Information about a famous person who was engaged in self-education. Crazy Chinese self-taught engineers and their strange inventions (15 photos). Sea cucumber submarine
It would be interesting to know how many among my readers there are those who wanted to try writing and seriously take up painting, but stopped not because of lack of time or lack of imagination, but because of the widespread stereotype that success in painting can only be achieved after for long years art education?
Many people think that self-taught artists can only write as a hobby, but they cannot count on success, recognition and wealth.
In my conversations with many people, I hear this opinion in a variety of forms. I even know many artists who write enthusiastically and very well, but consider their paintings just fun only because they themselves have not received an art education.
For some reason they think that an artist is a profession that must certainly be confirmed by a diploma and grades. And while there is no diploma, you cannot become an artist, good pictures you can’t write, and even if you write a work “for yourself”, then it’s forbidden to even think about selling it or putting it up for public judgment.
Allegedly, the paintings of self-taught artists are immediately recognized by experts as unprofessional, and will only cause criticism and ridicule.
I dare say - it's all nonsense! Not because I'm the only one who thinks so. But because history knows dozens of successful self-taught artists, whose paintings have taken their rightful place in the history of painting!
Moreover, some of these artists managed to become famous during their lifetime, and their work influenced the entire world of painting. Moreover, there are among them both artists of past centuries and modern self-taught artists.
For example, I will tell you only about some of these autodidacts.
1. Paul Gauguin / Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin
Perhaps one of the greatest self-taught artists. His path to the world of painting began with the fact that he, working as a broker and earning good money, began to acquire paintings by contemporary artists.
This hobby fascinated him, he learned to understand painting well and at some point began to try to paint himself. Art fascinated him so much that he began to devote less and less time to work and write more and more.
The painting "Sewing Woman" was painted by Gauguin when he was a stockbroker
At some point Gauguin decides to devote himself entirely to creativity, leaves his family and leaves for France to communicate with like-minded people and work. Here he began to paint really significant canvases, but his financial problems also began here.
Communication with the artistic elite and working with other artists became his only school.
Finally, Gauguin decides to completely break with civilization and merge with nature in order to create in paradise, as he considered, conditions. To do this, he sails to the Pacific Islands, first to Tahiti, then to the Marquesas Islands.
Here he becomes disillusioned with the simplicity and savagery " tropical paradise", gradually goes crazy and ... writes his best pictures.
Paintings by Paul Gauguin
Alas, recognition came to Gauguin after his death. Three years after his death, in 1906, an exhibition of his paintings was organized in Paris, which were completely sold out and later entered the most expensive collections in the world. His work "When is the wedding?" included in the ranking of the most expensive paintings in the world.
2. Jack Vettriano (aka Jack Hoggan)
The history of this master is in a sense the opposite of the previous one. If Gauguin died in poverty, painting his paintings under the yoke of unrecognized, then Hoggan managed to earn millions during his lifetime and become a philanthropist only at the expense of his paintings.
At the same time, he began to paint at the age of 21, when a friend gave him a set of watercolors. The new business fascinated him so much that he began to try to copy the works of famous masters in museums. And then he began to paint pictures on his own stories.
As a result, at his first exhibition, all the paintings were sold out, and later his work “The Singing Butler” became a sensation in the art world: it was bought for $ 1.3 million. Hollywood stars and Russian oligarchs, although most art critics consider them to be completely bad taste.
Painting by Jack Vettriano
Large incomes allow Jack to pay scholarships for low-income gifted students and do charity work. And all this - without an academic education- At the age of 16, young Hoggan began working as a miner, after which he did not officially study anywhere.
3. Henri Rousseau / Henri Julien Felix Rousseau
One of the most famous representatives of primitivism in painting, Rousseau was born into a family of plumbers, after graduating from school he served in the army, then worked at customs.
At this time, he began to paint, and it was the lack of education that allowed him to form his own technique, in which the richness of colors, vivid plots and saturation of the canvas are combined with the simplicity and primitiveness of the image itself.
Paintings by Henri Rousseau
Even during the life of the artist, his paintings were highly appreciated by Guillaume Appolinaire and Gertrude Stein.
4 Maurice Utrillo
Another French autodidact artist, without art education, he managed to become a world-famous celebrity. His mother was a model in art workshops, she also suggested to him the basic principles of painting.
Later, all his lessons consisted in observing how great artists paint in Montmartre. For a long time his paintings were not recognized by serious critics and he was interrupted only by occasional sales of his works to the common public.
Painting by Maurice Utrillo
But already by the age of 30, his work began to be noticed, at the age of forty he became famous, and at 42 receives the Legion of Honor for his contribution to the arts in France. After that, for another 26 years he worked and did not worry at all about the lack of a diploma in art education.
5 Maurice de Vlaminck
A self-taught French artist, whose entire formal education ended at a music school - his parents wanted to see him as a cellist. As a teenager, he began to paint, at the age of 17 he was engaged in self-education with his friend Henri Rigalon, and at 30 he sold his first paintings.
Painting by Maurice de Vlaminck
Until that time, he managed to feed himself and his wife with cello lessons and performances with musical groups in various restaurants. With the advent of fame, he completely devoted himself to painting, and his paintings, in the style of Fauvism, in the future seriously influenced the work of the Impressionists of the 20th century.
6. Aimo Katayainen / Aimo Katajainen
Finnish contemporary artist, whose work is classified as " naive art". There is a lot of blue color in the paintings - ultramarine, which in turn is very calming ... The plots of the paintings are calm and peaceful.
Paintings by Aimo Katajainen
Before becoming an artist, he studied finance, worked in an alcohol rehabilitation clinic, but painted all this time as a hobby, until his paintings began to sell and bring in a good income, enough to live on.
7. Ivan Generalic / Ivan Generalic
Croatian primitive artist who made a name for himself with paintings of rural life. He became famous by chance, when one of the students of the Zagreb Academy noticed his paintings and invited him to hold an exhibition.
Painting by Ivan Generalich
After his solo exhibitions were held in Sofia, Paris, Baden-Baden, Sao Paulo and Brussels, he became one of the most famous Croatian representatives of primitivism.
8 Anna Mary Robertson Moses(aka Grandma Moses)
Famous American artist who started painting at the age of 67 after the death of her husband, already suffering from arthritis. She had no art education, but a New York collector accidentally noticed her painting in the window of the house.
Painting by Anna Moses
He offered to hold an exhibition of her work. Grandma Moses' paintings quickly became so popular that her exhibitions were held in many European countries and later in Japan. At the age of 89, Grandmother received an award from US President Harry Truman. It is noteworthy that the artist lived for 101 years!
9. Ekaterina Medvedeva
The most famous representative of contemporary naive art in Russia, Ekaterina Medvedeva did not receive an art education, but she began to write when she worked part-time at the post office. Today she is included in the ranking of the 10,000 best artists in the world since the 18th century.
Painting by Ekaterina Medvedeva
10. Kieron Williams / Kieron Williamson
English prodigy autodidact, who began to paint in the style of impressionism at the age of 5, and at 8 he put his paintings up for auction for the first time. At the age of 13, he sold 33 of his paintings at auction for $235 thousand in half an hour, and today (he is already 18) he is a dollar millionaire.
Paintings by Kieron Williams
Kieron paints 6 paintings a week, and his work is constantly lined up. He simply does not have time for education.
11. Paul Ledent / Pol Ledent
Belgian self-taught artist and creative person. got carried away fine arts closer to 40 years old. Judging by the pictures, he experiments a lot. I studied painting on my own ... and immediately put the knowledge into practice.
Although Paul took a few painting lessons, most of his hobby was studied by himself. Participated in exhibitions, paints paintings to order.
Paintings by Paul Ledent
In my experience, creatively thinking people write interestingly and freely, whose head is not stuffed with academic artistic knowledge. And by the way, they achieve some success in the art niche no less than professional artists. It's just that such people are not afraid to look at ordinary things a little wider.
12. Jorge Maciel / JORGE MACIEL
Brazilian autodidact, contemporary talented self-taught artist. He produces wonderful flowers and colorful still lifes.
Paintings by Jorge Maciel
This list of self-taught artists can be continued for a very long time. It can be said that Van Gogh, one of the most influential artists in the world, he did not receive a formal education, studied episodically with various masters and never learned to paint the human figure (which, by the way, shaped his style).
You can remember Philip Malyavin, Niko Pirosmani, Bill Traylor and many other names: many famous artists were self-taught, that is, they studied on their own!
All of them are confirmation of the fact that it is not necessary to have a special art education to be successful in painting.
Yes, it is easier with him, but you can become a good artist without him. After all, no one canceled self-education ... As well as without talent - we have already talked about this .. The main thing is to have a burning desire to learn on your own and discover all the bright facets of painting in practice.
Most of them not only do not have a higher education, but even a secondary one. It is noteworthy that this did not prevent them from making amazing discoveries and becoming the founders of completely new scientific disciplines.
Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky
Russian and Soviet self-taught scientist and inventor, school teacher. Founder of theoretical astronautics. He substantiated the use of rockets for flights into space, came to the conclusion that it was necessary to use " rocket trains» - prototypes of multi-stage rockets. His main scientific works relate to aeronautics, rocket dynamics and astronautics.
For unknown reasons, Konstantin never entered the school, but decided to continue his education on his own. Living literally in Moscow on bread and water (his father sent 10-15 rubles a month), he began to work hard. “Apart from water and black bread, I then had nothing. Every three days I went to the bakery and bought 9 kopecks worth of bread there. Thus, I lived 90 kopecks a month. To save money, Konstantin moved around Moscow only on foot. He spent all his free money on books, instruments and chemicals.
Every day from ten in the morning until three or four in the afternoon, the young man studies science in the Chertkovo public library - the only free library in Moscow at that time.
Work in the library was subject to a clear routine. In the morning, Konstantin was engaged in precise and natural sciences requiring concentration and clarity of mind. Then he switched to simpler material: fiction and journalism. Actively studied "thick" journals, where they were published as reviews science articles and publicistic ones.
For three years, Konstantin fully mastered the gymnasium program, as well as a significant part of the university one.
Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengor
Having no special mathematical education, he received remarkable results in the field of number theory. Most significant is his work with Godfrey Hardy on the asymptotics of the number of partitions p(n).
At school, his outstanding abilities for mathematics showed up, and a student friend from the city of Madras gave him books on trigonometry. At the age of 14, Ramanujan discovered Euler's formula for sine and cosine and was very upset to learn that it had already been published. At the age of 16, the two-volume work of the mathematician George Shubridge Carr, "Collection of Elementary Results of Pure and Applied Mathematics", written almost a quarter of a century earlier, fell into his hands (later, thanks to the connection with the name of Ramanujan, this book was subjected to careful analysis). 6165 theorems and formulas were placed in it, practically without proofs and explanations. The young man, who had neither access to a university nor communication with mathematicians, plunged into communication with this set of formulas.
In 1913, the famous Cambridge University professor Godfrey Hardy received a letter from Ramanujan, in which Ramanujan reported that he did not graduate from the university, but after high school he studied mathematics on his own. Formulas were attached to the letter, the author asked to publish them if they were of interest, since he himself is poor and does not have sufficient funds for publication. A lively correspondence began between the Cambridge professor and the Indian clerk, as a result of which Hardy accumulated about 120 formulas unknown to science. At the insistence of Hardy, at the age of 27, Ramanujan moved to Cambridge. There he was elected a member of the English Royal Society (English Academy of Sciences) and at the same time a professor at Cambridge University. He was the first Indian to receive such honors.
Milton Humason
Born in Minnesota, in a family big banker. At the age of 14 he left school and from 1917 began working at the Mount Wilson Observatory - first as a laborer, then as a night assistant. Despite his lack of special education at that time, he showed extraordinary abilities as an observer, and by order of D. E. Hale was soon enrolled in the staff of scientists. He worked at the Mount Wilson Observatory until his retirement in 1957.
The main works in the field of spectral characteristics of stars and galaxies. In the initial period of his activity, together with W. S. Adams and A. H. Joy, he participated in the program for determining the absolute spectral magnitudes of 4179 stars; received a large number of photographs of nebulae and stellar regions. In 1928, he successfully continued the systematic spectral observations of faint galaxies begun at the Mount Wilson Observatory in order to determine their velocities. Developed a special technique for photographing the spectra of faint galaxies on a 100-inch, and then on a 200-inch reflector; in 1930-1957 he determined the radial velocities of 620 galaxies. Performed spectral observations of a large number of supernovae, former novae and faint blue stars, including white dwarfs. In 1961, he discovered a comet (1961e), which was distinguished by high activity at large distances from the Sun.
Camille Flammarion
He did not receive higher education. From 1858 to 1862 he worked under the direction of Le Verrier as a calculator at the Paris Observatory, from 1862 to 1866 he worked at the Bureau of Longitudes, in 1876-1882 he was an employee of the Paris Observatory. He was the editor of the scientific department of the journals Cosmos, Siecle, Magasin pittoresque.
In addition to astronomy, Flammarion dealt with the problems of volcanology, the earth's atmosphere, and climatology. In the years 1867-1880 he made several ascents in balloons in order to study atmospheric phenomena, in particular atmospheric electricity.
Michael Faraday
Faraday never managed to get a systematic education, but early showed curiosity and a passion for reading. There were many scientific books in the store; in later memoirs, Faraday especially noted books on electricity and chemistry, and in the course of reading, he immediately began to conduct simple independent experiments. Father and older brother Robert, to the best of their ability, encouraged Michael's craving for knowledge, supported him financially and helped to make the simplest source of electricity - the Leyden Bank. The brother's support continued after the sudden death of his father in 1810.
An important stage in Faraday's life was his visits to the City Philosophical Society (1810-1811), where 19-year-old Michael listened to popular science lectures on physics and astronomy in the evenings and participated in disputes. Some scholars who visited the bookstore noted a capable young man; in 1812, one of the visitors, musician William Dens (William Dance), presented him with a ticket to a series of public lectures at the Royal Institute of the famous chemist and physicist, the discoverer of many chemical elements, Humphrey Davy.
Discovered electromagnetic induction, which underlies the modern industrial production of electricity and many of its applications. Created the first model of the electric motor. Among his other discoveries are the first transformer, the chemical effect of current, the laws of electrolysis, the effect of a magnetic field on light, and diamagnetism. He was the first to predict electromagnetic waves. Faraday introduced the terms ion, cathode, anode, electrolyte, dielectric, diamagnetism, paramagnetism, and others into scientific use.
Walter Pitts
Walter Pitts was born in Detroit on April 23, 1923 to a dysfunctional family. He independently studied Latin and Greek languages, logic and mathematics in the library. At the age of 12, he read the book “Principia Mathematica” in 3 days and found several controversial points in it, about which he wrote to one of the authors of the three-volume book, Bertrand Russell. Russell responded to Pitts and suggested that he go to graduate school in the UK, however, Pitts was only 12 years old. After 3 years, he learned that Russell had come to lecture at the University of Chicago and ran away from home.
In 1940, Pitts meets Warren McCulloch and they begin to pursue McCulloch's idea of neuron computerization. In 1943 they published "A logical calculus of ideas relating to nervous activity".
Pitts laid the foundations for the revolutionary idea of the brain as a computer, which stimulated the development of cybernetics, theoretical neurophysiology, and computer science.
Vladimir Andreevich Nikonov
A self-taught scientist without higher education, one of the largest Soviet onomasts. Honorary Member of the International Committee of Onomastic Sciences at UNESCO (1972).
After the gymnasium, he did not study anywhere, being engaged exclusively in self-education. Nikonov, therefore, did not have a higher education, a certificate of secondary education and a certificate of completion of elementary school.
The main scientific interests in onomastics are Russian surnames, geographical names (toponyms), names of space objects (astronyms), animal nicknames (zoonyms). More than 300 articles and notes by Nikonov have been published in various Soviet encyclopedias. He lectured at 18 universities of the USSR.
Boris Vasilievich Kukarkin
After graduating from school, he was engaged in self-education and at the age of 18 headed the observatory of the Nizhny Novgorod Society of Physics and Astronomy Lovers, having stayed in this post until 1931.
In 1928, he discovered a relationship between the period and spectral type of eclipsing variable stars.
In 1934, together with P. P. Parenago, he established a statistical relationship between the flare amplitude and the duration of the cycles between flares for U Gemini variables, which led to their prediction of the flare of the nova-like star T Northern Corona.
Conducted studies of light curves, periods and luminosities of Cepheids.
