Robert Boyle

Irish-born natural philosopher (1627-1691), often called the father of modern chemistry.

Life and Work

Boyle was the fourteenth child of the Earl of Cork, one of the richest men in the British Isles. He never needed to work for a living, and he used that freedom to do science full time. He was deeply religious and saw experimental investigation as a way of understanding God’s creation.

His most famous result is Boyle’s Law — the inverse relationship between the pressure and volume of a gas. He arrived at it through meticulous air pump experiments conducted with Robert Hooke, who built the pumps. These experiments were landmark demonstrations of the new experimental method: instead of arguing from first principles, you built apparatus and measured things.

Boyle attacked the Aristotelian four-element theory (earth, air, fire, water) in The Sceptical Chymist (1661), arguing that elements should be defined by experiment, not philosophy. He was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society.

In the Novel

Daniel works in Boyle’s laboratory, and Boyle is part of the circle of natural philosophers Daniel moves through in London. His wealth and piety make him a contrast to the scrappier, more contentious Hooke.