Camille Flammarion
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Nicolas Camille Flammarion FRAS (; 26 February 1842 – 3 June 1925) was a French
astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. Astronomers observe astronomical objects, such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galax ...
and author. He was a prolific author of more than fifty titles, including
popular science Popular science (also called pop-science or popsci) is an interpretation of science intended for a general audience. While science journalism focuses on recent scientific developments, popular science is more broad ranging. It may be written ...
works about astronomy, several notable early
science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...
novels, and works on psychical research and related topics. He also published the magazine '' L'Astronomie'', starting in 1882. He maintained a private observatory at Juvisy-sur-Orge, France.


Biography

Camille Flammarion was born in Montigny-le-Roi, Haute-Marne, France. He was the brother of Ernest Flammarion (1846–1936), the founder of the Groupe Flammarion publishing house. In 1858, he became a professional at computery at the Paris Observatory. He was a founder and the first president of the '' Société astronomique de France'', which originally had its own independent journal, ''BSAF'' (''Bulletin de la Société astronomique de France''), which was first published in 1887. In January 1895, after 13 volumes of '' L'Astronomie'' and 8 of ''BSAF'', the two merged, making ''L’Astronomie'' its bulletin. The 1895 volume of the combined journal was numbered 9, to preserve the ''BSAF'' volume numbering, but this had the consequence that volumes 9 to 13 of ''L'Astronomie'' can each refer to two different publications five years apart. The " Flammarion engraving" first appeared in Flammarion's 1888 edition of ''L’Atmosphère''. In 1907, he wrote that he believed that dwellers on
Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...
had tried to communicate with Earth in the past. He also believed in 1907 that a seven-tailed
comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that warms and begins to release gases when passing close to the Sun, a process called outgassing. This produces an extended, gravitationally unbound atmosphere or Coma (cometary), coma surrounding ...
was heading toward Earth. In 1910, for the appearance of
Halley's Comet Halley's Comet is the only known List of periodic comets, short-period comet that is consistently visible to the naked eye from Earth, appearing every 72–80 years, though with the majority of recorded apparitions (25 of 30) occurring after ...
, he was widely but falsely reported as believing the gas from the comet's tail "would impregnate he Earth’satmosphere and possibly snuff out all life on the planet". As a young man, Flammarion was exposed to two significant social movements in the western world: the thoughts and ideas of Darwin and
Lamarck Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck (1 August 1744 – 18 December 1829), often known simply as Lamarck (; ), was a French naturalist, biologist, academic, and soldier. He was an early proponent of the idea that biolo ...
and the rising popularity of
spiritism Spiritism may refer to: Religion * Espiritismo, a Latin American and Caribbean belief that evolved and less evolved spirits can affect health, luck and other aspects of human life * Kardecist spiritism, a new religious movement established in ...
with spiritualist churches and organizations appearing all over Europe. He has been described as an "astronomer, mystic, and storyteller" who was "obsessed by life after death, and on other worlds, and hoseemed to see no distinction between the two". He was influenced by
Jean Reynaud Jean Ernest Reynaud (; February 14, 1806–July 28, 1863) was a French mining engineer and socialist philosopher. He was a member of the Saint-Simonian community. He was a co-founder of the Encyclopédie nouvelle. Life He was born in Lyo ...
(1806–1863) and his ''Terre et ciel'' (1854), which described a religious system based on the transmigration of souls believed to be reconcilable with both
Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...
and pluralism. He was convinced that souls after the physical death pass from planet to planet and progressively improve at each new incarnation. In 1862, he published his first book, ''The Plurality of Inhabited Worlds'', and was dismissed from his position at the Paris Observatory later the same year. It is not quite clear if these two incidents are related to each other. In ''Real and Imaginary Worlds'' (1864) and ''Lumen'' (1887), he "describes a range of exotic species, including sentient plants which combine the processes of digestion and respiration. This belief in
extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life, or alien life (colloquially, aliens), is life that originates from another world rather than on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been scientifically conclusively detected. Such life might range from simple forms ...
, Flammarion combined with a religious conviction derived, not from the Catholic faith upon which he had been raised, but from the writings of Jean Reynaud and their emphasis upon the transmigration of souls. Man he considered to be a “citizen of the sky,” other worlds “studios of human work, schools where the expanding soul progressively learns and develops, assimilating gradually the knowledge to which its aspirations tend, approaching thus evermore the end of its destiny.” His psychical studies also influenced some of his
science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...
, where he would write about his beliefs in a cosmic version of metempsychosis. In ''Lumen'', a human character meets the soul of an alien, able to cross the universe faster than light, that has been reincarnated on many different worlds, each with its own gallery of organisms and their evolutionary history. Other than that, his writing about other worlds adhered fairly closely to then current ideas in evolutionary theory and astronomy. Among other things, he believed that all planets went through more or less the same stages of development, but at different rates depending on their sizes. The fusion of science, science fiction and the spiritual influenced other readers as well; "With great commercial success he blended scientific speculation with science fiction to propagate modern myths such as the notion that “superior” extraterrestrial species reside on numerous planets, and that the human soul evolves through cosmic reincarnation. Flammarion's influence was great, not just on the popular thought of his day, but also on later writers with similar interests and convictions." In the English translation of ''Lumen'', Brian Stableford argues that both
Olaf Stapledon William Olaf Stapledon (10 May 1886 – 6 September 1950) was an English philosopher and author of science fiction.Andy Sawyer, " illiamOlaf Stapledon (1886-1950)", in Bould, Mark, et al, eds. ''Fifty Key Figures in Science Fiction''. New York ...
and William Hope Hodgson have likely been influenced by Flammarion.
Arthur Conan Doyle Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Hol ...
's ''The Poison Belt'', published 1913, also has a lot in common with Flammarion's supposed worries that the tail of Halley's Comet would be poisonous for earth life.
Edgar Rice Burroughs Edgar Rice Burroughs (September 1, 1875 – March 19, 1950) was an American writer, best known for his prolific output in the adventure, science fiction, and fantasy genres. Best known for creating the characters Tarzan (who appeared in ...
makes a direct reference to Flammarion in Skeleton Men of Jupiter.


