Sadi Carnot and Joseph Fourier, Visionaries of the Industrial Revolution

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The Industrial Revolution, which began at the end of the 18th century — thanks, among other things to the steam engine and the subsequent development of rail transport — triggered a period of intense technical development. This has continued into our own day, though its impact on the environment and climate is now tending to check its progress. In this ‘Future of Yesteryear’ feature, Pierre Papon, a physicist by training, highlights two French scientists, Sadi Carnot and Joseph Fourier, some of whose relatively unknown works have since proved entirely visionary about the future drivers of the Industrial Revolution (e.g. the steam engine and the combustion engine), but also about the way our planet’s climate reacts to the laws of heat and hence the impact human activities such as industry might have on it. Pierre Papon presents these works here and shows, most informatively, how very prescient they were in terms of the understanding of the laws of energy and thermodynamics.