Skip to main content

William and John Herschel’s Quest for Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
The Scientific Legacy of William Herschel

Part of the book series: Historical & Cultural Astronomy ((HCA))

Abstract

The contributions to astronomy made by Sir William Herschel (1738–1822; Fig. 5.1) place him among the leading astronomers of modern times. His son, Sir John Herschel (1792–1871), does not rank far behind. The goals of the present study are to document from their published and unpublished writings the intense interest they shared in the question of the existence of extraterrestrial intelligent life (hereafter ETI). To put it somewhat differently, we shall attempt to show that a quasi-religious, quasi-metaphysical doctrine – belief in a plurality of inhabited worlds – at times motivated their labors, influenced their theories, and in some cases may have had an impact even on their observations. Earlier historians, including this author, have treated aspects of this topic, but it seems timely to draw these researches together into a single study. We shall also suggest that although it is widely assumed that present-day astronomers are more concerned with extraterrestrials than their eighteenth-century predecessors were, the reverse is nearer the truth.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Among earlier publications that have touched on the Herschels’ involvement with ideas of extraterrestrials, some of the most important are: Steven Kawaler and J. Veverka, “The Habitable Sun: One of William Herschel’s Stranger Ideas,” Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Journal, 75 (1981), 46–55; Simon Schaffer, “‘The Great Laboratories of the Universe’: William Herschel on Matter Theory and Planetary Life,” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 11 (1980), 81–111; Daniel A. Beck, “Life on the Moon: A Short History of the Hansen Hypothesis,” Annals of Science, 41 (1984), 463–70; Laura Snyder, “‘Lord only of the Ruffians and Fiends’? William Whewell and the Plurality of Worlds Debate,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 38 (September 2007), 584–592, Michael Hoskin, “William Herschel and God,” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 45 (2014), 247–252, and M. J. Crowe, “The Surprising History of Claims for Life on the Sun,” Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 14:3 (Nov., 2011), 169–179. I have also written on this topic in my The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750–1900: The Idea of a Plurality of Worlds from Kant to Lowell (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, England,1988) and in The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915: A Source Book (Univ. of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, IN, 2008). Relevant materials can also be found in my Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Herschel (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, England,1998). Not only do new materials appear in this study, it also draws together researches that I have carried out over the last forty years. My most recent publication relating to the Herschels is my “William Whewell, the Plurality of Worlds, and the Modern Solar System,” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science, 50:2 (June, 2016), 431–49. Finally, mention should be made of Richard Holmes’s The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science (Pantheon, New York, 2008), esp. chs. 2 and 4. A significant portion of this very engaging book draws on the writings of Michael Hoskin as well as my writings on the involvement of the Herschels with ETI to show how engaged persons during the romantic period were by developments in astronomy. The Royal Society recognized the success of this book by awarding it a prize of £10,000 for science writing. See http://new.bbc.co.UK/2/science/nature/8256979.stm, viewed 17 Sept. 2009.

  2. 2.

    As quoted in Constance Lubbock, The Herschel Chronicle (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, 1933), p. 170. On his discoveries, see also Mark Barton, The Complete Guide to the Herschel Objects: Sir William Herschel’s Star Clusters, Nebula and Galaxies (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2011).

  3. 3.

    James Ferguson, Astronomy Explained upon Sir Isaac Newton’s Principles, 2nd ed. (London, 1757), p. 4.

  4. 4.

    Ferguson, Astronomy, pp. 16–18.

  5. 5.

