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Information about William Derham

William Derham (26 November 1657 - 5 April 1735)[1] was an English clergyman and natural philosopher. He was the first man known to measure the speed of sound.

Life

Derham was the son of Thomas Derham. He was born at Stoulton in Worcestershire, England. He was educated at Blockley, Gloucestershire and at Trinity College, Oxford from 1675 to 1679.[1] He was ordained on 29 May 1681. In 1682 he became vicar of Wargrave and from 1689 to 1735 he was rector at Upminster.

Work

In 1696 he published his Artificial Clockmaker, which went through several editions. The best known of his subsequent works are Physico-Theology, published in 1713; Astro-Theology, 1714; and Christo-Theology, 1730. The first two of these books were teleological arguments for the being and attributes of God, and were used by Paley nearly a century later.

On 3 February 1703 Derham was elected fellow of the Royal Society, and in 1716 was made a canon of Windsor. He was Boyle lecturer in 1711-1712. His last work, entitled A Defence of the Church's Right in Leasehold Estates, appeared in 1731.

Besides the works published in his own name, Derham, who was keenly interested in natural history, contributed a variety of papers to the Transactions of the Royal Society, revised the Miscellanea Curiosa, edited the correspondence of John Ray and Eleazar Albin's Natural History, and published some of the manuscripts of Robert Hooke, the natural philosopher.

References

1. ^ Marja Smolenaars, ‘Derham, William (1657–1735)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 26 May 2007
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  • 456 - St. Patrick returns to Ireland as a missionary bishop.

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speed of sound describes how much distance such a wave travels in a given amount of time. In dry air, at a temperature of 21 Â°C (70 Â°F) the speed of sound is 344 m/s (1238 km/h, or 769 mph, or 1128 ft/s).
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Worcestershire

Geography
Status Ceremonial & Non-metropolitan county
Region West Midlands
Area
- Total
- Admin. council Ranked 34th
 km ( sq mi)
Ranked 29th
Admin HQ Worcester
GB-WOR
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Motto
Dieu et mon droit   (French)
"God and my right"
Anthem
No official anthem specific to England — the anthem of the United Kingdom is "God Save the Queen".
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Blockley is a village in Gloucestershire, England, in the north Cotswolds.

Coordinates:

External link

  • Blockley information at The Cotswold Gateway

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    Gloucestershire (pronounced [ˈglɒstəʃə]; GLOSS-ter-sher) is a county in South West England.
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    The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford, of the foundation of Thomas Pope[1], or Trinity College for short, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England.
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    Wargrave is a village in Berkshire, England beside the River Thames, near Henley-on-Thames and opposite the village of Shiplake. It has three local schools, the primary school, infant school and a comprehensive school. Each is funded by the Church of England.
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    Upminster


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    God

    General approaches
    Agnosticism Atheism
    Deism Dystheism
    Henotheism Ignosticism
    Monism Monotheism
    Natural theology Nontheism
    Pandeism Panentheism
    Pantheism Polytheism
    Theism Theology
    Transtheism
    Specific conceptions
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    William Paley (July 1743 – May 25, 1805) was a British divine, Christian apologist, utilitarian, and philosopher. He is best remembered for his watchmaker analogy, an argument for the existence of God in his book Natural Theology.
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    February 3 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.

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    Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge, known simply as The Royal Society, is a learned society for science that was founded in 1660 and claims to be the oldest such society still in existence.
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    Natural history or (in Latin) Naturalis Historia is the scientific study of plants or animals.

    Natural History may also refer to:

    In science and medicine:
    • Natural History (Pliny), Naturalis Historia

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    John Ray (November 29, 1627 – January 17, 1705) was an English naturalist, sometimes referred to as the father of English natural history. Until 1670, he wrote his name as John Wray although no one knows why.
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    Eleazar Albin (known from 1708 - c.1742) was an English naturalist and watercolourist illustrator who wrote and illustrated a number of books including A Natural History of English Insects (1720), A Natural History of Birds (1731-38) and
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    Robert Hooke, FRS (July 18, 1635 – March 3, 1703) was an English polymath who played an important role in the scientific revolution, through both experimental and theoretical work.
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