Observation as a Way of Life: Time, Attention, Allegory

Saussure invented an instrument called the cyanometer to measure
the shades of blue of the sky, ranging over fifty-three graduations,
from milky white to midnight blue. 8 Every simple perception –
the sky is blue – fanned out into an array of ever more exquisite
distinctions, each duly marked and named. (Figure 10)
There is an analogy between the form of attentiveness cultivated
by early modern scientific observers and their meticulously timed
Figure 10: Horace Bénédict de Saussure, Cyanometer for measuring the blueness of the
sky. Courtesy of © Musée d’histoire des sciences de Genève.
8 Jean Senebier, “Mémoire historique sur la vie et les écrits de Horace Bénédict Desaussure,” in Horace-
Bénédict de Saussure, Voyages dans les Alpes [ 779-96], vols. (Geneva: Éditions Slatkine, 978), vol. ,
p. 28.
2