    Although Ferguson seems to have been his chief source, other sources can also be mentioned. Herschel’s biographers note that after initially arriving in England, Herschel purchased John Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding. In discussing the human senses, Locke remarks: “we cannot believe it impossible to God to make a creature with other organs and more ways to convey into the understanding the notice of corporeal things than those five…which he has given to man.... [W]hether yet some other creatures, in some other parts of this vast and stupendous universe, may not have this, will be a greater presumption to deny. He that will not set himself proudly at the top of all things, but will consider the immensity of this fabric, and the great variety that is to be found in this little and inconsiderable part of it which he has to do with, may be apt to think that in other mansions of it there may be other and different intelligent beings of whose faculties he has as little knowledge or apprehension, as a worm shut up in one drawer of a cabinet hath of the senses or understanding of a man: such variety and excellency being suitable to the wisdom and power of the maker.” See Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding, vol. 1 (John Carfare and Thos. Nelson, Edinburgh, 1819), Book II, Ch. 3, pp. 121–22. In 1761, Herschel read G. W. Leibniz’s Théodicée, another book embracing extraterrestrials. Regarding Leibniz, see Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900, pp. 27–30, 62.

  6. 6.

    The Scientific Papers of William Herschel, 2 vols., ed. by J. L. E. Dreyer (The Royal Society and The Royal Astronomical Society, London, 1912), vol. I, p. 5.

  7. 7.

    Herschel had himself made observations of this type. See Herschel, Papers, vol. I, pp. xci–xcii.

  8. 8.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. xc.

  9. 9.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. xc. In this and the subsequently cited passages from Herschel’s manuscripts, I have preserved his spellings.

  10. 10.

    Microfilm (Reel 17) of the Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W. 3/1.1, pp. 1–2.

  11. 11.

    Microfilm (Reel 17) of the Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W. 3/l.1, p. 4.

  12. 12.

    Microfilm (Reel 17) of the Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W. 3/1.1, pp. 8–10.

  13. 13.

    Microfilm (Reel 17) of the Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W. 3/1.1, p. 17.

  14. 14.

    Ibid., p. 17.

  15. 15.

    Ibid., pp. 65–8.

  16. 16.

    Ibid., pp. 65 and 69.

  17. 17.

    Ibid., pp. 71–2. See also p. 75 for a 1793 observation of a lunar twilight.

  18. 18.

    See Reel 12 of the Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W. 3/1, pp. 66–7.

  19. 19.

    See Lubbock, Herschel Chronicle, pp. 99, 103–4, and 179 and Simon Schaffer, “Herschel in Bedlam: Natural History and Stellar Astronomy,” British Journal for the History of Science, 13 (1980), 211–39.

  20. 20.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, pp. xxxiii–xxxiv.

  21. 21.

    Michael Hoskin, Discoverers of the Universe: William and Caroline Herschel (Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2011), 147–48.

  22. 22.

    As quoted in M. J. Crowe (editor), The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915: A Source Book (Univ. of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, IN, 2009), p. 218. For passages from Fontenelle and Ferguson, see pp. 80 and 172–73.

  23. 23.

    Clifford J. Cunningham, Herschel’s Spurious Moons of Uranus: Their Impact on Satellite Orbital Theory, Celestial Cartography and Literature (in preparation) as quoted from William Herschel, “On the Discovery of Four Additional Satellites of the Georgium Sidus. The Retrograde Motion of Its Old Satellites Announced; and the Cause of Their Disappearance at Certain Distances from the Planet Explained.” Philosophical Transactions, 88 (1798), 66.

  24. 24.

    Cunningham, Herschel’s Spurious Moons, p. 3.

  25. 25.

    J. A. Bennett, “‘On the Power of Penetrating into Space’: The Telescopes of William Herschel,” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 7 (1976), 75–108:75.

  26. 26.

    Bennett, “Telescopes of William Herschel,” 76–84.

  27. 27.

    William Herschel, “Account of Some Observations Tending to Investigate Construction of the Heavens,” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 74 (1784), 437–57 as reprinted in Herschel, Papers, vol. I, 157–66:158, 160.

  28. 28.

    M. E. W. Williams, “Was There Such a Thing as Stellar Astronomy in the Eighteenth Century?” History of Science, 21 (1983), 369–85.

  29. 29.

    As quoted in Lubbock, The Herschel Chronicle, 170.

  30. 30.

    For a fuller discussion of this thesis, see Ch. 2 of my Extraterrestrial Life Debate (1986).

  31. 31.