Viktor Stepanovich Grebennikov
Russian entomologist and apiologist, animal painter, specialist in breeding and protection of insects, writer. Honored ecologist of Russia, member of the International Association of Bee Scientists, as well as a member of the Social and Ecological Union and the Siberian Ecological Fund.
Self-taught, had no higher education.
In 1946, he was convicted of forging bread cards (he drew them "by hand"), and was released under an amnesty in 1953. Since 1976, he worked in Novosibirsk, at the Siberian Research Institute of Agriculture and Chemicalization Agriculture. Created in the village of Krasnoobsk, Novosibirsk region, where he lived, several micro-reserves (reserves) for insects.
He devoted his entire life to the study of insects.
He died April 10, 2001 at the age of 73.
Israel Moiseevich Gelfand
The main works of Gelfand relate to functional analysis, algebra and topology. One of the creators of the theory of normed rings (Banach algebras), which served as the starting point for the theory of rings with involution created by him (together with M. A. Naimark) and the theory of infinite-dimensional unitary representations of Lie groups, which is essential for theoretical physics. Along with this, the author of fundamental results in the field of the theory of generalized functions, studied differential equations, the theory of topological linear spaces, inverse problems of spectral analysis, quantum mechanics, dynamical systems, probability theory, approximate and numerical methods, and other areas of mathematics. Author of numerous works on the neurophysiology of volitional movements, cell migration in tissue cultures, proteomics (classification of the tertiary structure of proteins) and the algorithmization of the clinical work of doctors.
It is noteworthy that he is the founder of a large scientific school, although he himself did not even receive a secondary education.
"The main lesson of history is that humanity is unteachable."
Winston, the eldest son of aristocratic parents, disliked the process of education from a very young age. In his memoirs, he recalled: “For the first time, education appeared before me in the form of an ominous figure of a governess, whose appearance was announced in advance. I had to carefully prepare for this day by studying the book “Reading Without Tears” (in my case, the title clearly did not work). Every day, my nanny and I struggled through the book, a process I found not only terribly tiring, but absolutely useless. We never got to the end, when the fateful hour struck and the governess appeared on the threshold of the nursery. I remember that I did what hundreds of oppressed sufferers had done before me in similar circumstances: I went on the run.” At the age of nine, education finally overtook him: he was assigned to the private school of St. George at Ascot. It was there that the stubborn boy really understood (and not so much with his mind, but with other, less noble parts of the body) how much a pound of dashing in the system English education. Losers at Ascot were beaten regularly and heartily, and Winston was consistently at the bottom of the class. He was not hopelessly stupid: teachers regularly found him in some secluded corner with a book out of age. However, Churchill categorically refused to teach lessons, work in the classroom, and generally at least somehow try. Two years after the start of classes, Lord Winston showed almost zero progress in the exams, and his parents took him home. However, not for long. At the age of thirteen, the sufferer was again sent to the private Harrow High School. By this time, he had already somehow learned to imitate the process of passing exams, so that the deuces were replaced by triples. However, Churchill was still considered one of the weakest students: he, along with the rest of the "stupid" in the class, was even removed from studying Latin and ancient Greek, appointing instead additional classes in mother tongue. Considering that Winston's loser went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, they seem to have done the trick.
Achievements: Prominent British statesman and politician, Prime Minister of Great Britain in 1940-1945 and 1951-1955; military man, journalist, writer, honorary member of the British Academy (1952), Nobel Prize in Literature (1953). According to a poll conducted in 2002 by the BBC broadcaster, he was named the greatest Briton in history.
Henry Ford
“I don’t care where the person came from – from Sing Sing prison or Harvard.
We hire a person, not a story."
Henry Ford was born into a wealthy family, but, as Ford noted, "there was too much work on the farm compared to the results." Education, which left much to be desired, Henry received in a church school. Already an adult Ford, drawing up important contracts, still made mistakes. One day he will sue a newspaper that called him "ignorant", and to the accusation of ignorance he will answer: "If I ... needed to answer your stupid questions, I would only have to press a button in the office, and specialists would appear at my disposal with answers.
Ford did not consider illiteracy to be a disadvantage, but an unwillingness to apply the mind in life: “The most difficult thing in the world is to think with your own head. That's probably why so few people do it."
Achievements: the legendary businessman of the twentieth century, the organizer of the conveyor production and the "father" of the automotive industry.
Ivan Kulibin
"All my thoughts on the invention of the treasury and society of useful machines."
The son of a Nizhny Novgorod tradesman. Since childhood, he was interested in inventing and staging various intricate weathercocks, and especially in the arrangement of the wooden mechanism of home wall clocks. Thanks to the financial assistance of the Nizhny Novgorod merchant, M.A. Kostromin, Kulibin managed to arrange a very complex clock, which had the shape of an egg: every hour the small Royal doors were dissolved in it, behind which one could see the Holy Sepulcher, with soldiers armed on the sides. The angel rolled away the stone from the tomb, the guards fell on their faces, two myrrh-bearing women appeared; the chimes played the prayer Christ is Risen three times, and the doors closed. At the invitation of the director of the Academy of Sciences, Count Vladimir Grigoryevich Orlov, Kulibin moved to St. Petersburg and in 1770 entered the service at the academy.
Responding to the call of the British to do " best model such a bridge, which would consist of one arc or vault without piles, and would be approved by its ends only on the banks of the river, "Kulibin in December 1776 demonstrated at the academic yard, in front of a meeting of scientists, a 14-sazhen model of the bridge, for which he was He was awarded a large gold medal, he invented "engine boats for navigation" (1782), "the ship went against the water, with the help of the same water, without any extraneous force ..." Using ordinary mirrors, Kulibin lit up the dark passages of the Tsarskoye Selo Palace, arranged pocket electrophores , a huge incendiary glass, watermills of a special system, a three-wheeled scooter.
In 1801, Kulibin was dismissed from his duties as a mechanic at the Academy of Sciences. Forgotten and impoverished by almost everyone (a fire in 1813 deprived him of almost all his property), Kulibin in 1814 presented a project for an iron three-arch bridge across the Neva, a model of which is kept in the museum of the Institute of Railway Engineers. Unusually capable, Kulibin was poorly educated and often worked on what was already known before him.
Achievements: outstanding Russian self-taught mechanic-inventor.
Heinrich Schliemann
At the age of 14, he entered the grocer's shop in Fürstenberg as a boy, but after 5 years he was forced to leave his place for health reasons. Schliemann was hired as a cabin boy on a ship heading from Hamburg to Venezuela, but the ship was wrecked near the Dutch island of Texel. So Schliemann found himself in Holland. In Amsterdam, he joined a trading company as a messenger and soon became an accountant. Schliemann became interested in learning foreign languages and achieved fluency in Dutch, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian.
After Schliemann learned Russian, in January 1846 he was sent to Russia, to St. Petersburg, where he lived for 11 years. There he started his own business, in which he achieved significant success (in 1847, Schliemann signed up for a merchant guild), and married a Russian. In the 1850s, he visited the United States and became an American citizen. Retiring from business, Schliemann learned ancient and modern Greek and in 1858-1859 traveled to Italy, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Turkey and Greece; in 1864 he visited Tunisia, Egypt, India, Java, China and Japan, and in 1866 he settled in Paris. After 1868, Schliemann studied the history of Greece, paying special attention to the poems of Homer.
Having studied Corfu, Ithaca and Mycenae, Schliemann put forward a theory (based on the guess of the English archaeologist F. Calvert), according to which ancient Troy is located on the Hissarlik hill in Asia Minor. The substantiation of this theory in the work of Ithaka, Peloponnese and Troy (Ithaka, der Peloponnes und Troja, 1869) brought him a doctorate awarded by the University of Rostock.
In 1870 Schliemann divorced his wife, moved to Athens and married a young Greek woman. Over the next three years, he led the excavations of Troy, where he found a lot of gold jewelry. In 1874 his reports on excavations at French under the title Trojan antiquities (Antiquits Troyennes). Frustrated by the public reaction to the book and the friction that arose with the Turkish government due to the fact that gold was illegally exported from the country, Schliemann went to Mycenae, where in November 1876 he opened the tombs of the Mycenaean kings.
In 1878, Schliemann returned to Troy to continue excavations, with the help of archaeologist Emil Burnouf and the famous pathologist R. Virchow; the resulting book, Ilios, included an autobiography by Schliemann and a foreword by Virchow. Unable to keep the collection at home in Athens, in 1880 Schliemann handed it over to the German government (now it is in Moscow).
During 1880 and 1881, Schliemann excavated another "Homeric" city - Orchomenus, and the work Orchomenus published by him (Orchomenos, 1881) contributed to a better understanding of ancient Greek architecture. In 1882 he resumed his exploration of Troy, this time in collaboration with W. Dörpfeld, a professional architect who had already taken part in the German excavations at Olympia. The preliminary publication - the book of Troy (1884) in 1885 was followed by the work of Ilion, the city and country of the Trojans (Ilios, ville et pays des Troyens), in which Dörpfeld's influence is undoubted. In 1884, Schliemann began excavations of the citadel of Tiryns, but Dörpfeld completed this work.
In 1886, Schliemann again excavated at Orchomenus; he spent the winter of 1886-1887 on the Nile. Excavations were planned in Egypt and Crete (later carried out by A. Evans), work began on Cythera and Pylos. Despite the fierce attacks of French and German scientists, in 1890 Dörpfeld and Schliemann began new excavations of Troy, which allowed Dörpfeld to reveal the historical sequence of overlapping city buildings uncovered by Schliemann. It was established that the second layer from the bottom, containing a treasure of gold objects, is much older than Homeric Troy, and the city of Homer is the one that Dörpfeld identified as the sixth from the mainland rock. However, Schliemann did not live to see the truth. He died in Naples on December 25, 1890.
Achievements: amateur archaeologist, famous for his findings in Asia Minor, on the site of ancient (Homeric) Troy.
Aristotle
Aristotle, famous Greek philosopher, son of Nicomachus, physician to the Macedonian king Amyntas II. The birthplace of Aristotle was sometimes called the Stagirite. For 20 years (367-347) Aristotle was a student and colleague of Plato, and after his death, stung by the choice of Speusippus as the head of the Academy, he left Athens and taught in Assos in Troas, and then in Mytilene in Lesbos. In 342, Philip II, king of Macedonia, entrusted him with the education of his thirteen-year-old son Alexander. Aristotle stayed in Macedonia for 7 years. After Alexander's accession to the throne, he returned to Athens and founded his own philosophical school, the famous Lykeion, where he taught for 12 years. The Lyceum had a covered gallery for walks (peripatos), so the school was called Peripate, and its adepts Peripatetics. Ego was an exemplary scientific institution, equipped with a rich library and valuable collections, which attracted outstanding scientists and specialists in various fields. Research was led by Aristotle, and their results were processed synthetically, creating a system that encompassed all knowledge about the world of that time. In 323, after the death of Alexander, his patron, Aristotle left Athens in fear of persecution and soon died in Chalkis of Euboea. Under the name of Aristotle, a few fragments of works of a literary nature, written mostly in the form of a dialogue, have been preserved, as well as an extensive collection of philosophical treatises intended for study at school, the so-called Corpus Aristotelicum. In Rome, these texts were ordered, cataloged and published by the famous Peripatetic Andronicus of Rhodes. According to tradition, Aristotle's writings are usually divided into seven groups:
1) logical works, which the later peripatetics called Organon (Organon instruments), because logic was separated from philosophy by Aristotle himself and recognized as a necessary tool and foundation of any science;
2) works from the field of physics, that is, the science of nature (from the Greek word physis nature);
3) biological essays;
4) essays from the field of psychology;
5) works relating to the so-called primary philosophy, placed by Andronikov after the books on physics and therefore called "Ta meta physika" (postphysical writings, metaphysics);
6) the so-called practical essays on ethics, politics, economics, theory of state and law;
7) works from the field of rhetoric and poetics.
In the surviving writings of Aristotle, we find numerous repetitions and inconsistencies, traces of corrections and comments; therefore, it can be assumed that they are a collection of lectures and rough drafts of Aristotle, supplemented by notes from his students and listeners. And if today in many cases it is already difficult to recognize what Aristotle himself wrote, then the whole bears the imprint of his genius, the breadth of knowledge and the depth of his philosophical intuition inspire respect. Aristotle not only created a philosophical system that lasted for many centuries and had a huge impact on the history of human thought and European philosophy, but also laid the foundation for the development of such scientific disciplines as logic, biology and psychology.
Aristotle is one of the most versatile thinkers, and his influence, both on philosophy and on individual sciences, was enormous.
Paracelsus
Philip Aureol Theophast Bombast von Hohenheim (10/24/1493, Schwyz - 9/24/1541, Salzburg). Paracelsus - a physician of the Renaissance, "the first professor of chemistry from the creation of the world" (A.I. Herzen). Paracelsus studied medicine and alchemy with his father, also a doctor, then with some monks. He also studied at the University of Basel and traveled extensively in Europe. Paracelsus sharply opposed scholastic medicine and blind reverence for the authority of Galen, the classic of ancient medicine, who had many works and had a huge impact on the development of medicine. Paracelsus studied the healing effect of various chemical elements and compounds on the processes occurring in the body. Medicine owes him the introduction of a number of new remedies, both mineral and plant origin, such as preparations of iron, mercury, antimony, lead, copper, arsenic, sulfur, etc., hitherto used extremely rarely.
Paracelsus brought together chemistry and medical science: therefore, the teachings of Paracelsus and his followers are called iatrochemistry (medical chemistry). He was the first to look at the processes taking place in a living organism as chemical processes.
Nicholas Copernicus
Having lost his father as a 9-year-old child and remained in the care of his maternal uncle, Canon Watzelrod, Copernicus entered the University of Krakow in 1491, where he studied mathematics, medicine and theology with equal zeal.
At the end of the course, Copernicus traveled around Germany and Italy, listened to lectures on various universities, and at one time even taught himself as a professor in Rome; in 1503 he returned to Krakow and lived there for seven whole years, being a university professor and doing astronomical observations.
However, the noisy life of university corporations was not to Copernicus' liking, and in 1510 he moved to Frauenburg, a small town on the banks of the Vistula, where he spent the rest of his life, being a canon of a Catholic church and devoting his leisure time to astronomy and gratuitous treatment of the sick. When necessary, Copernicus devoted his energies to practical work: according to his project, a new monetary system was introduced in Poland, and in the city of Frauenburg he built a hydraulic machine that supplied water to all houses.
In depth of considerations, Copernicus was indisputably the greatest astronomer of his time, but as a practitioner he was lower even than the Arab astronomers; however, this is not his fault: he had the poorest means at his disposal, and he made all the tools with his own hands.
Thinking about the Ptolemaic system of the world, Copernicus was amazed at its complexity and artificiality, and, studying the writings of ancient philosophers, especially Nikita of Syracuse, Philolaus, and others, he came to the conclusion that not the Earth, but the Sun should be the motionless center of the universe.
Proceeding from this position, Copernicus very simply explained all the apparent intricacy of the movements of the planets, but, not yet knowing the true paths of the planets and accepting them as circular, he was still forced to partly retain the epicycles and trims of the ancients in order to explain various inequalities of movements. These epicycles and trims were finally rejected only by Kepler.
The main and almost the only work of Copernicus, the fruits of more than 30 years of his work in Frauenburg, is: "De revolutionibns orbium coelestium". The work was published in Regensburg in 1043 and is dedicated to Pope Paul III; it is divided into 6 parts and printed under the supervision of the best and favorite student of Copernicus, Rheticus; the author had the joy of seeing and holding this creation in his hands, albeit on his deathbed.
The first part talks about the sphericity of the world and the Earth, and also sets out the rules for solving right-angled and spherical triangles; the second gives the foundations of spherical astronomy and the rules for calculating the apparent positions of stars and planets in the firmament. The third speaks of the precession or precession of the equinoxes, with an explanation of its backward movement of the line of intersection of the equator with the ecliptic. In the fourth - about the Moon, in the fifth - about the planets in general, and in the sixth - about the reasons for changing the latitudes of the planets.
Thirty years before the publication of his great book, he sent to different countries handwritten copies of a kind of synopsis of the future essay "Nicholas Copernicus on Hypotheses Relating to Celestial Motions, a Brief Commentary." (These manuscripts were considered irretrievably lost and only in 1878 did they suddenly find one in the Vienna archives, and three years later another in Stockholm.) He was already old when he decided to print the main work of his life. He had no doubts that he was right. He wrote with calm dignity:
“Many other scientists and remarkable people have argued that fear should not keep me from publishing a book for the benefit of all mathematicians. The more absurd my teaching about the motion of the Earth at the present moment seems to the majority, the greater will be the surprise and gratitude when, as a result of the publication of my book, they will see how every shadow of absurdity is eliminated by the clearest proofs. So, yielding to these exhortations, I allowed my friends to proceed with the publication that they had been seeking for so long.