Family

Camille was a brother of Ernest Flammarion and Berthe Martin-Flammarion, and uncle of a woman named Zelinda. His first wife was Sylvie Petiaux-Hugo Flammarion, and his second wife was Gabrielle Renaudot Flammarion, also a noted astronomer.


Mars

Beginning with Giovanni Schiaparelli's 1877 observations, 19th-century astronomers observing
Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...
believed they saw a network of lines on its surface, which were named "canals" by Schiaparelli. These turned out to be an optical illusion due to the limited observing instruments of the time, as revealed by better telescopes in the 1920s. Camille, a contemporary of Schiaparelli, extensively researched the so-called "canals" during the 1880s and 1890s. As American astronomer Percival Lowell, he thought the "canals" were artificial in nature and most likely the "rectification of old rivers aimed at the general distribution of water to the surface of the continents." He assumed the planet was in an advanced stage of its habitability, and the canals were the product of an intelligent species attempting to survive on a dying world. Flammarion also assumed the red color on the planet's surface was either exposure of the interior of the soil, or because of red vegetation.


Halley's Comet

When astronomers announced that the Earth would pass through the tail of Halley's Comet in May 1910, Flammarion was widely reported, in numerous American newspapers, as believing that toxic gases in the tail might "possibly snuff out all life on the planet". In an article in the ''New York Herald'' in November 1909, responding to such claims by others, he stated that "The poisoning of humanity by deleterious gases is improbable", and correctly stated that the matter in the comet's tail is so tenuous that it would have no noticeable effect. However, he also indulged in a "thought experiment" about what might happen if it ''did'' inject various gases into the atmosphere. Sensation-seeking papers chose to quote only the latter part, leading to the widespread misconception that Flammarion actually believed it. On 1 February 1910, Flammarion published an update in the ''Herald'', saying he wished to warn journalists against "accusing me of announcing the end of the world for May 19 next. The end of the world will not occur on May 19 next."