    Michael Hoskin, “William Herschel’s Early Investigations of Nebulae: A Reassessment,” in Hoskin’s Stellar Astronomy: Historical Studies (Bucks, England, 1982), pp. 125–36. First appeared in Journal for the History of Astronomy, 10 (1979), 165–176.

  32. 32.

    Hoskin, “Early Investigations,” p. 128.

  33. 33.

    Michael Hoskin, The Herschels of Hanover (Science History Publications, Cambridge, England, 2007), p. 110.

  34. 34.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, pp. 422 and 481.

  35. 35.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. II, p. 194.

  36. 36.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 33.

  37. 37.

    On Mira Ceti, see Michael Hoskin, Stellar Astronomy: Historical Studies (Chalfont St. Giles, 1982), p. 54 and also Royal Astronomical Society Herschel MSS, W.4/1, f.32; regarding Algol, see Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. cvii.

  38. 38.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, pp. 416–17.

  39. 39.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 482; see also p. 330.

  40. 40.

    See Gentleman’s Magazine, 57 (1787), 636. For information on Elliot, see Robert J. Manning, “John Elliot and the Inhabited Sun,” Annals of Science, 50 (1993), 349–64.

  41. 41.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 479. On Herschel’s theory, see Steven Kawaler and J. Veverka, “The Habitable Sun: One of William Herschel’s Stranger Ideas,” Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Journal, 75 (1981), 46–55.

  42. 42.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 479.

  43. 43.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 481.

  44. 44.

    Edward S. Holden, Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1881), p. 149.

  45. 45.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. xcvi.

  46. 46.

    In particular, Herschel stated: “it will hardly be possible to assign any sufficient mutual distance [to them] to leave room for crowding in those planets, for whose support those stars have been, or might be, supposed to exist. It would seem, therefore, highly probable that they exist for themselves; and are, in fact, only very capital, lucid, primary planets, connected together in one great system of mutual support.” Herschel, Papers, vol. I, pp. 482–83.

  47. 47.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 484.

  48. 48.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. II, p. 147.

  49. 49.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. II, p. 529.

  50. 50.

    Actually, this issue does not seem to have been carefully studied or documented. A number of historians have said that this is the case, but they rarely provide documentary evidence that this was in fact the case. See A. J. Meadows, Early Solar Physics (Pergamon, Oxford, 1970), pp. 4–6. See also Crowe, “The Surprising History of Claims for Life on the Sun,” Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 14:3 (Nov., 2011), 169–179.

  51. 51.

    William Herschel, “Catalogue of Five Hundred New Nebulae, Nebulous Stars, Planetary Nebulae, and Clusters of Stars, with Remarks on the Construction of the Heavens,” Philosophical Transactions, (1802), 477–528.

  52. 52.

    Herschel, Papers, vol. II, p. 201.

  53. 53.

    See Herschel, Papers, vol. I, p. 330.

  54. 54.

    The only full-length biography of John Herschel is Günther Buttmann, The Shadow of the Telescope: A Biography of John Herschel, trans. by B. E. J. Pagel (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1970). An older but still useful study is Agnes M. Clerke, The Herschels and Modern Astronomy (London, 1901). See also M. J. Crowe (ed.), David R. Dyck and James J. Kevin (associate editors), Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Herschel (Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, England, 1998) and M. J. Crowe, “John F. W. Herschel,” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed. H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, vol. 26 (Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 2004), pp. 825–31.

  55. 55.

    John Herschel, A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy (Longman, London,1830).

  56. 56.

    John Herschel, A Treatise on Astronomy (Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green & Longman, London, 1833), section #1; John Herschel, Outlines of Astronomy, 3rd ed. (London, 1850), section #1.

  57. 57.

    Herschel, Treatise #2; Outlines, #2.

  58. 58.

    Herschel, Treatise, #592; Outlines, #819.

  59. 59.

    John Herschel, A Treatise on Astronomy (London, 1833), #592; Outlines, #819.

  60. 60.

    Herschel, Treatise, #332; Outlines, #389.

  61. 61.

