page_title: 18th century
section_title: Inventions, discoveries, introductions
hierarchical_section_title: 18th century / Inventions, discoveries, introductions
caption_attribution_description: English: The Main Red building of Putuo Zongcheng temple, Chengde 中文（中国大陆）‎: 普陀宗乘之庙大红台
context_page_description: The 18th century lasted from January 1, 1701 to December 31, 1800. During the 18th century, elements of Enlightenment thinking culminated in the American, French, and Haitian revolutions. The age saw violent slave trading and human trafficking on a global scale. The reactions against monarchical and aristocratic power helped fuel the revolutionary responses against it throughout the century.
  The period is also known as the "century of lights" or the "century of reason". In continental Europe, philosophers dreamed of a brighter age. For some, this dream turned into a reality with the French Revolution of 1789, though this was later compromised by the excesses of the Reign of Terror. At first, many monarchies of Europe embraced Enlightenment ideals, but in the wake of the French Revolution they feared loss of power and formed broad coalitions for counter-revolution. The Ottoman Empire experienced an unprecedented period of peace and economic expansion, taking part in no European wars from 1740 to 1768.
context_section_description: 1709: The first piano was built by Bartolomeo Cristofori
  1711: Tuning fork was invented by John Shore
  1712: Steam engine invented by Thomas Newcomen
  1714: Mercury thermometer by Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit
  1717: Diving bell was successfully tested by Edmond Halley, sustainable to a depth of 55 ft
  c. 1730: Octant navigational tool was developed by John Hadley in England, and Thomas Godfrey in America
  1733: Flying shuttle invented by John Kay
  1736: Europeans encountered rubber – the discovery was made by Charles Marie de La Condamine while on expedition in South America. It was named in 1770 by Joseph Priestley
  c. 1740: Modern steel was developed by Benjamin Huntsman
  1741: Vitus Bering discovers Alaska
  1745: Leyden jar invented by Ewald Georg von Kleist was the first electrical capacitor
  1752: Lightning rod invented by Benjamin Franklin
  1753: The first  Clock  to be built in the New World (North America) was invented by Benjamin Banneker.
  1755: The tallest wooden Bodhisattva statue in the world is erected at Puning Temple, Chengde, China.
  1764: Spinning jenny created by James Hargreaves brought on the Industrial Revolution
  1765: James Watt enhances Newcomen's steam engine, allowing new steel technologies
  1761: The problem of longitude was finally resolved by the fourth chronometer of John Harrison
  1763: Thomas Bayes publishes first version of Bayes' theorem, paving the way for Bayesian probability
  1768–1779: James Cook mapped the boundaries of the Pacific Ocean and discovered many Pacific Islands
  1774: Joseph Priestley discovers "dephlogisticated air", oxygen
  1775: Joseph Priestley first synthesis of "phlogisticated nitrous air", nitrous oxide, "laughing gas"
  1776:  First improved steam engines installed by James Watt
  1776: Steamboat invented by Claude de Jouffroy
  1777: Circular saw invented by Samuel Miller
  1779: Photosynthesis was first discovered by Jan Ingenhousz
  1781: William Herschel announces discovery of Uranus
  1784: Bifocals invented by Benjamin Franklin
  1784: Argand lamp invented by Aimé Argand
  1785: Power loom invented by Edmund Cartwright
  1785: Automatic flour mill invented by Oliver Evans
  1786: Threshing machine invented by Andrew Meikle
  1787: Jacques Charles discovers Charles's law
  1789: Antoine Lavoisier discovers the law of conservation of mass, the basis for chemistry, and begins modern chemistry
  1798: Edward Jenner publishes a treatise about smallpox vaccination
  1798: The Lithographic printing process invented by Alois Senefelder
  1799: Rosetta Stone discovered by Napoleon's troops
caption: The Chinese Putuo Zongcheng Temple of Chengde, completed in 1771, during the reign of the Qianlong Emperor.
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