke, H. Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 88–98.
  35. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The pyramid of the sciences. JG Cotta'sche Buchhandlung, Stuttgart / Berlin 1929.
  36. Klaus Mainzer: Energy and Catalysis - Wilhelm Ostwald's natural philosophy yesterday and today. (Wilhelm Ostwald Symposium 2004) PDF file
  37. J.-P. Domschke; P. Lewandrowski: Wilhelm Ostwald - life, work and conceptions of society. Dissertation, Karl Marx University Leipzig 1977, pp. 276–291.
  38. Edwin E. Slosson: Wilhelm Ostwald . In: Great Men - Studies on the Biology of Genius. Volume IV: Wilhelm Ostwald - Guidelines collected from his life on his 60th birthday. Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, Leipzig 1913, p. 22.
  39. ^ Archives of the AdW of the USSR, f 474, op. 3, no. 755. AW Speranski, quoted in: NI Rodnyi / Ju. I. Solowjew: Wilhelm Ostwald. Series: Biographies of outstanding natural scientists, technicians and medical professionals, Volume 30. BSB, BG Teubner Verlagsgesellschaft, Leipzig 1977, p. 173.
  40. ^ Paul Walden: Wilhelm Ostwald. Published by Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig 1904.
  41. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Lectures on natural philosophy. Veit & Co, Leipzig 1902, p. 37. Quoted in: Karl Hansel, Fritz Wollenberg (ed.): From Wilhelm Ostwald's correspondence on the introduction of a 'world language. Special issue 6 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV, 1999, ISSN 1433-3910, p. 15.
  42. ^ Letter from Louis Couturat to Wilhelm Ostwald dated October 26 , 1901 , (French) NL Ostwald No. 499 in the archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. In this first letter, Couturat Ostwald asks to participate in the “delegation”. They corresponded until 1907.
  43. Ulrich Becker / Fritz Wollenberg: A language for science. Contributions and materials of the Interlinguistics Colloquium for Wilhelm Ostwald on November 9, 1996 at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Interlinguistic information. Bulletin of the Society for Interlinguistics eV, Supplement 3. Berlin 1998. ISSN 1432-3567. This volume lists and describes Ostwald's correspondence on interlinguistic problems with around 40 correspondence partners, sorted by person.
  44. ^ Karl Hansel and Fritz Wollenberg (eds.): From Wilhelm Ostwald's correspondence on the introduction of a 'world language. Special issue 6 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV, 1999 ISSN 1433-3910. This volume lists and describes Ostwald's correspondence on interlinguistic problems with around 40 correspondents, sorted by date.
  45. VI. International Congress of Applied Chemistry in Rome from April 26 to May 3, 1906 . In: Chemiker-Zeitung, No. 35, pp. 597-598. Report with Ostwald's speech.
  46. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The international auxiliary language and Esperanto. Möller & Borel, Berlin 1906.
  47. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The demand of the day. Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft mb H., Leipzig 1910, pp. 436-511. Ostwald's speeches and articles on the world auxiliary language 1903–1907 were commented on and supplemented by him in an afterword from 1910.
  48. Ivo Lapenna , Ulrich Lins , Tazio Carlevaro: Esperanto en perspective. Rotterdam 1974, p. 423. Reference is made here to the research results published by Ric Berger in 1937.
  49. The Fundamento de Esperanto was adopted at the 1st Esperanto World Congress in 1905 in Boulogne-sur-Mer as a basic description of the linguistic structure of Esperanto and is still valid today.
  50. Detlev Blanke: Ostwald, Ido and Interlinguistics. In: Ulrich Becker / Fritz Wollenberg: A language for science. Contributions and materials of the Interlinguistics Colloquium for Wilhelm Ostwald on November 9, 1996 at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Interlinguistic information. Bulletin of the Society for Interlinguistics eV, supplement 3. Berlin 1998, pp. 24 and 27, ISSN 1432-3567.
  51. ^ Fritz Wollenberg: The correspondence of Wilhelm Ostwald. In: Communications from the Wilhelm Ostwald Society in Großbothen eV 2nd year - Issue 2/1997, pp. 25–41, ISSN 1433-3910.
  52. ^ Louis Couturat, Otto Jespersen, Richard Lorenz, Wilhelm Ostwald, Leopold Pfaundler: Weltsprach und Wissenschaft. Thoughts on the introduction of the international auxiliary language into science. Publishing house by Gustav Fischer, Jena 1909.
  53. Alfred Schlohmann: Ilustrita teknikal vortolibri in sis lingui Germana Angla-franca Rusa-Italiana-Hispana. Tomo I. Mashin Elementi. Ordinara utensils. Tradukita en Ido da A. Wormser. Oldenbourg, Munich / Berlin 1910, foreword by Ostwald, pp. III-IV.
