What’s revolutionary about the Chemical Revolution?

In the 1770s, Antoine Lavoisier proposed a theory that would result in such an extraordinary change to chemistry that it would later be referred to as the Chemical Revolution. His theory of combustion not only brought forward the discovery of a new element – oxygen – but it also signified the end of what was previously regarded as the standard understanding of combustion and of chemical phenomena more broadly; namely the end of phlogiston theories.

The effects this event has had on the development and success of chemistry is not hard to appreciate. What is perhaps not so evident is how important this event has been to the development of philosophical ideas.

To many philosophers, the Chemical Revolution brings to mind the broader notion of scientific revolutions. In large part, this is because the Chemical Revolution features in one of the most influential and popular philosophical books of the past century; namely Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. In this book, Kuhn proposes a quite insightful and (at the time of its publication) highly original account of how science undergoes changes and alters our understanding of the world.