    On Brewster, see Miguel de Asúa, “Sir David Brewster’s Changing Ideas on the Plurality of Worlds.” Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 9, no. 1 (2006), 83–92.

  62. 62.

    Herschel, Treatise, #364; also Outlines, #431, but weakened by the qualification: “this process...must...be confined within very narrow limits.”

  63. 63.

    Herschel, Treatise, #435.

  64. 64.

    Herschel, Treatise, #435.

  65. 65.

    Herschel, Treatise, #435.

  66. 66.

    Herschel, Treatise, #435; Outlines, #508.

  67. 67.

    Herschel, Treatise, #448; Outlines, #525.

  68. 68.

    Herschel, Treatise, #609; Outlines, #847.

  69. 69.

    Herschel, Treatise, #610; Outlines, #851.

  70. 70.

    John Herschel, “Remarks on a Fifth Catalogue of Double Stars, Communicated to the Royal Astronomical Society, June 7, 1832,” Royal Astronomical Society Memoirs, 6 (1833), 74–81:78.

  71. 71.

    On Gruithuisen, see Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900, pp. 202–4.

  72. 72.

    Herschel’s letter is available at the National Library of Scotland as NatLibScot MS.582, no.667.

  73. 73.

    Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900, pp. 210–15 and for important supplementary information, Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915, pp. 294–95.

  74. 74.

    For a recent, very informative study of this famous event see Matthew Goodman, The Sun and the Moon: The Remarkable True Account of Hoaxers, Showmen, Dueling Journalists, and Lunar Man-Bats in Nineteenth-Century New York (Basic Books, New York, 2008).

  75. 75.

    Goodman, Sun and the Moon, pp. 223–27.

  76. 76.

    William N. Griggs, “Moon Story,” The Origin and Incidents (Runnell and Price, New York, 1852), p. 39.

  77. 77.

    This letter is preserved in the Herschel papers at the Harry Ransom Library of the University of Texas as TxU:H/L-0120; Reel 1054 and a copy of the letter is at the Royal Society in the Herschel Papers as RS:HS 25.15.1.

  78. 78.

    These are: Brian Warner (ed.), Margaret Herschel: Letters from the Cape 1834–1838 (Friends of the South African Library, Cape Town, 1991); Brian Warner and Nancy Warner (eds.), Maclear and Herschel: Letters and Diaries at the Cape of Good Hope, 1834–1838 (A. A. Balkema, Rotterdam,1984); David S. Evans, Terence J. Deeming, Betty Hall Evans, and Stephen Goldfarb (eds.), Herschel at the Cape: Diaries and Correspondence of Sir John Herschel, 1834–1838 (Univ. of Texas Press, Austin, Texas, 1969). The last does supply some items of information, the main one of which will be cited shortly.

  79. 79.

    Athenaeum, #440 (April 2, 1836), 505.

  80. 80.

    Letter is preserved at the Royal Society Herschel Papers as RS:HS 3.345.

  81. 81.

    Joseph Crampton, The Lunar World: Its Scenery, Motions, etc., Considered with a View to Design (Adam and Charles Black, Edinburgh, 1863), pp. 83–84. Crampton attributes the letter to Sir Frederick Beaufort, but it is clear that it must have been Francis Beaufort.

  82. 82.

    Paine’s letter is preserved in the Herschel Papers at the Royal Society as RS:HS 13:209; Herschel’s response is preserved at the Herschel papers at the Univ. of Texas Ransom Library as TxU:H/L–0291; Reel 1054.

  83. 83.

    Steven S. Ruskin, “A Newly-Discovered Letter of J. F. W. Herschel Concerning the ‘Great Moon Hoax,’” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 33 (2002), 71–74.

  84. 84.

    As quoted in Evans, Herschel at the Cape, p. 282.

  85. 85.

    Goodman, Sun and Moon, p. 230.

  86. 86.

    John Herschel, [Letter to François Arago], Athenaeum, #478 (Dec. 24, 1836), 907–8. For what appears to the French original, see Comptes rendus hebdomadieres des Seances des l’Académie des Sciences, 3 (Juillet-Décembre, 1836), 505.

