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why are mathematicians important
why are mathematicians important
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There have been many great mathematicians in the world, though many are not well known. People have been studying math for ages, the oldest mathematical object dated all the way back to around 35,000 BC. There are still mathematicians today, studying math and figuring out ways to improve the mathematical world. Some of the most well-known mathematicians include Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and Aristotle. These mathematicians (and many more) have influenced the mathematical world and mathematics would not be where it is today without them. There were many great individuals who contributed greatly in mathematics but there was one family with eight great mathematicians who were very influential in mathematics. This was the Bernoulli family. The Bernoulli family contributed a lot to mathematics, medicine, physics, and other areas. Even though they were great mathematicians, there was also hatred and jealousy between many of them. These men did not want their brothers or sons outdoing them in mathematics. Most Bernoulli fathers told their sons not to study mathematics even if they wanted. They were told to study medicine, business, or law, instead, though most of them found a way to study mathematics. The mathematicians in this family include Jacob, Johann, Daniel, Nicolaus I, Nicolaus II, Johann II, Johann III, and Jacob II Bernoulli.
Daniel Bernoulli
Born in the Netherlands, Daniel Bernoulli was one of the most well-known Bernoulli mathematicians. He contributed plenty to mathematics and advanced it, ahead of its time. His father, Johann, made him study medicine at first, as there was little money in mathematics, but eventually, Johann gave in and tutored Daniel in mathematics. Johann treated his son’s desire to lea...
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...I Bernoulli, son of Johann III, studied law and mathematics. With his true interests in mathematics, Jacob III worked with geometry and mathematical physics.
The Bernoulli family had eight significant and important mathematicians, starting with Jacob Bernoulli, born in 1654. Though there was a great deal of hatred and jealousy between the Bernuollis, they made many remarkable contributions in mathematics and science and helped progress mathematics to become what it is today. For example, Daniel discovered a way to measure blood pressure that was used for 170 years, which advanced the medical field. Daniel’s way of measuring pressure is still used today to measure the air speed of a plane. Without the Bernoulli family’s contributions and advancements to calculus, probability, and other areas of mathematics and science, mathematics would not be where it is now.
Overall George Boole’s life was filled with many moments of success, but was Boole an advance towards where mathematics is today? As many times that Boole was recognized his work finally paid off. At one point even Albert Einstein used Boole’s methods of mathematics to continue to advance of his own mathematics and sciences.
Born in the summer of September 17, 1826 in Breselenz, Kingdom of Hanover what’s now modern-day Germany the son of Friederich Riemann a Lutheran minister married to Charlotte Ebell was the second of six children of whom two were male and four female. Charlotte Ebell passed away before seeing any of her six children reach adult hood. As a child Riemann was a shy child who suffered of many nervous breakdowns impeding him from articulating in public speaking but he demonstrated exceptional skills in mathematics at an early age. At the age of four-teen Bernhard moved to Hanover to live with his grandmother and enter the third class at Lynceum two years later his grandmother also passed away he went on to move to the Johanneum Gymnasium in Lunberg and entered High School. During these years Riemann studied the Bible, Hebrew, and Theology but was often amused and side tracked by Mathematics. Showing such interests in mathematics the director of the gymnasium often time allowed Riemann to lend some mathemat...
When most people hear the name Isaac Newton, they think of various laws of physics and the story of the apple falling from the tree; in addition, some may even think of him as the inventor of calculus. However, there was much more to Newton’s life which was in part molded by the happenings around the world. The seventeenth century was a time of great upheaval and change around the world. The tumultuousness of this era was due mostly to political and religious unrest which in effect had a great impact on the mathematics and science discoveries from the time Newton was born in 1646 until the early 1700’s.
Daniel Bernoulli ( 1700 - 1782 ), son of Johann II Bernoulli, was born in the Groningen, Netherlands. At the age of 13, Daniel was sent to Basel University to study philosophy and logic. Later he obtained his master's degree in philosophy at the age of sixteen. Although Daniel was interested mainly in mathematics, his father pushed him into the medical field where he could profit the most. Again, Daniel attended Basel and other colleges around Europe where he obtained his doctorate in medicine in 1720. While studying medicine in Venice, Daniel published his first book entitled Mathematical Exercises. Daniel soon became interested in fluid flow while working with the flow of blood and blood pressure. With the help of the famous scientist Euler, Daniel published his most famous book Hydrodynamica in 1738. In this book Daniel discusses equilibrium, pressure, and speed in fluids which led to Bernoulli's principle. Read on to find out about his principle.
Having more than one mathematician in a family is not unheard of. There have been many father-son and father-daughter duos in the history of mathematics, e.g. Theon and Hypatia, Farcas Bolyai(1775-1856) and Janos Bolyai(1802-1860), George David Birkhoff(1884-1944) and Garrent Birkhoff, Emil and Michael Artin, Elie and Henri Cartan, etc. The Riccati family in Italy managed to produce three mathematicians, but the their contributions to mathematics do not compare to that of all eight of the Bernoulli mathematicians.
Pierre de Fermat was born in the town of Beaumont-de-Lomagne in southwestern France at the beginning of the seventeenth century in the year 1601. Being the son of a wealthy merchant, Fermat was able to gain a privileged education at monasteries and universities. The young man, however, never showed any particular strength in the subject of mathematics, choosing instead to pursue a career in the civil service of France. His elevated status in society allowed him to include the “de” in his surname. He suffered a serious attack of the plague during his adult life, severe enough to prompt friends to mistakenly pronounce him dead! Fermat never made math his career, but mathematics at th...
