Pierre Prévost (3.03.1751 -8.04.1839) - Swiss physicist, philosopher and man of letters. Born in Geneva, where he received a legal education at the college. In 1773 — 80 he was a teacher and engaged in literary work in Holland and France (Lyons, Paris), in 1780 —84 — member of the Academy of Sciences and professor of philosophy in Berlin, in 1793 — 1802 — professor of philosophy, and in 1802 — 23 — of general physics at the Geneva Academy.
His research concerned heat and magnetism. He constructed (1791) a theory of the exchange of radiation between bodies — the theory of mobile thermal equilibrium. He introduced the concept of mobile, dynamic thermal equilibrium and showed that the processes of the emission and absorption of heat proceed simultaneously, continuously and independently of each other, and that the transfer of heat is not one-sided but the result of a mutual radiant exchange of heat. He translated Euripides into French. He was the author of a two-volume philosophical work, “An Essay on Philosophy, or the Study of the Human Mind”.
Fellow of the Royal Society (1801) and of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1796), member of the Paris Academy of Sciences (1800).