Psychical research

Flammarion approached
spiritism Spiritism may refer to: Religion * Espiritismo, a Latin American and Caribbean belief that evolved and less evolved spirits can affect health, luck and other aspects of human life * Kardecist spiritism, a new religious movement established in ...
, psychical research and
reincarnation Reincarnation, also known as rebirth or transmigration, is the Philosophy, philosophical or Religion, religious concept that the non-physical essence of a living being begins a new lifespan (disambiguation), lifespan in a different physical ...
from the viewpoint of the
scientific method The scientific method is an Empirical evidence, empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has been referred to while doing science since at least the 17th century. Historically, it was developed through the centuries from the ancient and ...
, writing, "It is by the scientific method alone that we may make progress in the search for truth. Religious belief must not take the place of impartial analysis. We must be constantly on our guard against illusions." He was very close to the French author Allan Kardec, who founded
Spiritism Spiritism may refer to: Religion * Espiritismo, a Latin American and Caribbean belief that evolved and less evolved spirits can affect health, luck and other aspects of human life * Kardecist spiritism, a new religious movement established in ...
.in "Death and Its Mystery", 1921, 3 volumes. Translated by Latrobe Carroll (1923, T. Fisher Unwin, Ltd. London: Adelphi Terrace.). Partial online version a
Manifestations of the Dead in Spiritistic Experiments
Flammarion had studied mediumship and wrote, "It is infinitely to be regretted that we cannot trust the loyalty of mediums. They almost always cheat". However, Flammarion, a believer in psychic phenomena, attended séances with Eusapia Palladino and claimed that some of her phenomena were genuine. He produced in his book alleged levitation photographs of a table and an impression of a face in
putty PuTTY () is a free and open-source terminal emulator, serial console and network file transfer application. It supports several network protocols, including SCP, SSH, Telnet, rlogin, and raw socket connection. It can also connect to a se ...
. Joseph McCabe did not find the evidence convincing. He noted that the impressions of faces in putty were always of Palladino's face and could have easily been made, and she was not entirely clear from the table in the levitation photographs. His book ''The Unknown'' (1900) received a negative review from the psychologist
Joseph Jastrow Joseph Jastrow (January 30, 1863 – January 8, 1944) was a Polish-born American psychologist renowned for his contributions to experimental psychology, design of experiments, and psychophysics. He also worked on the phenomena of optical illu ...
who wrote "the work's fundamental faults are a lack of critical judgment in the estimation of evidence, and of an appreciation of the nature of the logical conditions which the study of these problems presents." After two years investigation into automatic writing he wrote that the subconscious mind is the explanation and there is no evidence for the spirit hypothesis. Flammarion believed in the survival of the soul after death but wrote that mediumship had not been scientifically proven. Even though Flammarion believed in the survival of the soul after death he did not believe in the spirit hypothesis of Spiritism, instead he believed that Spiritist activities such as ectoplasm and levitations of objects could be explained by an unknown " psychic force" from the medium. He also believed that
telepathy Telepathy () is the purported vicarious transmission of information from one person's mind to another's without using any known human sensory channels or physical interaction. The term was first coined in 1882 by the classical scholar Frederic ...
could explain some paranormal phenomena. In his book ''Mysterious Psychic Forces'' (1909) he wrote: In the 1920s Flammarion changed some of his beliefs on apparitions and hauntings but still claimed there was no evidence for the spirit hypothesis of mediumship in
Spiritism Spiritism may refer to: Religion * Espiritismo, a Latin American and Caribbean belief that evolved and less evolved spirits can affect health, luck and other aspects of human life * Kardecist spiritism, a new religious movement established in ...
. In his 1924 book ''Les maisons hantées'' (Haunted Houses) he came to the conclusion that in some rare cases hauntings are caused by departed souls whilst others are caused by the "remote action of the psychic force of a living person". The book was reviewed by the magician Harry Houdini who wrote it "fails to supply adequate proof of the veracity of the conglomeration of hearsay it contains; it must, therefore, be a collection of myths." In a presidential address to the
Society for Psychical Research The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal. It describes itself as the "first society to condu ...
in October 1923 Flammarion summarized his views after 60 years of investigating paranormal phenomena. He wrote that he believed in
telepathy Telepathy () is the purported vicarious transmission of information from one person's mind to another's without using any known human sensory channels or physical interaction. The term was first coined in 1882 by the classical scholar Frederic ...
, etheric doubles, the stone tape theory and "exceptionally and rarely the dead do manifest" in hauntings. He was also a member of the Theosophical Society.


Legacy

He was the first to suggest the names Triton and Amalthea for moons of
Neptune Neptune is the eighth and farthest known planet from the Sun. It is the List of Solar System objects by size, fourth-largest planet in the Solar System by diameter, the third-most-massive planet, and the densest giant planet. It is 17 t ...
and
Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a Jupiter mass, mass more than 2.5 times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined a ...
, respectively, although these names were not officially adopted until many decades later. George Gamow cited Flammarion as having had a significant influence on his childhood interest in science.