  87. 87.

    Evans notes that it arrived in London on 26 September 1836. Evans, Herschel at the Cape, p. 235. One comment in the letter indicates that it was written in the winter season in Cape Town and another comment mentions an observation made on May 20, 1836. From the fact that the time for the Herschels’ voyages between London and the Cape of Good Hope was over two months, we can set the date range of the letter between May 20 and July 26 of 1836. Thus June 1836 seems a reasonable approximation.

  88. 88.

    As quoted in Evans, Herschel at the Cape, pp. 236–37. Emphasis in original.

  89. 89.

    For an excellent account of this development, see Daniel A. Beck, “Life on the Moon: A Short History of the Hansen Hypothesis,” Annals of Science, 41 (1984), 463–70.

  90. 90.

    Simon Newcomb, Reminiscences of an Astronomer (London, 1903), p. 319 as quoted in Daniel Beck, “Life on the Moon: A Short History of the Hansen Hypothesis,” Annals of Science, 41 (1984), 463–470:464.

  91. 91.

    Peter Andreas Hansen, “Sur la figure de la lune,” Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society, 24 (1856), 29–90:32.

  92. 92.

    Willy Ley, Rockets, Missiles, and Men in Space (New American Library, New York, 1969), p. 31.

  93. 93.

    Simon Newcomb, “On Hansen’s Theory of the Physical Constitution of the Moon,” American Association for the Advancement of Science Proceedings, 17 (1868), 167–171:171.

  94. 94.

    Herschel, Outlines, 5th ed. (London, 1858), #436a and b. Herschel’s discussion was described as “one of the most remarkable additions” to that edition in the review of it in Eclectic Review, 47 (1859), 33–39:36.

  95. 95.

    [John Herschel], “Figure of the Moon and of the Earth,” Cornhill Magazine, 6 (1862), 548–550:549. Internal evidence and Walter E. Houghton (ed.), Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals, vol. I (Toronto, 1966), p. 332 support ascription of this essay to Herschel.

  96. 96.

    [William Whewell], Of the Plurality of Worlds: An Essay, 5th ed. (London, 1859), pp. 412–13.

  97. 97.

    On this book, see chapter 11 in both my Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900 and my Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915.

  98. 98.

    Isaac Todhunter, William Whewell (London, 1876), vol. 2, p. 399.

  99. 99.

    Todhunter, Whewell, vol. 2, p. 399.

  100. 100.

    For a full transcription of the letter along with extensive notes on it, see my Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915, pp. 358–60. The original of the letter is at Trinity College Library (Cambridge) Whewell Papers Add.Ms.a. 20,790 and I have compared my transcription with the transcription at the Royal Society Herschel papers RS:HS.23.140.

  101. 101.

    This phrase “Look only at the Russians & Turks” needs some commentary. Recently another scholar has not only made a very different transcription of this portion of the letter, but also made her reading quite prominent by featuring it in the title of her publication. Dr. Laura Snyder’s publication is “‘Lord only of the Ruffians and Fiends’? William Whewell and the Plurality of Worlds Debate,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 38 (September, 2007), 584–92. When her paper was at an early stage—announced as a paper to be read at a conference—I emailed her suggesting that this was a mis-transcription and suggesting my own transcription. She acknowledged the email but did not directly deal with the suggestion or change her transcription. Having devoted ten years of my research career to working on John Herschel correspondence, I know the difficulties of his handwriting. In this case, however, I am quite certain of the correctness of my transcription. At least three reasons support this confidence. First, my transcription agrees with that made shortly after John Herschel’s death under the direction of his son, Col. John Herschel, which transcription is preserved in the John Herschel papers at the Royal Society. Second, I have run tests with four other professors who are experienced in nineteenth-century orthography, all of whom support my reading. Third, Herschel’s letter to Sedgwick, which is quoted later in this essay, also mentions the Russians and Turks, who were much in the news at that time because of the Crimean War. Persons interested in this issue may wish to examine the original at the Wren Library (Cambridge) and the transcription at the Royal Society (London). These are referenced in the previous footnote.