When you first see the name DeMoivre, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? While for many their first thought could be an Italian pizza, many may be surprised to find out it’s actually a French mathematician. Abraham de Moivre was a French Huguenot, a pioneer in the development of analytic trigonometry and in the theory of probability. Abraham became interested in mathematics at a very young age, he later perused mathematics intentionally in school all by himself. Eventually, he left France at the age of 18 and decided to move to London. Believing that maybe there he could soon pursue and advance his lifelong dreams, and oh boy he did!
Born in France on March 31st, 1596, Rene Descartes grew to be known as ‘The Father of Modern Philosophy”. Not only was Rene a philosophical man but he contributed greatly to Mathematics and his ideas have influenced our daily lives in a productive way. DesCartes was raised in a very religious christian family, his father was a member of the parliament and strongly believed in education at a young age. DesCartes studied at the Jesuit college at the mere age of eight. As a child and throughout his adulthood physical incapabilities enabled DesCartes to function as swift or promptly as his peers. Growing up and until the day of his death, Descartes’s health was always a major precaution he was forced to remain aware of. The Jesuit college granted him the immunity of resting in mornings before class. It was this education that led him to contribute philosophical and mathematical theories and devices that still hold a great value to mathematicians and everyday people even today in the 21st century. From a very young age he had interests in mathematics and analytical geometry. Descartes’s contributions to modern day society were affected by his young adulthood, soon he created mathematical and scientific ideas, and lastly philosophical ideas.
On the 29th of April in the year of 1854 Henri Poincare was born in Nancy, France. He was born into a very influential and sophisticated family. His father was a professor of medicine at the University of Nancy, his sister married a spiritualist philosopher, and his cousin was the President and Prime Minister of France. Henri was said to be a very ill child because of diphtheria. He received special, private teaching from his mother because of this. It is said that Henri had excellent memory and could memorize lines and pages of text that he had read. He could also remember everything that he heard, word for word. Obviously, Henri was very talented, but he also had his defaults. He was physically very clumsy and lacked talent in the arts. This, however, wouldn’t hamper him from becoming one of the greatest mathematicians in history.
No other field of study had a bigger impact in changing the course of history as mathematics. With the contributions of early mathematicians, many of our modern technology wouldn't be possible. Unfortunately, most mathematicians get little recognition in their contributions. One of these people is known by the name of Pythagoras.
His father taught his Latin but after a while saw his son’s greater passion towards mathematics. However, Andre resumed his Latin lessons to enable him to study the work of famous mathematicians Leonhard Euler and Bernoulli. While in the study of his father’s library his favorite study books were George Louis Leclerc history book and Denis Diderot and Jean Le Rond Encyclopedia, became Ampere’s schoolmasters (Andre). When Ampere finished in his father’s library he had his father take him to the library in Lyon. While there he studied calculus. A couple of weeks later he was able to do difficult treaties on applied mathematics (Levy, Pg. 135). Later in life he said “the new as much about mathematics when he was 18, than he knew in his entire life. His reading...
Carl Friedrich Gauss was born April 30, 1777 in Brunswick, Germany to a stern father and a loving mother. At a young age, his mother sensed how intelligent her son was and insisted on sending him to school to develop even though his dad displayed much resistance to the idea. The first test of Gauss’ brilliance was at age ten in his arithmetic class when the teacher asked the students to find the sum of all whole numbers 1 to 100. In his mind, Gauss was able to connect that 1+100=101, 2+99=101, and so on, deducing that all 50 pairs of numbers would equal 101. By this logic all Gauss had to do was multiply 50 by 101 and get his answer of 5,050. Gauss was bound to the mathematics field when at the age of 14, Gauss met the Duke of Brunswick. The duke was so astounded by Gauss’ photographic memory that he financially supported him through his studies at Caroline College and other universities afterwards. A major feat that Gauss had while he was enrolled college helped him decide that he wanted to focus on studying mathematics as opposed to languages. Besides his life of math, Gauss also had six children, three with Johanna Osthoff and three with his first deceased wife’s best fri...
Calculus, the mathematical study of change, can be separated into two departments: differential calculus, and integral calculus. Both are concerned with infinite sequences and series to define a limit. In order to produce this study, inventors and innovators throughout history have been present and necessary. The ancient Greeks, Indians, and Enlightenment thinkers developed the basic elements of calculus by forming ideas and theories, but it was not until the late 17th century that the theories and concepts were being specified. Originally called infinitesimal calculus, meaning to create a solution for calculating objects smaller than any feasible measurement previously known through the use of symbolic manipulation of expressions. Generally accepted, Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz were recognized as the two major inventors and innovators of calculus, but the controversy appeared when both wanted sole credit of the invention of calculus. This paper will display the typical reason of why Newton was the inventor of calculus and Leibniz was the innovator, while both contributed an immense amount of knowledge to the system.
Burton, D. (2011). The History of Mathematics: An Introduction. (Seventh Ed.) New York, NY. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
The 17th Century saw Napier, Briggs and others greatly extend the power of mathematics as a calculator science with his discovery of logarithms. Cavalieri made progress towards the calculus with his infinitesimal methods and Descartes added the power of algebraic methods to geometry. Euclid, who lived around 300 BC in Alexandria, first stated his five postulates in his book The Elements that forms the base for all of his later Abu Abd-Allah ibn Musa al’Khwarizmi, was born abo...