Honors

Named after him * Flammarion (lunar crater) * Flammarion (Martian crater) *
Asteroid An asteroid is a minor planet—an object larger than a meteoroid that is neither a planet nor an identified comet—that orbits within the Solar System#Inner Solar System, inner Solar System or is co-orbital with Jupiter (Trojan asteroids). As ...
s: 1021 Flammario is named in his honour. In addition, 154 Bertha commemorates his sister; 169 Zelia commemorates his niece;
141 Lumen 141 Lumen is a carbonaceous asteroid from the intermediate asteroid belt, approximately 130 kilometers in diameter. It is an identified Eunomia family#Interlopers, Eunomian interloper. Description It was discovered on January 13, 1875, by th ...
is named after Flammarion's book ''Lumen: Récits de l'infini''; 286 Iclea for the heroine of his novel ''Uranie''; and 605 Juvisia after Juvisy-sur-Orge, France, where his observatory is located. * In 1897, he received the Prix Jules Janssen, the highest award of the Société astronomique de France, the French astronomical society. * He was made a Commandeur de la Legion d'honneur.


Works

* ''La pluralité des mondes habités'' (The Plurality of Inhabited Worlds), 1862. * ''Real and Imaginary Worlds'', 1865. * ''God in nature'', 1866. Flammarion argues that the mind is independent of the brain. * ''L'atmosphère: Des Grands Phenomenes'', 1872. (Appears to be an earlier edition of ''L'atmosphère: météorologie populaire'' 1888 which does not have the Flammarion engraving). * ''Récits de l'infini'', 1872 (translated into English as ''Stories of Infinity'' in 1873). **'' Lumen'', a series of dialogues between a man and a disembodied spirit which is free to roam the Universe at will. The novel includes observations about the implications of the finite velocity of light, and many images of otherworldly life adapted to alien circumstances. **''History of a Comet'' **''In Infinity'' * ''Distances of the Stars'', 1874. Popular Science Monthly V.5, Aug 1874. Translated in English from La Nature. ( available online) * ''Astronomie populaire'', 1880. His best-selling work, it was translated into English as ''Popular Astronomy'' in 1894. * ''Les Étoiles et les Curiosités du Ciel'', 1882. A supplement of the ''L'Astronomie Populaire'' works. An observer's handbook of its day. * ''De Wereld vóór de Schepping van den Mensch'', 1886. A paleontological work. * ''L'atmosphère: météorologie populaire'', 1888. * '' Uranie'', 1889 (translated into English as ''Urania'' in 1890). * ''La planète Mars et ses conditions d'habitabilité'', 1892. * ''La Fin du Monde'' (The End of the World), 1893 (translated into English as '' Omega: The Last Days of the World'' in 1894), is a science fiction novel about a
comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that warms and begins to release gases when passing close to the Sun, a process called outgassing. This produces an extended, gravitationally unbound atmosphere or Coma (cometary), coma surrounding ...
colliding with the
Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...
, followed by several million years leading up to the gradual death of the planet, and has recently been brought back into print. It was adapted into a film in 1931 by
Abel Gance Abel Gance (; born Abel Eugène Alexandre Péréthon; 25 October 188910 November 1981) was a French film director, producer, writer and actor. A pioneer in the theory and practice of montage, he is best known for three major silent films: ''J'ac ...
. * ''Stella'' (1897) * ''L’inconnu et les problèmes psychiques'' (published in English as: L’inconnu: The Unknown), 1900, a collection of psychic experiences. *
Mysterious psychic forces: an account of the author's investigations in psychical research, together with those of other European savants
', 1907 *
Astronomy for Amateurs
', 1904 *
Thunder and Lightning
', 1905 * ''Death and its mystery—proofs of the existence of the soul; Volume 1—Before death'', 1921 * ''Death and its mystery—proofs of the existence of the soul; Volume 2—At the moment of death'', 1922 * ''Death and its mystery—proofs of the existence of the soul; Volume 3—After death'', 1923 *
Dreams of an Astronomer
', 1923 * ''Haunted houses'', 1924 Source:


See also

* Flammarion engraving * Scientific marvelous


References


External links

* * * *
Atlas cèleste, Paris 1877
at AtlasCoelestis.com] * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Flammarion, Camille 1842 births 1925 deaths 19th-century apocalypticists 19th-century French novelists 19th-century French male writers 20th-century apocalypticists 20th-century French astronomers 20th-century French male writers 19th-century French astronomers French balloonists French male novelists French science fiction writers French parapsychologists People from Haute-Marne Writers from Grand Est Reincarnation researchers