Pressure cooker, safety valve Related technology Relief Commentary

Denis Papin pneumatics

Pressure cooker, safety valve

• Denis Papin’s early prototypes exploded,
• so he added a safety valve
• regulated by adjusting
• the position of a weight on a lever.
• Thus he perfected his “steam digester”
• intended to render bones brittle for grinding
• but showing how future locomotives
• would be powered and regulated
• and how to cook potatoes in ten minutes
• and a whole chicken in fifteen.

Related technology

• Denis Papin didn’t invent the steam bomb;
• he wasn’t interested in armaments.
• He didn’t invent the autoclave;
• he wasn’t trying to sterilize instruments.
• He didn’t invent the steam engine;
• although he thought of moving pistons in cylinders.

Relief

• to forget or think
• over choices that grind
• but seem, eventually,
• to disappear, give me a break