  54. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Chemical world literature. In: Journal for Physical Chemistry, Stoichiometry and Relationship, 76, No. 1/1931, pp. 1-20.
  55. Wilhelm Ostwald: Saluti ad progreso. La mondolinguo: un necesajo. In: Progreso VIII, No. 81 (1) 1931, pp. 1-4).
  56. René de Saussure (= Antido): La logika bazo de vortfarado en Esperanto. Propono al la Akademio Esperantista okaze de la Sesa Universala Kongreso de Esperanto en Washington 1910, Universala Esperantista Librejo, Geneva 1910.
  57. J.-P. Domschke, H. Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 50–51.
  58. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: Weltdeutsch. In: Monistic Sunday Sermons No. 36 (1915), pp. 545–558.
  59. J.-P. Domschke, H. Hofmann: The physical chemist and Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932) - A picture of life . Special issue 23 of the series of publications of the Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft zu Großbothen eV , 2012, ISSN  1433-3910 , pp. 51–52.
  60. a b W. Ostwald: Lifelines. An autobiography. Third part. Großbothen and the world 1905–1927. Klasing & Co., Berlin 1927, pp. 329-335
  61. ^ W. Ostwald: Lifelines. An autobiography. Third part. Großbothen and the world 1905–1927 . Klasing & Co, Berlin 1927, pp. 133-137.
  62. ^ Member History: Wilhelm Ostwald. American Philosophical Society, accessed November 3, 2018 .
  63. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald , accessed on February 21, 2020 in Wilhelmexner.org.
  64. Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 184.
  65. Ulf Messow and Ulrike Köckritz: Documentation and comments on the Wilhelm Ostwald Memorial in Großbothen
  66. ^ Pro and contra Wilhelm Ostwald. UNIVERSITY OF LEIPZIG: Notices and reports for members of the University of Leipzig. Issue 1/98, p. 27.
  67. ^ Wilhelm-Ostwald-Strasse. In: Street name lexicon of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein (near  Kaupert )
  68. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald Medal - Saxon Academy of Sciences. In: saw-leipzig.de. Retrieved April 19, 2017 .
  69. ^ Archive of the BBAW
  70. ^ Fritz Wollenberg: Planned languages ​​in the archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. In: Planned Language Libraries and Archives - Contributions to the 17th Annual Meeting of the Society for Interlinguistics e. V., 23-25. November 2007 in Berlin. Interlinguistische Informations, supplement 15, Detlev Blanke (Ed.), Berlin 2008, pp. 45–56.
  71. ^ Hans-Günther Körber: From the scientific correspondence of Wilhelm Ostwald. Part II, Akademieververlag, Berlin 1969.
  72. Beate Bahnert: The giant on the mountain . In: Leipziger Blätter, Issue 14, spring 1989, Council of the District of Leipzig, Department of Culture (Ed.), Pp. 40–46. Beate Bahnert was a research assistant in the Wilhelm Ostwald Archive.
  73. Ulf Messow and Ulrike Köckritz: Documentation and comments on the Wilhelm Ostwald Memorial in Großbothen
  74. ^ Publication series Wilhelm Ostwald Society eV messages
  75. Ulrich Pofah: Dr. Ing.Karl Hansel. In: Communications of the Wilhelm Ostwald Society in Großbothen eV, 11th year 2006, issue 2, p. 52, ISSN 1433-3910.
  76. ^ On the 125th birthday of Wilhelm Ostwald. Scientific contributions, Leipzig 1980.
  77. Hubert Laitko and Regina Zott: Problems of scientific communication around the turn of 19/20. Century. Contributions to the 27th Berlin Colloquium on the History of Science on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Wilhelm Ostwald's death - April 6, 1982, Berlin. Academy of Sciences of the GDR. Institute for Theory, History and Organization of Science, Berliner Wissenschaftshistorische Kolloquien VI, Issue 28, Berlin 1982, printed as a manuscript.
  78. Ulrich Becker / Fritz Wollenberg: A language for science. Contributions and materials of the Interlinguistics Colloquium for Wilhelm Ostwald on November 9, 1996 at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Interlinguistic information. Bulletin of the Society for Interlinguistics eV, Supplement 3. Berlin 1998. ISSN 1432-3567.
  79. Fritz Wollenberg: Interlingvistika Memorkolokvo por Wilhelm Ostwald en Berlin. In: Esperanto - Language and Culture in Berlin, Anniversary Book 1903–2003, Esperanto League Berlin (ed.), Mondial, New York - Berlin 2006, pp. 203–215, Esperanto with résumé in German - ISBN 978-1-59569 -043-2 .
  80. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald: The international auxiliary language and Esperanto . Möller & Borel, Berlin 1906.
  81. ^ Wilhelm Ostwald Symposium 2004 program