> ” Would he have pursued a career in chemistry, focused on agriculture, and discovered nitrogen-based fertilizer if it weren’t for Mt. Tambora’s eruption 7,000

> ” Would he have pursued a career in chemistry, focused on agriculture, and discovered nitrogen-based fertilizer if it weren’t for Mt. Tambora’s eruption 7,000 miles away that caused a German famine? Probably not. Which is wild.” I would say “maybe”, but that isn’t “wild”. What’s the base of this assumption? Also, I would say that probably other person would have discovered it. It’s not like that weren’t incentives to improve agriculture before the famine. The author just glossed over of the essential research of synthesizing ammonia not made by Liebig. Who are all those people? Were they all motivated by the famine?