Editing 1761 in science (section)

==Astronomy==
* June 6 – The first [[transit of Venus]] since [[Edmond Halley]] suggested that its observation could determine the distance from the [[Earth]] to the [[Sun]]. [[Joseph-Nicolas Delisle]] set up a 62-station network for observing the transit. Those taking part included:
** [[Nathaniel Bliss]] at the [[Royal Greenwich Observatory]] near London
** [[César-François Cassini de Thury|César Cassini de Thury]] in [[Vienna]]
** [[Jean-Baptiste Chappe d'Auteroche]] in [[Tobolsk]], [[Siberia]]
** [[Jeremiah Dixon]] and [[Charles Mason]] in [[Cape Town]], [[South Africa]] (they had originally planned to go to [[Bencoolen (city)|Bengcoolen]], [[Sumatra]])
** [[Maximilian Hell]] in [[Vardø (town)|Vardø]], [[Norway]]
** [[Joseph de Lalande]] in [[Paris]]
** [[Tobias Mayer]] in [[Göttingen]]
** [[Nevil Maskelyne]] on [[Saint Helena]]
** [[Alexandre Pingré]] on [[Rodrigues (island)|Rodrigues Island]] (where he makes the last record of the [[Rodrigues parrot]])
** [[John Winthrop (educator)|John Winthrop]] in [[St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador|St. John's]], [[Newfoundland (island)|Newfoundland]]
** [[Mikhail Lomonosov]], who finds the first evidence that the planet has an [[celestial body atmosphere|atmosphere]]
[[Guillaume Le Gentil]], who had hoped to observe from [[Pondicherry (city)|Pondicherry]] in [[India]], is prevented from doing so due to the [[Seven Years' War]] and [[Ruđer Bošković]] arrives late in [[Istanbul|Constantinople]].