Pierre Lecomte du Noüy (; 20 December 1883,

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...

– 22 September 1947,

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

) was a French

biophysicist Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. B ...

and philosopher. He is probably best remembered by scientists for his work on the surface tension, and other properties, of liquids.

Life and work

Du Noüy was a descendant of the French dramatist Pierre Corneille. His mother wrote many novels, one of which, ''Amitié Amoureuse'', was translated into 16 languages and ran for 600 editions in France. Born and educated in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...

, du Noüy obtained the degrees of LL.B., Ph.B., Sc.B., Ph.D., and Sc.D. He was an associate member of the Rockefeller Institute working in

Alexis Carrel Alexis Carrel (; 28 June 1873 – 5 November 1944) was a French surgeon and biologist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1912 for pioneering vascular suturing techniques. He invented the first perfusion pump with Char ...

's lab from 1920 through 1928, head for 10 years of the biophysics division of the

Pasteur Institute The Pasteur Institute (french: Institut Pasteur) is a French non-profit private foundation dedicated to the study of biology, micro-organisms, diseases, and vaccines. It is named after Louis Pasteur, who invented pasteurization and vaccines f ...

, and the author of some 200 published papers. He invented the

Tensiometer Tensiometer may refer to one of a number of devices. The two most common are: * Tensiometer (surface tension) an instrument used to measure the surface tension of liquids * Tensiometer (soil science) an instrument to determine matric water p ...

, a scientific apparatus that used his

du Noüy ring method In surface science, the du Noüy ring method is a technique for measuring the surface tension of a liquid. The method involves slowly lifting a ring, often made of platinum, from the surface of a liquid. The force, , required to raise the ring fr ...

to measure the surface tension of liquids. Du Noüy believed that mankind should have confidence in science, but be aware that we know less about the material world than is commonly believed.

Telefinalism

Du Noüy converted from

agnosticism Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficie ...

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesu ...

. He supported a

theistic Theism is broadly defined as the belief in the existence of a supreme being or deities. In common parlance, or when contrasted with ''deism'', the term often describes the classical conception of God that is found in monotheism (also referred to ...

and teleological interpretation of

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

.Simpson, George Gaylord (1964). ''This View of Life: The World of an Evolutionist''. Harcourt, Brace & World, pp. 217–223. In his book ''Human Destiny'' he wrote that biological evolution continues to a spiritual and moral plane. Du Noüy met

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin Pierre Teilhard de Chardin ( (); 1 May 1881 – 10 April 1955) was a French Jesuit priest, scientist, paleontologist, theologian, philosopher and teacher. He was Darwinian in outlook and the author of several influential theological and philo ...

who shared similar interests in evolution and spirituality. Du Noüy developed his own hypothesis of

orthogenesis Orthogenesis, also known as orthogenetic evolution, progressive evolution, evolutionary progress, or progressionism, is an obsolete biological hypothesis that organisms have an innate tendency to evolve in a definite direction towards some go ...

known as "telefinalism". According to Du Noüy evolution could not occur by chance alone and that on an average since "the beginning of the world it has followed an ascending path, always oriented in the same direction." He accepted naturalistic evolutionary mechanisms such as

mutation In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, m ...

and

natural selection Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the heritable traits characteristic of a population over generations. Cha ...

but believed science could not explain all evolutionary phenomena or the origin of life. According to his telefinalist hypothesis a transcendent cause which he equated with

God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...

is directing the evolutionary process. His "telefinalist" hypothesis was criticized by

Carl Hempel Carl Gustav "Peter" Hempel (January 8, 1905 – November 9, 1997) was a German writer, philosopher, logician, and epistemologist. He was a major figure in logical empiricism, a 20th-century movement in the philosophy of science. He is esp ...

Leo Koch Leo Francis Koch (February 8, 1916 – November 14, 1982) was an American academic. An Assistant Professor of biology at the University of Illinois, he was fired for promoting premarital sex. Early life Leo Francis Koch was born on February ...

and

George Gaylord Simpson George Gaylord Simpson (June 16, 1902 – October 6, 1984) was an American paleontologist. Simpson was perhaps the most influential paleontologist of the twentieth century, and a major participant in the modern synthesis, contributing '' Tempo ...

as nonscientific.Koch, Leo (1957). "Vitalistic-Mechanistic Controversy", ''The Scientific Monthly',' Vol. 85, No. 5, pp. 245–255.

Publications

*''Between Knowing and Believing'' (1967) *''The Road to Reason'' (1948) *''Human Destiny'' (1947)
''Biological Time''
(1937) *''An Interfacial Tensiometer for Universal Use'' (1925). ''

The Journal of General Physiology ''Journal of General Physiology'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Rockefeller University Press. The journal covers biological, chemical, or physical mechanisms of broad physiological significance. The major emphasis is on physi ...

''. Volume 7, issue 5, pp. 625–633

Quotes

References

External links

Papers of Pierre Lecomte du Noüy
(Pasteur Institute)
Papers of Pierre Lecomte du Noüy at The University of Arizona
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nouy, Pierre Lecomte du 1883 births 1947 deaths 20th-century French male writers 20th-century French philosophers French male non-fiction writers Orthogenesis Theistic evolutionists Academic staff of the University of Paris