Ratik, the only, infinitely devoted and, alas, his only famous student, took the precious manuscript to Nuremberg, to the printers, and he remained waiting in his tower. He almost never went out, calling a few to himself. Waited for the book. In 1542, severe pulmonary hemorrhage and paralysis on the right side of his body chained him to bed. He died hard, slowly. On May 23, 1543, when the long-awaited book was brought from Nuremberg, he was already unconscious.
He died on the same day. The grave has not survived. The book remains.
Achievements: the famous Polish astronomer, the reformer of science, laid the foundation for the modern idea of the world system.
Tycho Brahe
Tycho Brahe is a famous Danish astronomer. In 1752 he observed new star in the constellation Cassiopeia. In 1576-97 he headed the Uraniborg observatory, which he built on the island of Ven in the Øresund Strait, near Copenhagen, and supplied excellent instruments made under his direction. Here, for 21 years, Brahe observed stars, planets and comets, making determinations of the positions of the luminaries with a very high precision. This is his main merit. In addition, he discovered two inequalities in the motion of the Moon (annual inequality and variation). Brahe also proved that comets are celestial bodies farther from the Earth than the Moon; made tables of refraction. He did not recognize the heliocentric systems of the world and instead proposed another, representing an unscientific combination of the teachings of Ptolemy with the system of Nicolaus Copernicus (the Sun moves around the Earth in the center of the universe, and the planets around the Sun). In 1597, after the death of King Frederick II, Tycho Brahe was forced to leave Denmark (after his departure, the Uraniborg observatory was abandoned). After 2 years spent in Germany, Johannes Kepler joined him as an assistant, who, after the death of Brahe, left the most valuable observations, on the basis of which Kepler derived his famous laws of planetary motion.
Astronomer, stargazer, these titles in those years caused mixed feelings among contemporaries. Respect for a scientist among enlightened people, superstitious fears among common people, contempt for ignorant nobility, suspicions of the Church ... Brahe despised class prejudices, put on an astrologer's cap and began to prepare a revolution in astronomy. Like many colleagues, he was simultaneously engaged in astrology and even tried to find the philosopher's stone.
He wanders around Europe: Wittenberg, Rostock, Basel, Ingolstadt, Augsburg... These are the largest centers of astronomy and astrology. In Augsburg, he began the construction of a huge celestial globe with a diameter of one and a half meters, on which he subsequently marked the position of the stars. Under the influence of his uncle, the astrologer Brahe became interested in alchemy and abandoned astronomy for a while ... However, when a new bright star appeared in the sky of Denmark in the constellation Cassiopeia, she turned him into an enthusiastic lover of the sky for the rest of his life. Tycho literally did not take his eyes off her day or night, anxiously noted all the gradual changes in her brilliance from the moment she appeared, when she competed in brightness with Venus, until her final disappearance after 16 months. A star flared up in the sky almost a month after the bloody night of St. Bartholomew. Many believed that it portends numerous troubles and the near end of the world ... Tycho Brahe, like many, talks about world events following the appearance of a star ... Kepler, who made fun of astrological forecasts, later expressed it like this: "If this star did not predict anything, then at least it heralded the birth of a great astronomer."
The result of Tycho Brahe's observations of "his" star was a book in which he expressed the idea that the star was much farther from the Earth than the Moon. And since she did not take part in the movements of the planets, he attributed her to the category of fixed stars. In our time, such a conclusion seems to be the most commonplace, but in the 16th century most astronomers firmly held on to Aristotle's conviction that the entire sky in general, and the region of the fixed planets in particular, is imperishable and unchanging; new stars, like comets, almost all belonged to the objects of the upper layers of our atmosphere. It was a challenge akin to Copernicus, and backed up by the iron logic of facts.
In 1576 the Danish king Frederick II, a zealous patron of the arts and sciences, assigned Tycho a content for astronomical research with astronomical generosity. The crowned sponsor gave the stargazer the whole island of Ven in the Sound to build a house and an observatory (which cost the king a barrel of gold). In addition to the annual salary, Tikho received income from the rental of the island by local peasants. It was a real medieval castle with spiers, loopholes and even a prison located in the basement ... Tycho called it Uraniborg (Castle in Heaven), and in another way - the "Palace of Urania" (muses - the patroness of astronomy). Inside the castle, Tycho placed several observatories with retractable conical roofs, a library with the famous large celestial globe, a chemical laboratory for 16 foci, that is, jobs. A fountain was built in the center of the first floor, which pumped water to all three floors of this truly unique astronomical school.
Subsequently, with an increase in the number of students and assistants who flocked to him from all over Europe, Tycho built a second building - Stjerenborg (Star Castle), remarkable for its underground observatories. Here he started workshops, where all the tools he brought to perfection of that time were made ...
At nightfall, the astrologer appeared at the observatory dressed in a mantle embroidered with stars and the pointed cap of a Chaldean magician. If he made observations of the moon, then it was a mantle embroidered with silver crescents. Mars was destined for clothes of red color...
At that time, astronomy and astrology were almost synonymous concepts. The nobles considered it their duty to personally draw up horoscopes, relying on very meager ideas about the laws of motion. celestial bodies. Tycho Brahe was no exception. All his life he was engaged in horoscopes. However, unlike many, he was well aware of the inefficiency of stellar forecasts compiled from inaccurate astronomical tables, and therefore devoted many years to scrupulously calculating the positions of celestial bodies. These tables of his were later used by Kepler in deriving his famous laws of motion.
The character of the great astronomer was arrogant and quick-tempered. Frederick II forgave the silver-nosed genius a lot (Tycho had a broken nose, and the surgeon attached a silver prosthesis in his place), but his successor on the Danish throne immediately disliked Tycho Brahe. He found fault with the fact that he placed a prison in Uraniborg for tenants who evaded rent, and in 1597 expelled Tycho Brahe from Denmark. The exile found shelter with a fan of astronomy, astrology and alchemy of the Czech Emperor Rudolf II, who gave Tycho the Benatek Castle, not far from Prague. Here the disgraced astrologer (sometimes together with Rudolph, who secretly came to him) began to observe. By a happy coincidence, among Brahe's assistants, in addition to the enthusiastic emperor, was the great Johannes Kepler, who later glorified his name.
The blow inflicted by exile did not go unnoticed. Tycho's strength was broken, and three years later he died, repeatedly shouting out, even in his dying delirium, the hope that his life had not been fruitless. The curtain is lowered, but the applause still sounds!
The main feature of Tycho Brahe as a scientist can be called his strict striving for the maximum accuracy of his observations. He was one of those who realized that precise instruments and rigorous methods were important not only for the practical applications of astronomy, but also for theory, in order to obtain data that could solve the question of the true structure of our planetary system. Tycho Brahe was one of the first to fully appreciate the importance of multiple repetitions of the same observation in various conditions with the aim that random sources of errors of individual observations mutually neutralize each other. His "Large Wall Quadrant" for measuring angular distances in the sky was not only a revolutionary device for that time, but also a real work of art. It is curious and strange that after death, most of the instruments created under the guidance of the great astronomer were destroyed.
What is the true place of Tycho Brahe in world astronomy? In 1543 Copernicus published his book On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres. This event marked the beginning of a new period in the development of natural science and a revolution in worldview.
In 1609, events took place that played a major role in the establishment of the Copernican doctrine. This year, Kepler's book "New Astronomy" was published, which contained the derivation of the first two laws of planetary motion around the Sun. In the same year, the telescope directed by Galileo to the sky made it possible to make several outstanding discoveries in astronomy, each of which played an important role in the development of this science.
Tycho Brahe was born three years later than the first event, and died eight years earlier than the second. His activity thus became an important step from Copernicus to Galileo. Based on a deep analysis and generalization of the results accumulated by him, it was possible to obtain new theoretical conclusions that develop the Copernican heliocentric doctrine.
Johannes Kepler was destined to cope with this no less titanic task, who overcame it, perpetuating the name of his great predecessor.
Rene Descartes
René Descartes was born a frail, weak child on the last day of March 1596 in small town Lae of the province of Touraine, in a not very noble, but prosperous noble family. A few days later, his mother died of consumption. Fortunately, the attached wet nurse came out to Rene, saved his life and improved his health. For eight years, René was given the full care of one of the best Jesuit colleges, just founded under the special patronage of King Henry IV.
Subsequently, Descartes recalled with gratitude the concerns of the educators of the college. Paradoxically, it is the Jesuits, the teachers of Descartes, who will become his sworn enemies: they will persecute his philosophical teachings, they will not allow him to work not only in their homeland, but also in neighboring Protestant Holland. The main subjects in the college were Latin, theology and philosophy. Since childhood, Descartes loved to solve problems, and that's all. free time dedicated to the study of mathematics. Descartes himself considered mathematics classes in the collegium to be “trinkets” and therefore independently engaged in a deeper study of it. The sciences of that time could not satisfy the inquisitive mind of Descartes and led him to skepticism. Only in mathematics did he find some satisfaction, but even here he was surprised, "how nothing sublime is built on such a basis of granite hardness." Disappointed in school wisdom, he, by virtue of noble traditions, prepares himself for military career devoting a lot of time to strengthening poor health through exercise and learning to use weapons. Dissatisfied with the current political situation in France, Descartes puts on the uniform of a Dutch volunteer and begins to wander around Europe, participating in the bloody ups and downs of the just-begun Thirty Years' War. Military fate throws him to Bavaria, to Bohemia, near Prague. However, idle stays in winter quarters in Bavaria became for Descartes times of intense work of thought, which led to the discovery of the main method, the first fruit of which was analytic geometry.
Tired of the hustle and bustle of military life, the twenty-five-year-old Descartes leaves the army and, as a traveling nobleman, appears at the palaces of The Hague and Brussels, then goes to Italy. Only in 1625 did Descartes briefly return to Paris. Here the circle of his scientific friends expands, and at the same time his reputation as a philosopher grows. Friends insist on the promulgation of the views of Descartes, expecting them to revolutionize the philosophical system. But the Jesuits oppose the philosophy of Descartes, threaten him with reprisals, and Descartes is forced to seek solitude in Holland, where he could work in peace. In Holland, Descartes lived for a total of about twenty years, moving from place to place, revealing himself only to particularly close friends. Here Descartes devotes himself entirely to scientific studies in philosophy, mathematics, physics, astronomy, physiology, publishes his famous works: Rules for the Guidance of the Mind, Treatise on Light, Metaphysical Reflections on the First Philosophy, Principles of Philosophy, Description human body" and others. Descartes' Discourse on Method, published in 1637, is best known.
Fearing persecution by the Inquisition, Descartes excludes from his work, wherever possible, everything that might displease the church. The title of his work has also changed. Now it sounds like this: "Discourse on the method to direct your mind well and seek the truth in the sciences." The book was written not in Latin, but in French. The author sought to ensure that a wider audience could get acquainted with his work, which, as Descartes writes, "will judge my opinions better than those who believe only in ancient books."
Around the philosophical teachings of Descartes there are fierce disputes. The disputants do not skimp on colorful epithets. For some, he is the Archimedes of our age, the Atlas of the universe, the mighty Hercules, for others - Cain, a vagabond, an atheist. The disputes themselves did little to touch the scientist. The only thing he feared was disapproval from the powerful Jesuit order. The terrible crimes of the Inquisition are still fresh in my memory. At the turn of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Giordano Bruno was burned alive in Flora Square. Twenty years later, in Toulouse, the philosopher Lucilio Vanini had his tongue torn out with ticks before being burned at the stake. The "Holy" Inquisition condemned the great Galileo. Descartes knew all this and was painfully worried, of course, he was afraid of the persecution of the Jesuits. Even in Holland, where the hand of the Jesuit order had not yet penetrated, opponents began to come out against Descartes, mainly Protestant theologians, accusing him of materialism and atheism. Although Descartes was not an atheist, moreover, in the "Discourses" he even proved the existence of God and the immortality of the human soul, nevertheless, he recognized matter and motion. It was precisely this that the theologians opposed, for they discerned the danger of Cartesian philosophy for Christian doctrine. Descartes became the target of violent attacks by churchmen. And later the works of Descartes were awarded for burning as heretical. All these troubled years, Descartes continued to live in Holland, occasionally visiting France, but each time not staying there for a long time. Last time he was at home in 1648. And two years later he died, although, perhaps, he could have lived longer, had not the eccentric representative of the august family interfered in his fate.
At that time, Sweden was ruled by a twenty-year-old Queen Christina. The young ruler had extraordinary abilities. She spoke six languages, was an excellent shot, could tirelessly pursue an animal, was accustomed to cold and heat, slept five hours a day and got up very early. In addition, this newborn Amazon was interested in philosophy. She was especially interested in the philosophy of Descartes, and the energetic queen decided to invite the scientist to Sweden. Without waiting for the consent of Descartes, she sent an admiral's ship for him, which delivered Descartes in 1649 to Stockholm. With his arrival in Sweden, Descartes hoped to calmly engage in science, without fear of persecution of churchmen. But the arrival in this northern country for the scientist was fatal. Received with honors, Descartes had to study philosophy with the Queen every day. Despite the winter cold, the lessons began every time at five o'clock in the morning. It was hard for Descartes, accustomed to the warm climate, besides, he liked to soak up in bed almost until noon. At the same time, Descartes was obliged to work hard on the statute of the Academy of Sciences organized by the queen. One day, on his way to the palace, Descartes caught a cold, pneumonia began. Bloodletting, which was used at that time, did not help, and on February 11, 1650, Descartes died. "It's time to go, my soul," were his last words.
Philosophical studies of Descartes are closely related to his mathematical and physical work. Descartes was the first to show how mathematics can be applied to visual representation and mathematical analysis of the most diverse phenomena of nature and society. He proposed to depict the connections between natural phenomena with curved lines, and write the latter algebraic equations. Having put the concept of moving matter at the basis of his philosophy, Descartes introduced movement into mathematics. If before Descartes mathematics had a metaphysical character, operating with constant values, then with the works of Descartes, dialectics entered mathematics, and at the same time, all natural science. In the works of Descartes on mathematics, variables appear for the first time and indicate how the strict laws of geometry can be translated into algebraic language and used in solving various problems that at first glance are far from mathematics. Thus, Descartes is the discoverer of analytic geometry, which is based on the method of coordinates he invented. This method, as is known, was used earlier by Descartes. He received significant development from Fermat. Nevertheless, with Descartes it acquired much greater significance, since with the help of this method Descartes was able to indicate new directions in the further development of mathematics. We owe to the mathematical genius of the thinker the introduction of the now familiar notation with the help of Latin letters constant and variable greatness, as well as the designation of degrees. Thanks to Descartes, algebra, both in its basic methods and in symbolism, took on the character that it still has today. Descartes attached particular importance to mathematics. He proceeded from the conviction that mathematics should be a model for any other science. In his opinion, only that science can be considered true, which in its construction follows mathematics, since all the conclusions of mathematics are logically necessary, giving complete certainty.
Descartes' mathematical research is closely related to his work in philosophy and physics. In "Geometry" (1637) Descartes first introduced the concept variable and functions.
For Descartes, the real number acted as the ratio of the length of the segment to the unit, although only I. Newton formulated such a definition of the number. Negative numbers received from Descartes a real interpretation in the form of directed coordinates. Descartes introduced now generally accepted signs for variables and unknown quantities, for literal coefficients, and also for degrees. Recordings of algebra formulas by Descartes almost do not differ from modern ones. Descartes initiated the scientific study of the properties of equations; he was the first to formulate the position that the number of real and complex roots of an equation is equal to its degree. Descartes formulated the rules of signs for determining the number of positive and negative roots of an equation, raised the question of the boundaries of real roots and the reducibility of a polynomial. In analytical geometry, which was developed simultaneously with Descartes by P. Fermat, the main achievement of Descartes was the method of rectilinear coordinates he created. In "Geometry" Descartes outlined an algebraic way of constructing normals and tangents to plane curves and applied it to curves of the 4th order, Descartes' ovals. Having laid the foundations of analytic geometry, Descartes himself made little progress in this area. His coordinate system was imperfect: it did not consider negative abscissas. Questions of the analytic geometry of three-dimensional space remained almost untouched. Nevertheless, Descartes' "Geometry" had a huge impact on the development of mathematics, and for almost 150 years algebra and analytic geometry developed mainly in the directions indicated by Descartes. From the correspondence of Descartes it is known that he made a number of other discoveries. Named after Descartes: coordinates, product, parabola, sheet, oval.
Descartes refined Galileo's law of inertia. Following Kepler, Descartes believed: the planets behave as if there is an attraction of the Sun. In order to explain attraction, he designed the mechanism of the universe, in which all bodies are set in motion by pushes. The world of Descartes is completely filled with the thinnest invisible matter - ether. Deprived of moving rectilinearly, the transparent flows of this medium formed systems of large and small vortices in space. Vortices, picking up larger, visible particles of ordinary matter, form the cycles of celestial bodies. They mold them, rotate them and carry them in orbits. The Earth is also inside the small vortex. The rotation tends to pull the transparent vortex outward. In this case, the particles of the vortex drive the visible bodies towards the Earth. According to Descartes, this is gravity. Descartes' system was the first attempt to mechanically describe the origin of the planetary system.
Of particular note is the "principle of close action" put forward by Descartes. According to this "principle", the mutual influence of any bodies occurs not through empty space, which is impossible, but through the ether - the physical medium. Each of the bodies through direct contact with the ether affects its state, and the changed state of the ether, in turn, affects other bodies. This principle was later rejected by I. Newton as not necessary for knowledge, since, in his opinion, it is enough to know the mathematical laws of the interaction of bodies, and not their causes.
Blaise Pascal
The French religious philosopher, writer, mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal was born in Clermont-Ferrand in the family of a highly educated lawyer who studied mathematics and raised his children under the influence of the pedagogical ideas of M. Montaigne. Received home education; early showed outstanding mathematical abilities, entering the history of science as a classic example of adolescent genius.
The first mathematical treatise Praktat "Experience in the theory of conic sections" (1639, published 1640) contained one of the main theorems of projective geometry - Pascal's theorem. In 1641 (according to other sources, in 1642) Pascal designed a summing machine. By 1654, Mr.. completed a number of works on arithmetic, number theory, algebra and probability theory (published in 1665). The circle of mathematical interests of Pascal was very diverse. He found a general algorithm for finding signs of the divisibility of any integer by any other integer (treatise "On the nature of the divisibility of numbers"), a method for calculating binomial coefficients, formulated a number of basic provisions of elementary probability theory ("Treatise on the Arithmetic Triangle", published in 1665 ., and correspondence with P. Fermat). In these works, Pascal was the first to accurately define and apply the method of mathematical induction for proof. Pascal's works, containing an integral method set forth in geometric form for solving a number of problems on calculating the areas of figures, volumes and surface areas of bodies, as well as other problems related to the cycloid, were a significant step in the development of infinitesimal analysis. Pascal's theorem on the characteristic triangle served as one of the sources for the creation of differential and integral calculus by G. Leibniz.
Together with G. Galileo and S. Stevin, Pascal is considered the founder of classical hydrostatics: he established its basic law (on the complete transfer of pressure produced on it by a liquid - Pascal's law), the principle of operation of a hydraulic press, pointed out the generality of the basic laws of equilibrium of liquids and gases. An experiment conducted under the direction of Pascal (1648) confirmed the assumption of E. Torricelli about the existence of atmospheric pressure. Pascal also expressed the idea of the dependence of atmospheric pressure on altitude, discovered the dependence of pressure on temperature and air humidity, and suggested using a barometer to predict the weather. The unit of pressure, the pascal, is named after him.
Pascal's work on the problems of the exact sciences mainly refers to the 1640-1650s. Disillusioned with the “abstractness” of these sciences, Pascal turns to religious interests and philosophical anthropology. Since 1655, he leads a semi-monastic lifestyle in the Jansenist monastery of Port-Royal-de-Champs, having entered into an energetic debate on religious ethics with the Jesuits; the fruit of this controversy was Letters to a Provincial (1657) - a masterpiece of French satirical prose. At the center of Pascal's studies in the last years of his life is an attempt to "justify" Christianity by means of philosophical anthropology. This work was not completed; aphoristic sketches for it after Pascal's death were published under the title "Thoughts of Mr. Pascal on Religion and on Certain Other Subjects" (1669).
Pascal's place in the history of philosophy is determined by the fact that he was the first thinker who went through the experience of mechanistic rationalism of the 17th century. and with all its sharpness raised the question of the boundaries of "scientificity", while pointing to the "arguments of the heart", different from the "reasons of the mind", and thereby anticipating the subsequent irrationalist trend in philosophy. Having derived the main ideas of Christianity from the traditional synthesis with cosmology and metaphysics of the Aristotelian or Neoplatonic type, as well as with the political ideology of monarchism (the so-called "union of the throne and the altar"), Pascal refuses to build an artificially harmonized theological image of the world; his sense of the cosmos is expressed in the words: "this eternal silence of boundless spaces terrifies me." Pascal proceeds from the image of a person, perceived dynamically (“the state of a person is inconstancy, longing, anxiety”), and does not get tired of talking about the tragedy and fragility of a person and at the same time about his dignity, which consists in the act of thinking (a person is a “thinking reed”, “in space, the universe embraces and absorbs me like a point; in thought I embrace it. Pascal's focus on anthropological issues anticipates the understanding of the Christian tradition by S. Kierkegaard and F.M. Dostoevsky. Pascal played a significant role in the formation of French classical prose; F. La Rochefoucauld and J. La Bruyère, M. Sevigne and M. Lafayette experienced his influence.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz is an outstanding German philosopher and mathematician. His father, professor of moral philosophy at the University of Leipzig, died when his son was six years old. Leibniz entered the University of Leipzig at the age of 15, graduated in 1663 with a bachelor's thesis "On the principle of individuation", which contained in embryo many of the philosopher's later ideas. In 1663-1666. Leibniz studied law in Jena and published a paper on legal education. Thanks to the latter, he was noticed by Baron Boyneburg and the Elector Archbishop of Mainz, who accepted him into the service. The archbishop was very interested in maintaining peace within the borders of the Holy Roman Empire, as well as between Germany and its neighbors. Leibniz completely immersed himself in the plans of the archbishop. He also sought a rational basis for the Christian religion, equally acceptable to Protestants and Catholics.
The most serious danger to peace in Europe at that time was Louis XIV. Leibniz presented to the king a plan for the conquest of Egypt, pointing out that such a conquest was more befitting the greatness of a Christian monarch than a war with petty and insignificant European countries. The plan was so well thought out that Napoleon is believed to have consulted it in the archives before sending an expedition to Egypt. In 1672, Leibniz was called to Paris to explain the plan, and he spent four years there. He did not manage to see Louis, but he met with such philosophers and scientists as N. Malebranche, A. Arno, H. Huygens. Leibniz also invented a calculating machine that surpassed Pascal's machine in that it could take roots, exponentiate, multiply, and divide. In 1673 he went to London, met with R. Boyle and G. Oldenburg, demonstrated the operation of his machine to the Royal Society, which then elected him a member. In 1673, the Archbishop of Mainz died, and in 1676, for lack of a place more appropriate to his taste and abilities, Leibniz entered the service of a librarian to the Duke of Brunswick. On the way to Hannover, Leibniz stopped for a month in Amsterdam, having read everything written by B. Spinoza - everything that he was persuaded to give to print. In the end, he managed to meet with Spinoza and discuss his ideas with him. This was the last direct contact between Leibniz and his fellow philosophers. From that time until his death, he was in Hannover, traveling abroad only in connection with his research on the history of the Brunswick dynasty. He persuaded the King of Prussia to establish a scientific academy in Berlin and became its first president; in 1700 he was granted the position of imperial adviser and the title of baron.
In a later period, Leibniz engaged in the infamous dispute with Newton's friends about the primacy in the invention of infinitesimal calculus. There is no doubt that Leibniz and Newton worked on this calculus in parallel and that in London Leibniz met mathematicians who were familiar with the work of both Newton and I. Barrow. What Leibniz owes to Newton and what both of them owe to Barrow can only be guessed at. It is known for certain that Newton formulated the calculus, the method of "fluxions", no later than 1665, although he published his results many years later. Leibniz was apparently right when he claimed that he and Barrow discovered calculus at the same time. Then all mathematicians worked on this complex of problems and knew about the results obtained in the addition of infinitesimals. There is nothing incredible about the simultaneous and independent discovery of calculus, and Leibniz is certainly to be credited as the first to use infinitesimals as differences and to develop a symbolism that proved so convenient that it is still used today.
Leibniz was also unlucky in regard to the recognition of his original logical ideas, which are most valued today. Only in the 20th century these ideas became generally known; Leibniz's results had to be rediscovered, and his own work was buried in the piles of manuscripts in the royal library in Hanover.
Toward the end of Leibniz's life, he was forgotten: Elector Sophia and her daughter Queen Sophia-Charlotte of Prussia, who greatly appreciated Leibniz and thanks to whom he wrote many works, died in 1705 and 1714, respectively. In addition, in 1714 George Louis, Duke of Hanover, was called to the English throne. Apparently, he did not like Leibniz and did not allow him to accompany him along with the court to London, ordering him to continue working as a librarian.
The misinterpretation of Leibniz's writings earned him the reputation of "Lovenix", a man who believes in nothing, and his name was not popular. The philosopher's health began to deteriorate, although he continued to work; brilliant correspondence with S. Clark belongs to this period. Leibniz died in Hanover on November 14, 1716. None of the retinue of the Duke of Hanover saw him off on his last journey. The Berlin Academy of Sciences, of which he was the founder and first president, did not pay attention to his death, but a year later B. Fontenel delivered a famous speech in his memory before the members of the Paris Academy. Later generations of English philosophers and mathematicians paid tribute to the achievements of Leibniz, thereby compensating for the conscious neglect of his death by the Royal Society.
Among Leibniz's most important works are Discourse on Metaphysics (1846); "A new system of nature and communication between substances, as well as on the connection that exists between the soul and the body" (1695); "New experiments on the human mind"; "Experiments of theodicy on the goodness of God, the freedom of man and the beginning of evil" (1710); "Monadology" (1714).
Leibniz put forward such a complete and rationally constructed metaphysical system that, according to modern philosophers, it can be represented as a system of logical principles. Today, no one can manage in the analysis of individuality without the famous Leibnizian principle of the identity of indistinguishables; now it is given the status of a logical principle, but Leibniz himself considered it the truth about the world. Similarly, the relational interpretation of space and time and the analysis of the elements of substance as energy carriers are the foundation for the development of the concepts of mechanics.
Leibniz introduced the concept into mechanics kinetic energy; he also believed that the concept of passive matter, existing in absolute space and consisting of indivisible atoms, was unsatisfactory from both a scientific and metaphysical point of view. Inertia itself is a force: endowing passive matter with motion should be classified as a miracle. Moreover, the very concept of the atoms of matter is absurd: if they are extended, then they are divisible, if they are not extended, then they cannot be atoms of matter. The only substance must be an active unit, simple, immaterial, existing neither in space nor in time. Leibniz called these simple substances monads. Because they have no parts, they can only come into existence through creation and can only be destroyed through annihilation. Monads are not able to influence each other. Since the only essential feature of a monad is its activity, all monads are of the same type and differ only in the degree of activity. There is an infinite series of monads, on its lower levels - monads that have the appearance of matter, although no monad can be completely inert. At the top of the ladder is God, the most active of the monads. Space is "a manifestation of the order of possible co-existences", and time is "the order of unstable possibilities".
In support of these conclusions based on metaphysical and scientific considerations, Leibniz gave arguments that contained an appeal to the nature of judgments, their truth and falsity. This view is closely related to Leibniz's life's work - the search for a language, characteristica universalis, in which all truths could be expressed and in which names would show the "composition" of the objects they designate. These truths would then find their place in the encyclopedia of all knowledge, and all discussion would become unnecessary - reasoning would give way to calculations using the "universal calculus".
Isaac Newton
Newton was born to a small farmer who died three months before his son was born. The baby was premature; there is a legend that he was so small that he was placed in a sheepskin mitten lying on a bench, from which he once fell out and hit his head hard on the floor. Newton grew up as a sickly and unsociable boy, prone to daydreaming. He was attracted to poetry and painting. Far from his peers, he made kites, invented a windmill, a water clock, a pedal cart. The beginning of school life was difficult for Newton. He studied poorly, was weak, and once classmates beat him until he lost consciousness. It was unbearable for the proud Newton to endure, and there was only one thing left: to stand out with academic success. By hard work, he achieved the fact that he took first place in the class.
Interest in technology made Newton think about the phenomena of nature; he was also deeply involved in mathematics. Jean Baptiste Bie later wrote about this: “One of his uncles, finding him one day under a hedge with a book in his hands, immersed in deep reflection, took the book from him and found that he was busy solving a mathematical problem. Struck by such a serious and active direction, so young man, he persuaded his mother not to resist further the desire of her son and send him to continue his studies.
After serious preparation, Newton entered Cambridge in 1660 as a Subsizzfr "a (the so-called poor students who were obliged to serve the members of the college, which could not but burden Newton). In the last year of college, Newton began to study astrology. Classes in astrology and the desire to prove its significance prompted him to research in the field of the motion of celestial bodies and their influence on our planet.
In six years, Newton completed all the degrees of the college and prepared all his further great discoveries. In 1665 Newton became a master of arts. In the same year, when the plague was raging in England, he decided to temporarily settle in Woolsthorpe. It was there that he began to actively engage in optics. The leitmotif of all research was the desire to understand the physical nature of light. Newton believed that light is a stream of special particles (corpuscles) emitted from a source and moving in a straight line until they encounter obstacles. The corpuscular model explained not only the straightness of light propagation, but also the law of reflection (elastic reflection) and the law of refraction.
At this time, the work, which was destined to become the main great result of Newton's works, was already completed, in the main - the creation of a single, based on the laws of mechanics of the physical picture of the World formulated by him.
Having set the task of studying various forces, Newton himself gave the first brilliant example of its solution, formulating the Law of universal gravitation as a generalization of the three laws of Kepler's celestial mechanics. This Law allowed Newton to give a quantitative explanation of the motion of the planets around the Sun, nature sea tides. This made a huge impression on the minds of researchers. The program of a unified mechanical description of all natural phenomena - both "terrestrial" and "heavenly" for many years was established in physics.
In 1668 Newton returned to Cambridge and soon received the Lucas Chair in Mathematics. Before him, this department was occupied by his teacher I. Barrow, who ceded the department to his beloved student in order to financially provide for him. By that time, Newton was already the author of the binomial and the creator (simultaneously with Leibniz, but independently of him) of the method of differential and integral calculus.
“We didn’t finish the academies,” said the nugget commander Vasily Ivanovich Chapaev in the legendary film of the same name. And not only he could say so about himself. Many of the greats did not have not only a higher, but in general the very elementary education. However, their innate talent and natural diligence brought them to the pinnacle of fame.
"All my thoughts on the invention of the treasury and society of useful machines."
The son of a Nizhny Novgorod tradesman. Since childhood, he was interested in inventing and staging various intricate weathercocks, and especially in the arrangement of the wooden mechanism of home wall clocks. Thanks to the financial assistance of the Nizhny Novgorod merchant, M.A. Kostromin, Kulibin managed to make a very complex clock, which had the shape of an egg: every hour the small Royal doors were dissolved in it, behind which one could see the Holy Sepulcher, with soldiers armed on the sides. The angel rolled away the stone from the tomb, the guards fell on their faces, two myrrh-bearing women appeared; the chimes played the prayer Christ is Risen three times, and the doors closed. At the invitation of the director of the Academy of Sciences, Count Vladimir Grigoryevich Orlov, Kulibin moved to St. Petersburg and in 1770 entered the service at the academy.
Responding to the challenge of the British to make "the best model of such a bridge, which would consist of one arc or vault without piles, and would be approved by its ends only on the banks of the river", Kulibin in December 1776 demonstrated at the academic yard, in front of a meeting of scientists, 14 - a planted model of the bridge, for which he was awarded a large gold medal. Invented "engine ships for navigation" (1782); "the ship went against the water, with the help of the same water, without any extraneous force ...". With the help of ordinary mirrors, Kulibin illuminated the dark passages of the Tsarskoye Selo Palace, arranged pocket electrophores, a huge incendiary glass, water mills of a special system, and a three-wheeled scooter.
In 1801, Kulibin was dismissed from his duties as a mechanic at the Academy of Sciences. Forgotten and impoverished by almost everyone (a fire in 1813 deprived him of almost all his property), Kulibin in 1814 presented a project for an iron three-arch bridge across the Neva, a model of which is kept in the museum of the Institute of Railway Engineers. Unusually capable, Kulibin was poorly educated and often worked on what was already known before him.
Achievements: outstanding Russian self-taught mechanic-inventor.
"The main lesson of history is that humanity is unteachable."
Winston, the eldest son of aristocratic parents, disliked the process of education from a very young age. In his memoirs, he recalled: “For the first time education appeared before me in the form of a sinister figure of a governess, whose appearance was announced in advance. I had to carefully prepare for this day by studying the book “Reading Without Tears” (in my case, the title clearly did not work). Every day, my nanny and I struggled through the book, a process I found not only terribly tiring, but absolutely useless. We never got to the end, when the fateful hour struck and the governess appeared on the threshold of the nursery. I remember that I did what hundreds of oppressed sufferers had done before me in similar circumstances: I went on the run.” At the age of nine, education finally overtook him: he was assigned to the private school of St. George at Ascot. It was there that the stubborn boy really understood (and not so much with his mind, but with other, less noble parts of the body) how much a pound of dashing in the English education system. Losers at Ascot were beaten regularly and heartily, and Winston was consistently at the bottom of the class. He was not hopelessly stupid: teachers regularly found him in some secluded corner with a book out of age. However, Churchill categorically refused to teach lessons, work in the classroom, and generally at least somehow try. Two years after the start of classes, Lord Winston showed almost zero progress in the exams, and his parents took him home. However, not for long. At the age of thirteen, the sufferer was again sent to the private Harrow High School. By this time, he had already somehow learned to imitate the process of passing exams, so that the deuces were replaced by triples. However, Churchill was still considered one of the weakest students: he, along with the rest of the "stupid people" in the class, was even removed from studying Latin and ancient Greek, instead appointing additional classes in his native language. Considering that Winston's loser went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, they seem to have done the trick.
Achievements: Prominent British statesman and politician, Prime Minister of Great Britain in 1940-1945 and 1951-1955; military man, journalist, writer, honorary member of the British Academy (1952), Nobel Prize in Literature (1953). According to a poll conducted in 2002 by the BBC broadcaster, he was named the greatest Briton in history.
“I don’t care where a person came from - from Sing Sing prison or Harvard. We hire a person, not a story."
Henry Ford was born into a wealthy family, but, as Ford noted, "there was too much work on the farm compared to the results." Education, which left much to be desired, Henry received in a church school. Already an adult Ford, drawing up important contracts, still made mistakes. One day he will sue a newspaper that called him “ignorant”, and to the accusation of ignorance he will answer: “If I ... needed to answer your stupid questions, I would only have to press a button in the office, and specialists would appear at my disposal with answers.
Ford did not consider illiteracy to be a disadvantage, but an unwillingness to apply the mind in life: “The most difficult thing in the world is to think with your own head. That's probably why so few people do it."
Achievements: the legendary businessman of the twentieth century, the organizer of the conveyor production and the "father" of the automotive industry.
At the age of 14, he entered the grocer's shop in Fürstenberg as a boy, but after 5 years he was forced to leave his place for health reasons. Schliemann was hired as a cabin boy on a ship heading from Hamburg to Venezuela, but the ship was wrecked near the Dutch island of Texel. So Schliemann found himself in Holland. In Amsterdam, he joined a trading company as a messenger and soon became an accountant. Schliemann became interested in learning foreign languages and achieved fluency in Dutch, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian.
After Schliemann learned Russian, in January 1846 he was sent to Russia, to St. Petersburg, where he lived for 11 years. There he started his own business, in which he achieved significant success (in 1847, Schliemann signed up for a merchant guild), and married a Russian. In the 1850s, he visited the United States and became an American citizen. Retiring from business, Schliemann learned ancient and modern Greek and in 1858-1859 traveled to Italy, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Turkey and Greece; in 1864 he visited Tunisia, Egypt, India, Java, China and Japan, and in 1866 he settled in Paris. After 1868, Schliemann studied the history of Greece, paying special attention to the poems of Homer.
Having studied Corfu, Ithaca and Mycenae, Schliemann put forward a theory (based on the guess of the English archaeologist F. Calvert), according to which ancient Troy is located on the Hissarlik hill in Asia Minor. The substantiation of this theory in the work of Ithaka, Peloponnese and Troy (Ithaka, der Peloponnes und Troja, 1869) brought him a doctorate awarded by the University of Rostock.
In 1870 Schliemann divorced his wife, moved to Athens and married a young Greek woman. Over the next three years, he led the excavations of Troy, where he found a lot of gold jewelry. In 1874, his excavation reports were published in French under the title Trojan Antiquities (Antiquits Troyennes). Frustrated by the public reaction to the book and the friction that arose with the Turkish government due to the fact that gold was illegally exported from the country, Schliemann went to Mycenae, where in November 1876 he opened the tombs of the Mycenaean kings.
In 1878, Schliemann returned to Troy to continue excavations, with the help of archaeologist Emil Burnouf and the famous pathologist R. Virchow; the resulting book, Ilios, included an autobiography by Schliemann and a foreword by Virchow. Unable to keep the collection at home in Athens, in 1880 Schliemann handed it over to the German government (now it is in Moscow).
During 1880 and 1881, Schliemann excavated another "Homeric" city - Orchomenus, and the work Orchomenus published by him (Orchomenos, 1881) contributed to a better understanding of ancient Greek architecture. In 1882 he resumed his exploration of Troy, this time in collaboration with W. Dörpfeld, a professional architect who had already taken part in the German excavations at Olympia. The preliminary publication - the book of Troy (1884) in 1885 was followed by the work of Ilion, the city and country of the Trojans (Ilios, ville et pays des Troyens), in which Dörpfeld's influence is undoubted. In 1884, Schliemann began excavations of the citadel of Tiryns, but Dörpfeld completed this work.
In 1886, Schliemann again excavated at Orchomenus; he spent the winter of 1886-1887 on the Nile. Excavations were planned in Egypt and Crete (later carried out by A. Evans), work began on Cythera and Pylos. Despite the fierce attacks of French and German scientists, in 1890 Dörpfeld and Schliemann began new excavations of Troy, which allowed Dörpfeld to reveal the historical sequence of overlapping city buildings uncovered by Schliemann. It was established that the second layer from the bottom, containing a treasure of gold objects, is much older than Homeric Troy, and the city of Homer is the one that Dörpfeld identified as the sixth from the mainland rock. However, Schliemann did not live to see the truth. He died in Naples on December 25, 1890.
Achievements: amateur archaeologist, famous for his findings in Asia Minor, on the site of ancient (Homeric) Troy.
Aristotle, famous Greek philosopher, son of Nicomachus, physician to the Macedonian king Amyntas II. The birthplace of Aristotle was sometimes called the Stagirite. For 20 years (367-347) Aristotle was a student and colleague of Plato, and after his death, stung by the choice of Speusippus as the head of the Academy, he left Athens and taught in Assos in Troas, and then in Mytilene in Lesbos. In 342, Philip II, king of Macedonia, entrusted him with the education of his thirteen-year-old son Alexander. Aristotle stayed in Macedonia for 7 years. After Alexander's accession to the throne, he returned to Athens and founded his own philosophical school, the famous Lykeion, where he taught for 12 years. The Lyceum had a covered gallery for walks (peripatos), so the school was called Peripate, and its adepts Peripatetics. Ego was an exemplary scientific institution, equipped with a rich library and valuable collections, which attracted outstanding scientists and specialists in various fields. Research was led by Aristotle, and their results were processed synthetically, creating a system that encompassed all knowledge about the world of that time. In 323, after the death of Alexander, his patron, Aristotle left Athens in fear of persecution and soon died in Chalkis of Euboea. Under the name of Aristotle, a few fragments of works of a literary nature, written mostly in the form of a dialogue, have been preserved, as well as an extensive collection of philosophical treatises intended for study at school, the so-called Corpus Aristotelicum. In Rome, these texts were ordered, cataloged and published by the famous Peripatetic Andronicus of Rhodes. According to tradition, Aristotle's writings are usually divided into seven groups:
1) logical works, which the later peripatetics called Organon (Organon instruments), because logic was separated from philosophy by Aristotle himself and recognized as a necessary tool and foundation of any science;
2) works from the field of physics, that is, the science of nature (from the Greek word physis nature);
3) biological essays;
4) essays from the field of psychology;
5) works relating to the so-called primary philosophy, placed by Andronikov after the books on physics and therefore called “Ta meta physika” (post-physical writings, metaphysics);
6) the so-called practical essays on ethics, politics, economics, theory of state and law;
7) works from the field of rhetoric and poetics.
In the surviving writings of Aristotle, we find numerous repetitions and inconsistencies, traces of corrections and comments; therefore, it can be assumed that they are a collection of lectures and rough drafts of Aristotle, supplemented by notes from his students and listeners. And if today in many cases it is already difficult to recognize what Aristotle himself wrote, then the whole bears the imprint of his genius, the breadth of knowledge and the depth of his philosophical intuition inspire respect. Aristotle not only created a philosophical system that lasted for many centuries and had a huge impact on the history of human thought and European philosophy, but also laid the foundation for the development of such scientific disciplines as logic, biology and psychology.
Aristotle is one of the most versatile thinkers, and his influence, both on philosophy and on individual sciences, was enormous.
Philip Aureol Theophast Bombast von Hohenheim (10/24/1493, Schwyz - 9/24/1541, Salzburg). Paracelsus - a physician of the Renaissance, "the first professor of chemistry from the creation of the world" (A.I. Herzen). Paracelsus studied medicine and alchemy with his father, also a doctor, then with some monks. He also studied at the University of Basel and traveled extensively in Europe. Paracelsus sharply opposed scholastic medicine and blind reverence for the authority of Galen, the classic of ancient medicine, who had many works and had a huge impact on the development of medicine. Paracelsus studied the therapeutic effect of various chemical elements and compounds on the processes occurring in the body. Medicine owes him the introduction of a number of new remedies, both of mineral and vegetable origin, such as preparations of iron, mercury, antimony, lead, copper, arsenic, sulfur, etc., hitherto used extremely rarely.
Paracelsus brought together chemistry and medical science: therefore, the teachings of Paracelsus and his followers are called iatrochemistry (medical chemistry). He was the first to look at the processes taking place in a living organism as chemical processes.
Having lost his father as a 9-year-old child and remained in the care of his maternal uncle, Canon Watzelrod, Copernicus entered the University of Krakow in 1491, where he studied mathematics, medicine and theology with equal zeal.
At the end of the course, Copernicus traveled around Germany and Italy, listened to lectures on various universities, and at one time even taught himself as a professor in Rome; in 1503 he returned to Krakow and lived there for seven whole years, being a university professor and doing astronomical observations.
However, the noisy life of university corporations was not to Copernicus' liking, and in 1510 he moved to Frauenburg, a small town on the banks of the Vistula, where he spent the rest of his life, being a canon of a Catholic church and devoting his leisure time to astronomy and gratuitous treatment of the sick. When necessary, Copernicus devoted his energies to practical work: according to his project, a new monetary system was introduced in Poland, and in the city of Frauenburg he built a hydraulic machine that supplied water to all houses.
In depth of considerations, Copernicus was indisputably the greatest astronomer of his time, but as a practitioner he was lower even than the Arab astronomers; however, this is not his fault: he had the poorest means at his disposal, and he made all the tools with his own hands.
Thinking about the Ptolemaic system of the world, Copernicus was amazed at its complexity and artificiality, and, studying the writings of ancient philosophers, especially Nikita of Syracuse, Philolaus, and others, he came to the conclusion that not the Earth, but the Sun should be the motionless center of the universe.
Proceeding from this position, Copernicus very simply explained all the apparent intricacy of the movements of the planets, but, not yet knowing the true paths of the planets and accepting them as circular, he was still forced to partly retain the epicycles and trims of the ancients in order to explain various inequalities of movements. These epicycles and trims were finally rejected only by Kepler.
The main and almost the only work of Copernicus, the fruits of more than 30 years of his work in Frauenburg, is: "De revolutionibns orbium coelestium". The work was published in Regensburg in 1043 and is dedicated to Pope Paul III; it is divided into 6 parts and printed under the supervision of the best and favorite student of Copernicus, Rheticus; the author had the joy of seeing and holding this creation in his hands, albeit on his deathbed.
The first part talks about the sphericity of the world and the Earth, and also sets out the rules for solving right-angled and spherical triangles; the second gives the foundations of spherical astronomy and the rules for calculating the apparent positions of stars and planets in the firmament. The third speaks of the precession or precession of the equinoxes, with an explanation of its backward movement of the line of intersection of the equator with the ecliptic. In the fourth - about the Moon, in the fifth - about the planets in general, and in the sixth - about the reasons for changing the latitudes of the planets.
Thirty years before the publication of his great book, he sent to different countries handwritten copies of a kind of synopsis of the future essay "Nicholas Copernicus on Hypotheses Relating to Celestial Motions, a Brief Commentary." (These manuscripts were considered irretrievably lost and only in 1878 did they suddenly find one in the Vienna archives, and three years later another in Stockholm.) He was already old when he decided to print the main work of his life. He had no doubts that he was right. He wrote with calm dignity:
“Many other scientists and remarkable people have argued that fear should not keep me from publishing a book for the benefit of all mathematicians. The more absurd my teaching about the motion of the Earth at the present moment seems to the majority, the greater will be the surprise and gratitude when, as a result of the publication of my book, they will see how every shadow of absurdity is eliminated by the clearest proofs. So, yielding to these exhortations, I allowed my friends to proceed with the publication that they had been seeking for so long.
Ratik, the only, infinitely devoted and, alas, his only famous student, took the precious manuscript to Nuremberg, to the printers, and he remained waiting in his tower. He almost never went out, calling a few to himself. Waited for the book. In 1542, severe pulmonary hemorrhage and paralysis on the right side of his body chained him to bed. He died hard, slowly. On May 23, 1543, when the long-awaited book was brought from Nuremberg, he was already unconscious.
He died on the same day. The grave has not survived. The book remains.
Achievements: the famous Polish astronomer, the reformer of science, laid the foundation for the modern idea of the world system.
Tycho Brahe is a famous Danish astronomer. In 1752 he observed a new star in the constellation Cassiopeia. In 1576-97 he headed the Uraniborg observatory, which he built on the island of Ven in the Øresund Strait, near Copenhagen, and supplied excellent instruments made under his direction. Here, for 21 years, Brahe observed stars, planets and comets, determining the positions of the stars with very high accuracy. This is his main merit. In addition, he discovered two inequalities in the motion of the Moon (annual inequality and variation). Brahe also proved that comets are celestial bodies farther from the Earth than the Moon; made tables of refraction. He did not recognize the heliocentric systems of the world and instead proposed another, representing an unscientific combination of the teachings of Ptolemy with the system of Nicolaus Copernicus (the Sun moves around the Earth in the center of the universe, and the planets around the Sun). In 1597, after the death of King Frederick II, Tycho Brahe was forced to leave Denmark (after his departure, the Uraniborg observatory was abandoned). After 2 years spent in Germany, Johannes Kepler joined him as an assistant, who, after the death of Brahe, left the most valuable observations, on the basis of which Kepler derived his famous laws of planetary motion.
Astronomer, stargazer, these titles in those years caused mixed feelings among contemporaries. Respect for a scientist among enlightened people, superstitious fears among common people, contempt for ignorant nobility, suspicions of the Church ... Brahe despised class prejudices, put on an astrologer's cap and began to prepare a revolution in astronomy. Like many colleagues, he was simultaneously engaged in astrology and even tried to find the philosopher's stone.
He wanders around Europe: Wittenberg, Rostock, Basel, Ingolstadt, Augsburg... These are the largest centers of astronomy and astrology. In Augsburg, he began the construction of a huge celestial globe with a diameter of one and a half meters, on which he subsequently marked the position of the stars. Under the influence of his uncle, the astrologer Brahe became interested in alchemy and abandoned astronomy for a while ... However, when a new bright star appeared in the sky of Denmark in the constellation Cassiopeia, she turned him into an enthusiastic lover of the sky for the rest of his life. Tycho literally did not take his eyes off her day or night, anxiously noted all the gradual changes in her brilliance from the moment she appeared, when she competed in brightness with Venus, until her final disappearance after 16 months. A star flared up in the sky almost a month after the bloody night of St. Bartholomew. Many believed that she portends numerous troubles and the near end of the world ... Tycho Brahe, like many, talks about world events following the appearance of a star ... Kepler, who made fun of astrological forecasts, later expressed himself as follows: “If this star did not predict anything, then, at least it heralded the birth of a great astronomer."
The result of Tycho Brahe's observations of "his" star was a book in which he outlined the idea that the star was much farther from the Earth than the Moon. And since she did not take part in the movements of the planets, he attributed her to the category of fixed stars. In our time, such a conclusion seems to be the most commonplace, but in the 16th century most astronomers firmly held on to Aristotle's conviction that the entire sky in general, and the region of the fixed planets in particular, is imperishable and unchanging; new stars, like comets, almost all belonged to the objects of the upper layers of our atmosphere. It was a challenge akin to Copernicus, and backed up by the iron logic of facts.
In 1576 the Danish king Frederick II, a zealous patron of the arts and sciences, assigned Tycho a content for astronomical research with astronomical generosity. The crowned sponsor gave the stargazer the whole island of Ven in the Sound to build a house and an observatory (which cost the king a barrel of gold). In addition to the annual salary, Tikho received income from the rental of the island by local peasants. It was a real medieval castle with spiers, loopholes and even a prison located in the basement ... Tycho called it Uraniborg (Castle in Heaven), and in another way - the "Palace of Urania" (muses - the patroness of astronomy). Inside the castle, Tycho placed several observatories with retractable conical roofs, a library with the famous large celestial globe, a chemical laboratory for 16 foci, that is, jobs. A fountain was built in the center of the first floor, which pumped water to all three floors of this truly unique astronomical school.
Subsequently, with an increase in the number of students and assistants who flocked to him from all over Europe, Tycho built a second building - Stjerenborg (Star Castle), remarkable for its underground observatories. Here he started workshops, where all the tools he brought to perfection of that time were made ...
At nightfall, the astrologer appeared at the observatory dressed in a mantle embroidered with stars and the pointed cap of a Chaldean magician. If he made observations of the moon, then it was a mantle embroidered with silver crescents. Mars was destined for clothes of red color ...
At that time, astronomy and astrology were almost synonymous concepts. The nobles considered it their duty to personally draw up horoscopes, relying on very meager ideas about the laws of motion of celestial bodies. Tycho Brahe was no exception. All his life he was engaged in horoscopes. However, unlike many, he was well aware of the inefficiency of stellar forecasts compiled from inaccurate astronomical tables, and therefore devoted many years to scrupulously calculating the positions of celestial bodies. These tables of his were later used by Kepler in deriving his famous laws of motion.
The character of the great astronomer was arrogant and quick-tempered. Frederick II forgave the silver-nosed genius a lot (Tycho had a broken nose, and the surgeon attached a silver prosthesis in his place), but his successor on the Danish throne immediately disliked Tycho Brahe. He found fault with the fact that he placed a prison in Uraniborg for tenants who evaded rent, and in 1597 expelled Tycho Brahe from Denmark. The exile found shelter with a fan of astronomy, astrology and alchemy of the Czech Emperor Rudolf II, who gave Tycho the Benatek Castle, not far from Prague. Here the disgraced astrologer (sometimes together with Rudolph, who secretly came to him) began to observe. By a happy coincidence, among Brahe's assistants, in addition to the enthusiastic emperor, was the great Johannes Kepler, who later glorified his name.
The blow inflicted by exile did not go unnoticed. Tycho's strength was broken, and three years later he died, repeatedly shouting out, even in his dying delirium, the hope that his life had not been fruitless. The curtain is lowered, but the applause still sounds!
The main feature of Tycho Brahe as a scientist can be called his strict striving for the maximum accuracy of his observations. He was one of those who realized that precise instruments and rigorous methods were important not only for the practical applications of astronomy, but also for theory, in order to obtain data that could solve the question of the true structure of our planetary system. Tycho Brahe was one of the first to fully appreciate the importance of multiple repetitions of the same observation under different conditions in order to neutralize each other by random sources of errors in individual observations. His "Large Wall Quadrant" for measuring angular distances in the sky was not only a revolutionary device for that time, but also a real work of art. It is curious and strange that after death, most of the instruments created under the guidance of the great astronomer were destroyed.
What is the true place of Tycho Brahe in world astronomy? In 1543 Copernicus published his book On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres. This event marked the beginning of a new period in the development of natural science and a revolution in worldview.
In 1609, events took place that played a major role in the establishment of the Copernican doctrine. This year, Kepler's book "New Astronomy" was published, which contained the derivation of the first two laws of planetary motion around the Sun. In the same year, the telescope directed by Galileo to the sky made it possible to make several outstanding discoveries in astronomy, each of which played an important role in the development of this science.
Tycho Brahe was born three years later than the first event, and died eight years earlier than the second. His activity thus became an important step from Copernicus to Galileo. Based on a deep analysis and generalization of the results accumulated by him, it was possible to obtain new theoretical conclusions that develop the Copernican heliocentric doctrine.
Johannes Kepler was destined to cope with this no less titanic task, who overcame it, perpetuating the name of his great predecessor.
Rene Descartes was born a frail, weak child on the last day of March 1596 in the small town of Lae in the province of Touraine, in a not very noble, but prosperous noble family. A few days later, his mother died of consumption. Fortunately, the attached wet nurse came out to Rene, saved his life and improved his health. For eight years, René was given the full care of one of the best Jesuit colleges, just founded under the special patronage of King Henry IV.
Subsequently, Descartes recalled with gratitude the concerns of the educators of the college. Paradoxically, it is the Jesuits, the teachers of Descartes, who will become his sworn enemies: they will persecute his philosophical teachings, they will not allow him to work not only in their homeland, but also in neighboring Protestant Holland. The main subjects in the college were Latin, theology and philosophy. Since childhood, Descartes loved to solve problems, and devoted all his free time to the study of mathematics. Descartes himself considered mathematics classes in the collegium to be “trinkets” and therefore independently engaged in a deeper study of it. The sciences of that time could not satisfy the inquisitive mind of Descartes and led him to skepticism. Only in mathematics did he find some satisfaction, but even here he was surprised, "how nothing sublime is built on such a basis of granite hardness." Disappointed in school wisdom, he, by virtue of noble traditions, prepares himself for a military career, devoting much time to strengthening poor health through physical exercises and learning to use weapons. Dissatisfied with the current political situation in France, Descartes puts on the uniform of a Dutch volunteer and begins to wander around Europe, participating in the bloody vicissitudes of the Thirty Years' War that has just begun. Military fate throws him to Bavaria, to Bohemia, near Prague. However, idle stays in winter quarters in Bavaria became for Descartes times of intense work of thought, which led to the discovery of the main method, the first fruit of which was analytic geometry.
Tired of the hustle and bustle of military life, the twenty-five-year-old Descartes leaves the army and, as a traveling nobleman, appears at the palaces of The Hague and Brussels, then goes to Italy. Only in 1625 did Descartes briefly return to Paris. Here the circle of his scientific friends expands, and at the same time his reputation as a philosopher grows. Friends insist on the promulgation of the views of Descartes, expecting them to revolutionize the philosophical system. But the Jesuits oppose the philosophy of Descartes, threaten him with reprisals, and Descartes is forced to seek solitude in Holland, where he could work in peace. In Holland, Descartes lived for a total of about twenty years, moving from place to place, revealing himself only to particularly close friends. Here Descartes devotes himself entirely to scientific studies in philosophy, mathematics, physics, astronomy, physiology, publishes his famous works: Rules for the Guidance of the Mind, Treatise on Light, Metaphysical Reflections on the First Philosophy, Principles of Philosophy, Description human body" and others. Descartes' Discourse on Method, published in 1637, is best known.
Fearing persecution by the Inquisition, Descartes excludes from his work, wherever possible, everything that might displease the church. The title of his work has also changed. Now it sounds like this: "Discourse on the method to direct your mind well and seek the truth in the sciences." The book was written not in Latin, but in French. The author sought to ensure that a wider audience could get acquainted with his work, which, as Descartes writes, "will judge my opinions better than those who believe only in ancient books."
Around the philosophical teachings of Descartes there are fierce disputes. The disputants do not skimp on colorful epithets. For some, he is the Archimedes of our age, the Atlas of the universe, the mighty Hercules, for others - Cain, a vagabond, an atheist. The disputes themselves did little to touch the scientist. The only thing he feared was disapproval from the powerful Jesuit order. The terrible crimes of the Inquisition are still fresh in my memory. At the turn of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Giordano Bruno was burned alive in Flora Square. Twenty years later, in Toulouse, the philosopher Lucilio Vanini had his tongue torn out with ticks before being burned at the stake. The "Holy" Inquisition condemned the great Galileo. Descartes knew all this and was painfully worried, of course, he was afraid of the persecution of the Jesuits. Even in Holland, where the hand of the Jesuit order had not yet penetrated, opponents began to come out against Descartes, mainly Protestant theologians, accusing him of materialism and atheism. Although Descartes was not an atheist, moreover, in the "Discourses" he even proved the existence of God and the immortality of the human soul, nevertheless, he recognized matter and motion. It was precisely this that the theologians opposed, for they discerned the danger of Cartesian philosophy for Christian doctrine. Descartes became the target of violent attacks by churchmen. And later the works of Descartes were awarded for burning as heretical. All these troubled years, Descartes continued to live in Holland, occasionally visiting France, but each time not staying there for a long time. The last time he was at home in 1648. And two years later he died, although, perhaps, he could have lived longer, had not the eccentric representative of the august family interfered in his fate.
At that time, Sweden was ruled by a twenty-year-old Queen Christina. The young ruler had extraordinary abilities. She spoke six languages, was an excellent shot, could tirelessly pursue an animal, was accustomed to cold and heat, slept five hours a day and got up very early. In addition, this newborn Amazon was interested in philosophy. She was especially interested in the philosophy of Descartes, and the energetic queen decided to invite the scientist to Sweden. Without waiting for the consent of Descartes, she sent an admiral's ship for him, which delivered Descartes in 1649 to Stockholm. With his arrival in Sweden, Descartes hoped to calmly engage in science, without fear of persecution of churchmen. But the arrival in this northern country for the scientist was fatal. Received with honors, Descartes had to study philosophy with the Queen every day. Despite the winter cold, the lessons began every time at five o'clock in the morning. It was hard for Descartes, accustomed to the warm climate, besides, he liked to soak up in bed almost until noon. At the same time, Descartes was obliged to work hard on the statute of the Academy of Sciences organized by the queen. One day, on his way to the palace, Descartes caught a cold, pneumonia began. Bloodletting, which was used at that time, did not help, and on February 11, 1650, Descartes died. "It's time to go, my soul," were his last words.
Philosophical studies of Descartes are closely related to his mathematical and physical work. Descartes was the first to show how mathematics can be applied to visual representation and mathematical analysis of the most diverse phenomena of nature and society. He proposed to depict the connections between natural phenomena with curved lines, and the latter to write down with algebraic equations. Having put the concept of moving matter at the basis of his philosophy, Descartes introduced movement into mathematics. If before Descartes mathematics had a metaphysical character, operating with constant values, then with the works of Descartes, dialectics entered mathematics, and at the same time, all natural science. In the works of Descartes on mathematics, variables appear for the first time and indicate how the strict laws of geometry can be translated into algebraic language and used in solving various problems that at first glance are far from mathematics. Thus, Descartes is the discoverer of analytic geometry, which is based on the method of coordinates he invented. This method, as is known, was used earlier by Descartes. He received significant development from Fermat. Nevertheless, with Descartes it acquired much greater significance, since with the help of this method Descartes was able to indicate new directions in the further development of mathematics. We owe to the mathematical genius of the thinker the introduction of the now familiar designations with the help of Latin letters of constant and variable greatness, as well as the designation of degrees. Thanks to Descartes, algebra, both in its basic methods and in symbolism, took on the character that it still has today. Descartes attached particular importance to mathematics. He proceeded from the conviction that mathematics should be a model for any other science. In his opinion, only that science can be considered true, which in its construction follows mathematics, since all the conclusions of mathematics are logically necessary, giving complete certainty.
Descartes' mathematical research is closely related to his work in philosophy and physics. In "Geometry" (1637) Descartes first introduced the concept of a variable and a function.
For Descartes, the real number acted as the ratio of the length of the segment to the unit, although only I. Newton formulated such a definition of the number. Negative numbers received from Descartes a real interpretation in the form of directed coordinates. Descartes introduced now generally accepted signs for variables and unknown quantities, for literal coefficients, and also for degrees. Recordings of algebra formulas by Descartes almost do not differ from modern ones. Descartes initiated the scientific study of the properties of equations; he was the first to formulate the position that the number of real and complex roots of an equation is equal to its degree. Descartes formulated the rules of signs for determining the number of positive and negative roots of an equation, raised the question of the boundaries of real roots and the reducibility of a polynomial. In analytical geometry, which was developed simultaneously with Descartes by P. Fermat, the main achievement of Descartes was the method of rectilinear coordinates he created. In "Geometry" Descartes outlined an algebraic way of constructing normals and tangents to plane curves and applied it to 4th order curves, Descartes' ovals. Having laid the foundations of analytic geometry, Descartes himself made little progress in this area. His coordinate system was imperfect: it did not consider negative abscissas. Questions of the analytic geometry of three-dimensional space remained almost untouched. Nevertheless, Descartes' "Geometry" had a huge impact on the development of mathematics, and for almost 150 years algebra and analytic geometry developed mainly in the directions indicated by Descartes. From the correspondence of Descartes it is known that he made a number of other discoveries. Named after Descartes: coordinates, product, parabola, sheet, oval.
Descartes refined Galileo's law of inertia. Following Kepler, Descartes believed: the planets behave as if there is an attraction of the Sun. In order to explain attraction, he designed the mechanism of the universe, in which all bodies are set in motion by pushes. The world of Descartes is completely filled with the thinnest invisible matter - ether. Deprived of moving rectilinearly, the transparent flows of this medium formed systems of large and small vortices in space. Vortices, picking up larger, visible particles of ordinary matter, form the cycles of celestial bodies. They mold them, rotate them and carry them in orbits. The Earth is also inside the small vortex. The rotation tends to pull the transparent vortex outward. In this case, the particles of the vortex drive the visible bodies towards the Earth. According to Descartes, this is gravity. Descartes' system was the first attempt to mechanically describe the origin of the planetary system.
Of particular note is the "principle of close action" put forward by Descartes. According to this "principle", the mutual influence of any bodies occurs not through empty space, which is impossible, but through the ether - the physical medium. Each of the bodies through direct contact with the ether affects its state, and the changed state of the ether, in turn, affects other bodies. This principle was later rejected by I. Newton as not necessary for knowledge, since, in his opinion, it is enough to know the mathematical laws of the interaction of bodies, and not their causes.
The French religious philosopher, writer, mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal was born in Clermont-Ferrand in the family of a highly educated lawyer who studied mathematics and raised his children under the influence of the pedagogical ideas of M. Montaigne. Received home education; early showed outstanding mathematical abilities, entering the history of science as a classic example of adolescent genius.
The first mathematical treatise Praktat "Experience in the theory of conic sections" (1639, published 1640) contained one of the main theorems of projective geometry - Pascal's theorem. In 1641 (according to other sources, in 1642) Pascal designed a summing machine. By 1654, Mr.. completed a number of works on arithmetic, number theory, algebra and probability theory (published in 1665). The circle of mathematical interests of Pascal was very diverse. He found a general algorithm for finding signs of the divisibility of any integer by any other integer (treatise "On the nature of the divisibility of numbers"), a method for calculating binomial coefficients, formulated a number of basic provisions of elementary probability theory ("Treatise on the Arithmetic Triangle", published in 1665 ., and correspondence with P. Fermat). In these works, Pascal was the first to accurately define and apply the method of mathematical induction for proof. Pascal's works, containing an integral method set forth in geometric form for solving a number of problems on calculating the areas of figures, volumes and surface areas of bodies, as well as other problems related to the cycloid, were a significant step in the development of infinitesimal analysis. Pascal's theorem on the characteristic triangle served as one of the sources for the creation of differential and integral calculus by G. Leibniz.
Together with G. Galileo and S. Stevin, Pascal is considered the founder of classical hydrostatics: he established its basic law (on the complete transfer of pressure produced on it by a liquid - Pascal's law), the principle of operation of a hydraulic press, pointed out the generality of the basic laws of equilibrium of liquids and gases. An experiment conducted under the direction of Pascal (1648) confirmed the assumption of E. Torricelli about the existence of atmospheric pressure. Pascal also expressed the idea of the dependence of atmospheric pressure on altitude, discovered the dependence of pressure on temperature and air humidity, and suggested using a barometer to predict the weather. The unit of pressure, the pascal, is named after him.
Pascal's work on the problems of the exact sciences mainly refers to the 1640s-1650s. Disillusioned with the “abstractness” of these sciences, Pascal turns to religious interests and philosophical anthropology. Since 1655, he leads a semi-monastic lifestyle in the Jansenist monastery of Port-Royal-de-Champs, having entered into an energetic debate on religious ethics with the Jesuits; the fruit of this controversy was Letters to a Provincial (1657) - a masterpiece of French satirical prose. At the center of Pascal's studies in the last years of his life is an attempt to "justify" Christianity by means of philosophical anthropology. This work was not completed; aphoristic sketches for it after Pascal's death were published under the title "Thoughts of Mr. Pascal on Religion and on Certain Other Subjects" (1669).
Pascal's place in the history of philosophy is determined by the fact that he was the first thinker who went through the experience of mechanistic rationalism of the 17th century. and with all its sharpness raised the question of the boundaries of "scientificity", while pointing to the "arguments of the heart", different from the "reasons of the mind", and thereby anticipating the subsequent irrationalist trend in philosophy. Having derived the main ideas of Christianity from the traditional synthesis with cosmology and metaphysics of the Aristotelian or Neoplatonic type, as well as with the political ideology of monarchism (the so-called "union of the throne and the altar"), Pascal refuses to build an artificially harmonized theological image of the world; his sense of the cosmos is expressed in the words: "this eternal silence of boundless spaces terrifies me." Pascal proceeds from the image of a person, perceived dynamically (“the state of a person is inconstancy, longing, anxiety”), and does not get tired of talking about the tragedy and fragility of a person and at the same time about his dignity, which consists in the act of thinking (a person is a “thinking reed”, “in space, the universe embraces and absorbs me like a point; in thought I embrace it. Pascal's focus on anthropological issues anticipates the understanding of the Christian tradition by S. Kierkegaard and F. M. Dostoevsky. Pascal played a significant role in the formation of French classical prose; F. La Rochefoucauld and J. La Bruyère, M. Sevigne and M. Lafayette experienced his influence.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz is an outstanding German philosopher and mathematician. His father, professor of moral philosophy at the University of Leipzig, died when his son was six years old. Leibniz entered the University of Leipzig at the age of 15, graduated in 1663 with a bachelor's thesis "On the principle of individuation", which contained in embryo many of the philosopher's later ideas. In 1663-1666. Leibniz studied law in Jena and published a paper on legal education. Thanks to the latter, he was noticed by Baron Boyneburg and the Elector Archbishop of Mainz, who accepted him into the service. The archbishop was very interested in maintaining peace within the borders of the Holy Roman Empire, as well as between Germany and its neighbors. Leibniz completely immersed himself in the plans of the archbishop. He also sought a rational basis for the Christian religion, equally acceptable to Protestants and Catholics.
The most serious danger to peace in Europe at that time was Louis XIV. Leibniz presented to the king a plan for the conquest of Egypt, pointing out that such a conquest was more befitting of the greatness of a Christian monarch than a war with small and insignificant European countries. The plan was so well thought out that Napoleon is believed to have consulted it in the archives before sending an expedition to Egypt. In 1672, Leibniz was called to Paris to explain the plan, and he spent four years there. He did not manage to see Louis, but he met with such philosophers and scientists as N. Malebranche, A. Arno, H. Huygens. Leibniz also invented a calculating machine that surpassed Pascal's machine in that it could take roots, exponentiate, multiply, and divide. In 1673 he went to London, met with R. Boyle and G. Oldenburg, demonstrated the operation of his machine to the Royal Society, which then elected him a member. In 1673, the Archbishop of Mainz died, and in 1676, for lack of a place more appropriate to his taste and abilities, Leibniz entered the service of a librarian to the Duke of Brunswick. On the way to Hannover, Leibniz stopped for a month in Amsterdam, having read everything written by B. Spinoza - everything that he was persuaded to give to print. In the end, he managed to meet with Spinoza and discuss his ideas with him. This was the last direct contact between Leibniz and his fellow philosophers. From that time until his death, he was in Hannover, traveling abroad only in connection with his research on the history of the Brunswick dynasty. He persuaded the King of Prussia to establish a scientific academy in Berlin and became its first president; in 1700 he was granted the position of imperial adviser and the title of baron.
In a later period, Leibniz engaged in the infamous dispute with Newton's friends about the primacy in the invention of infinitesimal calculus. There is no doubt that Leibniz and Newton worked on this calculus in parallel, and that in London Leibniz met mathematicians who were familiar with the work of both Newton and I. Barrow. What Leibniz owes to Newton and what both of them owe to Barrow can only be guessed at. It is known for certain that Newton formulated the calculus, the method of "fluxions", no later than 1665, although he published his results many years later. Leibniz was apparently right when he claimed that he and Barrow discovered calculus at the same time. Then all mathematicians worked on this complex of problems and knew about the results obtained in the addition of infinitesimals. There is nothing incredible about the simultaneous and independent discovery of calculus, and Leibniz is certainly to be credited as the first to use infinitesimals as differences and to develop a symbolism that proved so convenient that it is still used today.
Leibniz was also unlucky in regard to the recognition of his original logical ideas, which are most valued today. Only in the 20th century these ideas became generally known; Leibniz's results had to be rediscovered, and his own work was buried in the piles of manuscripts in the royal library in Hanover.
Toward the end of Leibniz's life, he was forgotten: Elector Sophia and her daughter Queen Sophia-Charlotte of Prussia, who greatly appreciated Leibniz and thanks to whom he wrote many works, died in 1705 and 1714, respectively. In addition, in 1714 George Louis, Duke of Hanover, was called to the English throne. Apparently, he did not like Leibniz and did not allow him to accompany him along with the court to London, ordering him to continue working as a librarian.
The misinterpretation of Leibniz's writings earned him the reputation of "Lovenix", a man who believes in nothing, and his name was not popular. The philosopher's health began to deteriorate, although he continued to work; brilliant correspondence with S. Clark belongs to this period. Leibniz died in Hanover on November 14, 1716. None of the retinue of the Duke of Hanover saw him off on his last journey. The Berlin Academy of Sciences, of which he was the founder and first president, did not pay attention to his death, but a year later B. Fontenelle delivered a famous speech in his memory before the members of the Paris Academy. Later generations of English philosophers and mathematicians paid tribute to the achievements of Leibniz, thereby compensating for the conscious neglect of his death by the Royal Society.
Among Leibniz's most important works are Discourse on Metaphysics (1846); "A new system of nature and communication between substances, as well as on the connection that exists between the soul and the body" (1695); "New experiments on the human mind"; "Experiments of theodicy on the goodness of God, the freedom of man and the beginning of evil" (1710); "Monadology" (1714).
Leibniz put forward such a complete and rationally constructed metaphysical system that, according to modern philosophers, it can be represented as a system of logical principles. Today, no one can manage in the analysis of individuality without the famous Leibnizian principle of the identity of indistinguishables; now it is given the status of a logical principle, but Leibniz himself considered it the truth about the world. Similarly, the relational interpretation of space and time and the analysis of the elements of substance as energy carriers are the foundation for the development of the concepts of mechanics.
Leibniz introduced the concept of kinetic energy into mechanics; he also believed that the concept of passive matter, existing in absolute space and consisting of indivisible atoms, was unsatisfactory from both a scientific and metaphysical point of view. Inertia itself is a force: endowing passive matter with motion should be classified as a miracle. Moreover, the very concept of the atoms of matter is absurd: if they are extended, then they are divisible, if they are not extended, then they cannot be atoms of matter. The only substance must be an active unit, simple, immaterial, existing neither in space nor in time. Leibniz called these simple substances monads. Because they have no parts, they can only come into existence through creation and can only be destroyed through annihilation. Monads are not able to influence each other. Since the only essential feature of a monad is its activity, all monads are of the same type and differ only in the degree of activity. There is an infinite series of monads, on its lower levels - monads that have the appearance of matter, although no monad can be completely inert. At the top of the ladder is God, the most active of the monads. Space is "a manifestation of the order of possible co-existences", and time is "the order of unstable possibilities".
In support of these conclusions based on metaphysical and scientific considerations, Leibniz gave arguments that contained an appeal to the nature of judgments, their truth and falsity. This view is closely related to Leibniz's life's work - the search for a language, characteristica universalis, in which all truths could be expressed and in which names would show the "composition" of the objects they designate. These truths would then find their place in the encyclopedia of all knowledge, and all discussion would become unnecessary - reasoning would give way to calculations using the "universal calculus".
Newton was born to a small farmer who died three months before his son was born. The baby was premature; there is a legend that he was so small that he was placed in a sheepskin mitten lying on a bench, from which he once fell out and hit his head hard on the floor. Newton grew up as a sickly and unsociable boy, prone to daydreaming. He was attracted to poetry and painting. Far from his peers, he made kites, invented a windmill, a water clock, a pedal cart. The beginning of school life was difficult for Newton. He studied poorly, was weak, and once classmates beat him until he lost consciousness. It was unbearable for the proud Newton to endure, and there was only one thing left: to stand out with academic success. By hard work, he achieved the fact that he took first place in the class.
Interest in technology made Newton think about the phenomena of nature; he was also deeply involved in mathematics. Jean Baptiste Bie later wrote about this: “One of his uncles, finding him one day under a hedge with a book in his hands, immersed in deep reflection, took the book from him and found that he was busy solving a mathematical problem. Struck by such a serious and active direction of such a young man, he persuaded his mother not to resist further the desire of her son and send him to continue his studies.
After serious preparation, Newton entered Cambridge in 1660 as a Subsizzfr'a (the so-called poor students who were obliged to serve the members of the college, which could not but burden Newton). In his senior year at college, Newton began studying astrology. Studies in astrology and the desire to prove its significance prompted him to research in the field of the movement of celestial bodies and their influence on our planet.
In six years, Newton completed all the degrees of the college and prepared all his further great discoveries. In 1665 Newton became a master of arts. In the same year, when the plague was raging in England, he decided to temporarily settle in Woolsthorpe. It was there that he began to actively engage in optics. The leitmotif of all research was the desire to understand the physical nature of light. Newton believed that light is a stream of special particles (corpuscles) emitted from a source and moving in a straight line until they encounter obstacles. The corpuscular model explained not only the straightness of light propagation, but also the law of reflection (elastic reflection) and the law of refraction.
At this time, the work, which was destined to become the main great result of Newton's works, was already completed, in the main - the creation of a single, based on the laws of mechanics of the physical picture of the World formulated by him.
Having set the task of studying various forces, Newton himself gave the first brilliant example of its solution, formulating the Law of universal gravitation as a generalization of the three laws of Kepler's celestial mechanics. This Law allowed Newton to give a quantitative explanation of the motion of the planets around the Sun, the nature of sea tides. This made a huge impression on the minds of researchers. The program of a unified mechanical description of all natural phenomena - both "terrestrial" and "heavenly" for many years was established in physics.
In 1668 Newton returned to Cambridge and soon received the Lucas Chair in Mathematics. Before him, this department was occupied by his teacher I. Barrow, who ceded the department to his beloved student in order to financially provide for him. By that time, Newton was already the author of the binomial and the creator (simultaneously with Leibniz, but independently of him) of the method of differential and integral calculus. Not limited to theoretical studies alone, in the same years he designed a reflective reflecting telescope. The second of the manufactured telescopes (improved) was the reason for the presentation of Newton as a member of the Royal Society of London. When Newton resigned his membership due to the impossibility of paying membership dues, it was considered possible, in view of his scientific merits, to make an exception for him, exempting him from paying them.
However, his theory of light and colors, outlined in 1675, provoked such attacks that Newton decided not to publish anything on optics while Hooke, his most bitter opponent, lived. From 1688 to 1694 Newton was a Member of Parliament.
By that time, in 1687, the “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy” came out - the basis of the mechanics of all physical phenomena, from the movement of celestial bodies to the propagation of sound. Several centuries later, this program determined the development of physics, and its significance has not been exhausted to this day. The constant oppressive feeling of material insecurity, enormous nervous and mental stress was undoubtedly one of the causes of Newton's illness. The immediate impetus for the disease was a fire, in which all the manuscripts he was preparing for publication perished. Therefore, for him great importance post of Warden of the Mint with the retention of a professorship at Cambridge. Zealously setting to work and quickly achieving notable success, Newton was appointed director in 1699. It was impossible to combine this with teaching, and Newton moved to London.
At the end of 1703, Newton was elected president of the Royal Society. By that time, he had reached the pinnacle of fame, and in 1705 he was elevated to the dignity of knighthood, but, having a large apartment, six servants and a rich exit, he remains still alone.
The time for active creativity is over, and Newton is limited to preparing the publication of "Optics", reprinting the work "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy" and interpreting Holy Scripture(he owns the interpretation of the Apocalypse, an essay on the prophet Daniel).
Newton died on March 31, 1727 in London and is buried in Westminster Abbey. The inscription on his grave ends with the words: "Let mortals rejoice that such an adornment of the human race lived in their midst."
What did Newton do, what are his merits before science?
Newton formulated the basic laws of mechanics and was the actual creator of a unified physical program for describing all physical phenomena on the basis of mechanics. Newton considered space and time to be absolute.
Newton discovered the law of universal gravitation, explained the motion of the planets around the Sun and the Moon around the Earth, as well as the tides in the oceans, laid the foundations of continuum mechanics, acoustics and physical optics. His fundamental works are The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (1687) and Optics (1704).
Newton developed (independently of H. Leibniz) differential and integral calculus, discovered the dispersion of light, chromatic aberration, studied interference and diffraction, developed the corpuscular theory of light, and expressed a hypothesis that combined corpuscular and wave representations.
The powerful apparatus of Newtonian mechanics, its universality and ability to explain and describe the widest range of natural phenomena, especially astronomical ones, had a huge impact on many areas of physics and chemistry. The influence of Newton's views on the further development of physics is enormous. President of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR S. I. Vavilov in his speech dedicated to Newton noted: “Newton forced physics to think in its own way, classically, as we say now ... without Newton, science would have developed differently.”
However, there are several remarks about I. Newton, which, of course, do not detract from his merits.
The first remark is connected with giving the Law of universal gravitation, discovered by him, of the status of universality. In the middle of the 19th century, the works of the German researchers Neumann and Zeliger showed that the extension of this Law to the entire Universe leads to a gravitational paradox: at every point in space, the gravitational potential turns out to be infinitely large and the existence of any forces becomes impossible. At present, this paradox is resolved in connection with the establishment of the physical basis of gravity as a result of the appearance of temperature gradients in the ether. An additional term appeared in Newton's law, which included the Gauss integral, and it turned out that gravity propagates over a limited distance, and the stars turned out to be gravitationally isolated.
The second remark is more significant. It was Newton who introduced the concept of action at a distance - "actio in distance", according to which we do not need to know the mechanism of interaction of bodies at all, it is enough to have their mathematical description. This slowed down the development of natural science for a long time. As V. I. Lenin put it in the book “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism”, among physicists “matter disappeared, only equations remained”. The result of this is the modern crisis of natural science. However, at present, the possibility of representing the interactions of bodies as a result of the movements of the ether, the parameters of which in the near-Earth space are determined, has become clear, and it is to be hoped that on this basis, ideas about the physical essence of all types of interactions of bodies will be restored in natural science, which will inevitably lead to a refinement of their mathematical descriptions.
Achievements: English mathematician, mechanic and physicist, astronomer and astrologer, creator of classical mechanics, member (since 1672) and president (since 1703) of the Royal Society of London, one of the founders of modern physics.
Born in the family of a state peasant-Pomor Vasily Dorofeevich Lomonosov and Elena Ivanovna, nee Sivkova (died in 1720). In the 1720s, Misha learned to read and write. Helping his father in fishing and sea animals in the White, Barents Seas and the Arctic Ocean, he got acquainted with the life and way of life of the northern peoples; at the same time, he became close to the schismatics-bespopovtsy.
