Théophile De Donder, a Belgian mathematician born in Brussels, elaborated two important ideas that created a bridge between thermodynamics and chemical kinetics. He invented the concept of the degree of advancement of a reaction, and, in 1922, he provided a precise mathematical form to the already known chemical affinity by translating Clausius’s uncompensated heat into formal language. These concepts merge in an important inequality that was the starting point for the formalization of non-equilibrium thermodynamics. The present article aims to (...) reconstruct how De Donder elaborated his ideas and developed them by exploring his teaching activity and its connection with his scientific production. Furthermore, it emphasizes the role played by the discussions with his disciples who became his collaborators. The paper analyzes De Donder’s efforts in participating in the second Solvay Chemistry Council in 1925 to call the attention of chemists to his mathematical approach. We explain why his work did not receive much attention at the time, and how, despite this, his formalization of chemical affinity became the basis for the birth of the so-called Brussels school of thermodynamics. (shrink)

ArgumentThis article contributes to a global history of relativity, by exploring how Einstein’s theory was appropriated in Belgium. This may sound like a contradiction in terms, yet the early-twentieth-century Belgian context, because of its cultural diversity and reflectiveness of global conditions (the principal example being the First World War), proves well-suited to expose transnational flows and patterns in the global history of relativity. The attempts of Belgian physicist Théophile de Donder to contribute to relativity physics during the 1910s and (...) 1920s illustrate the role of the war in shaping the transnational networks through which relativity circulated. The local attitudes of conservative Belgian Catholic scientists and philosophers, who denied that relativity was philosophically significant, exemplify a global pattern: while critics of relativity feared to become marginalized by the scientific, political, and cultural revolutions that Einstein and his theory were taken to represent, supporters sympathized with these revolutions. (shrink)

In this paper we consider the prehistory of quantum gravity (1916–1930) from two perspectives. First, we investigate how this research field constituted itself and we propose for the first time a red thread to trace its evolution in this earliest period. Second, we focus on a case study: the earliest work of Léon Rosenfeld. In 1927 he tried to merge wave mechanics with general relativity in the context of a five‐dimensional universe. We describe how Oskar Klein, Louis de Broglie, and (...) Théophile De Donder influenced Rosenfeld's work and analyze how and why Rosenfeld attempted to reconcile Einstein's theory with quantum phenomena. We argue that Rosenfeld investigated for the first time the corrections to a classical space‐time metric generated by a quantum source. As far as we know, Rosenfeld's approach has been largely ignored until today: he himself considered it “an accident.” After having reconsidered its connection with de Broglie's ideas and Rosenfeld's interpretation of the wave function in 1927, we argue that Rosenfeld's work can be interpreted as a first attempt to introduce the pilot‐wave theory in the context of quantum gravity and we infer that this was one of the reasons that ruled it out. (shrink)

This article based on a recent European study examines the subjective consequences of abuse against older women and their help seeking behavior. In 2010, survey data concerning experiences of abuse in domestic settings were collected from 2,880 older women across five European countries (Austria, Belgium, Finland, Lithuania, and Portugal). The results of the study indicated that overall 30.1% of older women reported at least one experience of abuse in the past year. Less than half of the victims talked about it (...) in the informal setting or reported it to any formal agency. An ecological framework is used to explain factors influencing women’s decisions to seek help. Some consequences of abuse (anger, tension, sleeping difficulties, and concentration difficulties), type of abuse (physical abuse and violation of personal rights), higher abuse intensity, and density are connected with positive help seeking behaviours. Victims abused by current partners or a spouse were more passive to seek help. (shrink)

Dans cet article, je reviens sur un constat bien connu, mais jamais parfaitement élucidé : Rousseau n’emploie que très exceptionnellement l’expression « intérêt général », à laquelle il préfère celle d’« intérêt commun ». Je m’efforce d’y apporter une explication nouvelle, en partant d’un réexamen du concept même d’« intérêt » dans son œuvre, auquel il faut prêter un sens assez différent de celui auquel la philosophie politique nous a accoutumés : l’intérêt ne saurait être individuel, il ne saurait s’identifier (...) à l’« avantage », il ne saurait faire l’objet d’un « calcul ». À ce titre, il existe une véritable antinomie entre la notion d’intérêt commun chez Rousseau et celle d’intérêt général qui se formalise chez les physiocrates de façon quasi contemporaine. L’intérêt commun est la base de formation démocratique d’une volonté politiquement orientée, qui prend comme telle le nom de « volonté générale », là où l’intérêt général est le langage normatif dans lequel une décision politique non nécessairement démocratique cherche à fonder sa légitimité en raison. (shrink)

« Je me croyais grec ou romain » écrit Rousseau de son enfance genevoise, durant laquelle le patriotisme de son père, son statut privilégié de citoyen et ses lectures de Plutarque se confondent en une même exaltation pour la vertu antique. La pensée politique de Rousseau semble ainsi pétrie de références à une Antiquité exemplaire et fantasmée – à Sparte, tout particulièrement. Elle s’est à ce titre régulièrement vu reprocher son anachronisme. Benjamin Constant, de façon célèbre, accuse Rouss...

In this article, I offer a new interpretation for Rousseau’s surprisingly spare use of the phrase “general interest” in his works. My starting point is the very notion of interest in his political thought. For Rousseau, interest is not a matter of calculation but of experience; properly speaking, once we are in the state of society, there is nothing like an individual interest because all our interests are shared with somebody else. And our political interest (our sensitivity to society’s general (...) disorders) is shared with all our fellow citizens. In this regard, I bring to light a clear antinomy between the “common interest” in Rousseau’s Social Contract and the “general interest” as conceptualized by the physiocrats a few years later. By “common interest” Rousseau means the material basis for the democratic formation of a general will (that is, a political will) among the citizens, whereas by “general interest” physiocrats mean the normative language in which a non-democratic political decision claims its legitimacy by appealing to reason. (shrink)

The new mathematical connection of De Donder’s differential entropy production with the differential changes of thermodynamic potentials (Helmholtz free energy, enthalpy, and Gibbs free energy) was obtained through the linear sequence of equations (direct, straightforward path), in which we use rigorous thermodynamic definitions of the partial molar thermodynamic properties. This new connection uses a global approach to the problem of reversibility and irreversibility, which is vital to global learners’ view and standardizes the linking procedure for thermodynamic potentials (Helmholtz free (...) energy, enthalpy, and and Gibbs free energy)—preferably to the sensing learners. It is shown that De Donder’s differential entropy production in an isolated composite system is equal to the differential change in total entropy and that De Donder’s equation agrees with Clausius’ inequality. The useful work of the irreversible process is discussed, which with the decrease of irreversibility tends towards the hypothetical maximum useful work of the reversible process. (shrink)