  102. 102.

    Letter from John Herschel to Adam Sedgwick of 11 March 1854 preserved in the Herschel letters at the Royal Society as RS:HS 15.445; a transcription is available as RS:HS 23.146.

  103. 103.

    Letter 1.101 in the collection of family letters owned by John Herschel Shorland.

  104. 104.

    Proceedings of the Royal Society, 16 (1867–68), lxi.

  105. 105.

    Laura Snyder, The Philosophical Breakfast Club: Four Remarkable Friends Who Transformed Science and Changed the World (Broadway Books, New York, 2010), 307. The four friends are John Herschel, Charles Babbage, William Whewell, and Richard Jones.

  106. 106.

    For more information on Proctor, see Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900, pp. 359–67.

  107. 107.

    Copies of Herschel’s letter are preserved at the Royal Society in London where the reference indicator is RS:HS 14.123C and a transcription is available at RS:HS 24.312. Proctor’s response is at RS:HS 14:134.

  108. 108.

    Richard Proctor, “A New Theory of Life in Other Worlds” in Proctor’s Our Place among Infinities 2nd ed. (Henry S. King, London, 1876), pp. 69–70. This essay is excerpted in Crowe, Extraterrestrial Life Debate, Antiquity to 1915, pp. 387–404.

  109. 109.

    Proctor, “New Theory,” pp. 44–45.

  110. 110.

    Simon Newcomb, “A Very Popular Astronomer,” Nation, 59 (Dec. 20, 1894), 469–70:469.

  111. 111.

    As quoted in R. A. Sherard, “Flammarion the Astronomer,” McClure’s, 2 (May, 1894), 569.

  112. 112.

    The original of this letter is preserved at the Royal Society in the Herschel Papers as RS:HS 7.267. Translation is my own.

  113. 113.

    Preserved at the Royal Society in the Herschel Papers as RS:HS 7.268.

  114. 114.

    Actually, we have a fragment of the letter. In some later editions of his Pluraité des mondes habités, for example, the 8th edition, published in 1866 by Didier (Paris), pp. 53–54, Flammarion not only quoted a pluralist passage from Herschel’s Treatise, but also added a quotation from the letter: “In a subject of this nature, each person ought to be impressed by the particular views that he can be led to draw from the à priori probabilities of the question and thereupon to base his views. For my part, although I do not think that the Moon may be inhabited, I strongly incline to the side that you have argued: to believe that the planets, at least some among them, are inhabited.” Crowe translation.

  115. 115.

    Preserved at the Royal Society in the Herschel Papers as RS:HS 7.269.

  116. 116.

    For details, see Crowe, The Extraterrestrial Life Debate 1750–1900, pp. 378–9.

  117. 117.

    John Herschel, “The Sun” in Herschel’s Familiar Lectures on Scientific Subjects (George Routledge & Sons, New York,1871), p. 84. This volume was first published in 1868, but a footnote (p. 79) indicates that this lecture was delivered in late 1861. The lecture was, according to the Preface, published in the journal Good Words. See C. F. Bartholomew, “The Discovery of the Solar Granulation,” Royal Astronomical Society Quarterly Journal, 17 (1976), 263–89.

  118. 118.

    John Herschel, “The Sun,” p. 84.

  119. 119.

    A copy of this letter is preserved in the collection of Herschel Letters at the Royal Society as RS:HS 23.334.

  120. 120.

    Samuel Pierpont Langley, The New Astronomy (Houghton, Boston, 1889), p. 14.

  121. 121.

    Walter Faye Cannon, “John Herschel and the Idea of Science,” Journal of the History of Ideas, 22 (1961), 215–39, esp. pp. 215, 238.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael J. Crowe .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Crowe, M.J. (2018). William and John Herschel’s Quest for Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life. In: Cunningham, C. (eds) The Scientific Legacy of William Herschel. Historical & Cultural Astronomy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32826-3_5

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics