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The Scientist Who Cooked Himself
And solved the mystery of sweat
The 1600s and 1700s in England were a period of remarkable scientific discoveries. Scholars at Oxford, Cambridge, and the Royal Society cracked open countless mysteries of the natural world. Isaac Newton uncovered the rules of physics; Edmond Halley explored the cosmos; Robert Hooke imagined the microscopic world. Sometimes the pursuit of science was weirder and less noble than we might think — sometimes, it involved putting a man and a steak in a really hot room and seeing which cooked first.
This was the scientific contribution of Charles Blagden and Joseph Banks, who repeatedly roasted themselves — and, sadly, a dog — in the 1770s in the name of science. Blagden was a well-regarded physician, and Banks was a botanist. They wanted to understand what happens to humans and other animals in extreme heat, so they did what seemed logical. They built a very hot room and tried to see how long they could sit in it.
Blagden and Banks simply sealed off a space, put a stove in it, ran the stove all night, and then stepped in. They started with temperatures that were certainly hot, but not too far from what nature produces — 125 degrees or so. After the two found they could handle Death Valley-level heat, they pushed the thermostat higher and higher, trying to find the limit for the human body…