Having received a passport from the Kholmogory provincial office, Misha in December 1730 went with a fish convoy to Moscow, where, hiding his origin, he entered the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy (15.1.1731). In 1733-1734, he probably studied at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy. In September 1734, Lomonosov tried to get a job as a priest in the Orenburg expedition of I. K. Kirilov, and in November 1735, among the 12 best students of the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy, he was transferred to the Academic University. In 1736, Lomonosov was sent to continue his studies in Germany at the University of Marburg. There he studied with the physicist and philosopher H. Wolf, and from 1739 studied chemistry, metallurgy and mining with I. Henkel in Freiburg. On May 26, 1740, Lomonosov married Elizaveta Khristina Zilch in the church of the Reformed community in the city of Marburg. Upon returning to St. Petersburg, Lomonosov experienced difficulties in communicating with the academic authorities and foreign colleagues, but he enjoyed the patronage of Count M. I. Vorontsov, and later - the favorite of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna I. I. Shuvalov. In January 1742, Lomonosov was appointed an adjunct of the physical class of the Academy of Sciences, in March 1751 he was granted the rank of collegiate adviser, on April 30, 1760 he was elected an honorary member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
Scientific and scientific-organizational activity of Lomonosov was extremely versatile. His works covered a wide range of natural and human sciences. Lomonosov's research in physics and chemistry was based on ideas about the atomic and molecular structure of matter. In his essay “Physical Reflections on the Causes of Heat and Cold” (1744), he carefully analyzed the available experimental material and provided strong evidence against the theory of caloric generally accepted in his time. In 1744 he submitted to the Academic Assembly his dissertation "On the action of solvents on dissolved bodies." In 1745-1746, Lomonosov achieved the construction of the first Russian Chemical Laboratory at the Academy (opened in 1748).
One of the most important inventions of the scientist in the field of optics was the "night-sighting tube" (1756−1758), which made it possible to distinguish objects relatively clearly at dusk. Lomonosov paid great attention to the study of atmospheric electricity; the experiments were carried out jointly with the physicist G. V. Richman (1711−1753), who died from a lightning strike during the experiment. In 1752, Lomonosov delivered at the Public Meeting of the Academy of Sciences "A word about aerial phenomena occurring from electric power", and on July 1, 1755 - "A word about the origin of light, representing a new theory of colors."
Lomonosov paid considerable attention to the development of geology and mineralogy in Russia and personally produced a large number of rock analyses. In July-November 1741, he was compiling a section in the Catalog of Stones and Fossils of the Mineralogical Cabinet of the Kunstkamera of the Academy of Sciences. Lomonosov also worked on proving the organic origin of soil, peat, coal, oil, and amber. He presented evidence of the existence of the mainland on south pole Earth.
Lomonosov had a significant influence on the development of domestic metallurgy (the work “On the free movement of air noted in the mines”, 1744), and on August 6, 1757, he spoke at the Public Meeting of the Academy with the “Word about the birth of metals from the shaking of the Earth”. In 1763 he published The First Foundations of Metallurgy or Mining.
For a number of years, Lomonosov developed a technology for obtaining colored glass, and in September 1752 he completed his first mosaic "Madonna" from a painting by the Italian painter F. Solimena (1657−1747), and also created a number of other mosaic images. In 1752, Lomonosov submitted to the Senate a proposal "On the establishment of a "mosaic case" in Russia." In the same year, he was engaged in the construction of a colored glass factory in Ust-Ruditsa (75 km from St. Petersburg), for which in 1753 he received land and peasants.
In March 1758, having started "supervision" of the Geographical Department of the Academy of Sciences, Lomonosov was engaged in organizing the compilation of the "Russian Atlas". Exploring sea ice, he gave their first classification (“Discourse on the Origin of Ice Mountains in the Northern Seas”, 1760).
Lomonosov repeatedly emphasized the political and economic importance for Russia of the development of the Northern Sea Route. In 1763, he completed a "Brief description of various travels in the northern seas and an indication of a possible passage by the Siberian Ocean to East India", in which he expressed confidence that "Russia's power will grow with Siberia."
In November 1761, Lomonosov turned to Shuvalov with a letter "On the preservation and reproduction Russian people”(11/1/1761), in which he proposed a number of measures to increase the population, considering the strengthening of marital relations as the main condition for the growth of the population, paying special attention to the duration of marriage. He proposed to ban marriages of unequal age, allow remarriages for priests, allow monastic vows no earlier than 50 years for men and 45 years for women. In October 1749 - March 1750, Lomonosov participated in the discussion of G. F. Miller's dissertation "The Origin of the Russian Name and People." In "Remarks" on the dissertation and in "Dedication" (1749) to the "History of the Russian" by V. N. Tatishchev, Lomonosov proved the originality of the origin of Russian culture and statehood. In 1760, he published "A Short Russian Chronicler with Genealogy", in which he outlined the main events of Russian history.
The literary work of Lomonosov was combined with a deep scientific understanding of philological problems. Odes belonged to his pen (“On the Capture of Khotin”, 1739; “Morning Reflection on the Majesty of God”, “Evening Reflection on the Majesty of God in the Event of the Great Northern Lights”, 1743; “On the Day of the Accession to the All-Russian Throne of Her Majesty Empress Elisaveta Petrovna 1747 year", 1747; ". Empress Ekaterina Alekseevna ... on her glorious ascension to ... the throne ...", 1762), lyric works, tragedies, messages, idylls, epigrams, etc. In August 1743 he participated in a poetic competition with A. P. Sumarokov and V. K. Trediakovsky, which consisted in creating various transcriptions in verse of the 143rd Psalm of David. He wrote the tragedies "Tamira and Selim" (1750), "Demophon" (1752). Widely distributed in the lists of his satire "Hymn to the Beard" (1757; published in 1859).
Concerned about the spread of education in Russia, Lomonosov insisted on the creation of a Russian university of the European type, accessible to all segments of the population. In June 1754, in a letter to Shuvalov, Lomonosov outlined a plan for founding a European-style university. His efforts were crowned with success in 1755: according to his project, a university was created in Moscow, which now bears the name of M. Lomonosov. He also developed the "States and Regulations" for the university and university gymnasiums.
Appointed adviser to the Academic Chancellery (February 13, 1757), he presented a plan for the reorganization of the administration of the Academy of Sciences and a draft of its charter. The most important task of the Academy of Sciences considered the training of domestic scientists. Lomonosov's attempt to organize St. Petersburg University during his lifetime was not crowned with success. On January 19, 1760, Lomonosov headed the Academic University and the gymnasium.
M.V. Lomonosov devoted a lot of energy to the development of Russian science, giving birth to its own scientists, so that Russian professors would teach at the university.
In the spring of 1765, Lomonosov caught a cold, fell ill with pneumonia, and died on April 4 (15 N.S.). M. V. Lomonosov was buried at the Lazarevsky cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg.
Achievements: natural scientist, poet, artist, historian, philologist, translator. Academician (professor) of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (July 25, 1745), honorary member of the Academy of Arts (1763), state councilor (1763)
Benjamin Franklin is an American statesman and scientist. Until the age of 10, he studied at a local school, then worked in a candle workshop and printing house, and at the age of 17 he moved to Philadelphia. In 1724 Franklin was sent to London to purchase printing equipment. In 1727 he founded his own business, and from 1729 to 1748 he published the Pennsylvania Gazette, and from 1732-1758 the yearly Poor Richard's Almanac. Franklin served as secretary of the Pennsylvania Assembly from 1736-1751, was a member for Philadelphia from 1751-1764, was postmaster of Philadelphia from 1737-1753, and from 1753-1774 was deputy postmaster general of the colonies.
Franklin independently studied French, Spanish, Italian, Latin. In 1727 he organized the Junto discussion club, and in 1731 he founded the first public library in America. He became interested in the phenomenon of electricity in 1746, when an "electric tube" was sent to the Philadelphia library. To test the hypothesis of the electrical nature of lightning, Franklin conducted the famous kite experiment in 1752, thanks to which he became known as a scientist. From this experiment, the idea of a lightning rod was subsequently born, and then the general theory of electrical phenomena and the new terminology associated with it (the concepts of positive and negative electricity, conductor, battery, etc.). Franklin explained the principle of operation of the Leyden jar and the role of dielectrics, the phenomenon of oil droplets spreading over the surface of water, and the effect of increasing the speed of sound in water. He invented the "electric wheel" and lamp for street lamps, the economical "Franklin oven" and the method of electric ignition of gunpowder, bifocal glasses and a unique musical instrument. Franklin founded the American Philosophical Society in 1743 and the University of Pennsylvania in 1751.
Franklin supported the concept of natural and inalienable human rights, proposed the "labor" theory of value and the famous definition of man as an animal that creates tools. He defended the ideas of reason, freedom and democracy, organized the first public library in America (1731), the American Philosophical Society (1743), the Philadelphia Academy (1751), which became the basis of the University of Pennsylvania.
Franklin was one of the initiators of the Congress of Representatives of the Colonies in Albany (1754). It was his plan for the unification of the colonies - the "plan of the Union" - that was adopted at this congress. In 1757-1762, Franklin represented the Pennsylvania Assembly in England, defended the interests of Georgia in 1768, New Jersey - in 1767 and Massachusetts - in 1770. These appointments and Franklin's wide popularity made him a kind of envoy of the colonies in Great Britain.
Franklin was involved in a scandal with the letters of the Chief Justice of Massachusetts T. Hutchinson, addressed to one of the members of the British government. The letters requested that troops be sent and strongly recommended that American freedoms be restricted. Franklin managed to get the originals of these letters, and at the end of 1772 he sent the letters to a friend in America to show them to several people, but on no account published them.
However, in June 1773 the letters were published, a scandal erupted, and in January 1774 the House of Representatives dismissed Franklin from his post as deputy postmaster general. Relations between England and the colonies became increasingly tense. Franklin in London assisted William Pitt and his associates in an attempt to reach an agreement. On March 20, 1775, Franklin sailed for America, arrived in Philadelphia on May 5, and the very next day was elected a member of the 2nd Continental Congress. He developed a new project for the Union of the Colonies, organized a unified postal service and became the first postmaster general. He soon joined a commission sent to Canada to persuade that colony to join the revolution, then became an adviser to General George Washington and a member of the committee drafting the Declaration of Independence. In 1776 the Congress decided to form a committee to negotiate with France for alliance and aid. Franklin, who arrived in Paris at the beginning of December 1776, was included in its first composition and for ten years served the cause of the independence of the colonies and the formation of a new state - the United States of America. Thanks to Gates's victory over Burgoyne at Saratoga and his own unceasing efforts, Franklin secured a treaty with France in early 1778, which brought diplomatic recognition to the new American state, as well as financial and military support. Tired of the burden of his mission, Franklin submitted his resignation on March 12, 1781, which was not accepted. On June 8, Franklin joined J. Adams and J. Jay in negotiations with Great Britain. On November 30, 1781, all preliminary conditions were agreed, but it was not until September 3, 1783 that the peace treaty was finally signed.
On December 26, 1783, Franklin again appealed to Congress with a request for recall, but only on May 2, 1785 received a message about the release from his duties as envoy. Arriving in Philadelphia on September 14, 1785, he was elected a member of the Constitutional Convention, which met in May 1787. On February 12, 1790, Franklin signed a memorandum to Congress, which called for the abolition of slavery. Franklin died in Philadelphia on April 17, 1790.
Benjamin Franklin combined a conscientious attitude to his main work with scientific and broad social activities almost all his life.
Vasily Yakovlevich Struve - the famous astronomer, was born in the family of the director of the gymnasium. Studying under the guidance of his father mainly in philology, Struve had already been prepared for 15 years to enter the university. At this time, his older brother taught at the Derpt gymnasium. Partly because of this, partly out of a desire to avoid the unrest of wartime, Struve chose Dorpat University. Here he continued to study philology and even wrote De studiis criticis et grammaticis apud Alexandrinos (1810). Soon, however, Struve became interested in Parrot's brilliant lectures on physics, and then, on the advice of the latter, devoted himself to the study of astronomy. Professor Gut himself had little interest in observations, but assisted Struve in every possible way in his first steps. As early as 1813, Struve published De geographica positione speculae astronomicae Dorpatensis.
Around this time, Struve was appointed as an astronomer-observer of the university. Despite the extreme poverty of the inventory of the observatory, he managed to choose a suitable and important task: not having the means to determine the declination of the luminaries, he undertook observations with a transit instrument of right ascensions of circumpolar stars. Then, on the initiative and at the expense of the Livonian Economic Society, Struve set about geodetic operations. The final processing of these long-term observations is given by him in "Beschreibung der Brieten gradmessung in den Ostseeprovinzen Russland" (1833). After Gut's death in 1818, Struve was appointed professor at the university.
In 1819, Struve attached a filar micrometer to Trouton's achromatic tube and began the main work of his life - the measurement of binary stars. Little by little, he succeeded in furnishing the observatory with first-class instruments. For their order, Struve traveled abroad several times. In 1822, a meridian circle by Reichenbach was installed, and in 1824 a refractor with a 9-inch lens by Fraunhofer, the best and largest at that time, was installed.
Not satisfied with the measurements of double stars already known since the time of Herschel, Struve undertook a revision of all the stars of the sky to the 9th magnitude; he managed to discover more than 3,000 new double stars ("Catalogigus novus stellrum duplicium etc.", 1827). The most fruitful epoch in Struve's life in 13 years began; among all other contemporaneous works, he collected 11,000 measurements of binary stars, which formed the basis of his classic: "Stellarum duplicium et multiplicium mensuvae micrometricae per magnum Fraunhoferi tubum annis a 1824 ad 1837 in specula Dorpatensi institutae" (1837).
The preface contains a lot interesting details works, various remarks by Struve, which remain useful for observers and our time, studies on the proper and orbital motion of many binary stars, etc. Along the way, Struve determined from these observations the parallax of the star alpha Lurae - the second (after Bessel) successful attempt to find the distance of the star from the earth. In parallel with the measurements of double stars with a refractor, Struve began on the meridian circle, first one, then with the help of Preis and Dellen, the determination of the exact positions in the firmament of all double stars. The result was the equally valuable catalog Stellarum fixarum imprimis duplicium et multiplicium positiones mediae pro epocha 1830 deductae ex observationibus meridianis annis 1822 ad 1843 in specila Dorpatensi institutes (1852).
In 1830, it was decided to build the Pulkovo Observatory and Struve became a member of the commission in charge of the construction. In 1832, Struve was elected an ordinary academician (he had been a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences since 1822). In 1834, at an audience with Emperor Nicholas I, Struve was appointed director of the observatory under construction and sent abroad to order the best instruments that the best craftsmen could make. The rest of Struve's life is connected with the Nikolaev main observatory in Pulkovo. Its construction and all the instruments are described in detail in Struve's voluminous work: Description de l'observatoire astronomique central de Poulkova (1845).
The first work after the opening of the observatory was to determine latitude and longitude. At the same time, Struve developed a way to determine the latitude with a passage instrument in the first vertical; during the grandiose chronometric expeditions between Altona, Grinich and Pulkovo (1843−1844), the principle of changing observers was observed for the first time to exclude their personal error, which is described in Expedition chonometriques entre Poulkova et Altona (1844), Expedition chonometriques entre Altona et Greenwich (1846).
Struve directed the activities of the observatory exclusively to measuring stellar astronomy. According to his plan, a transit instrument and a vertical circle determined the position of bright fundamental stars. The meridian circle served to catalog all the stars up to the 6th magnitude. The 15-inch refractor (for a long time the best in the world) was used to measure double stars. From the works of Struve himself, one should point to observations with a transit instrument in the first vertical. The result was the valuable determination of the magnitude of aberration "Sur le coefficient constant dans l'aberration des etoiles fixes deduit des observations executees a Poulkova" (1843). Struve's work "Etudes d'astronomie stellaire" (1847) is very famous. Although his views on the structure of the universe and on the distribution of stars are outdated, the historical part of the work is of great interest.
While still in Dorpat, Struve taught practical astronomy and geodesy to many topographers and naval officers. This activity has expanded significantly in Pulkovo. At the same time, the observatory became the center of activity for Russian geodesists for a long time. Here they were educated, all geographical expeditions were equipped here, and their results were processed here. The main works on the large Russian-Scandinavian degree measurement belong to this time (see Triangulation). Already earlier, Struve pointed out the possibility of covering the plain Western Russia continuous network of triangles. The operations of Russian surveyors in the southwestern provinces provided excellent material for this; these triangles were connected with the work of Struve himself and continued through Finland and Norway to the Arctic Ocean. The treatment of the entire material was done by Struve in his "Arc du meridien de 25°20" entre le Danube et la mer glaciale mesure deruis 1816 jusqu'en 1856 etc." (1857−60, two volumes and drawings.) This classic work in many respects is still unparalleled.Then Struve prepared an equally grandiose enterprise - measuring the arc of a parallel across Europe (see Triangulation).
In January 1858, Struve suddenly fell ill. Although the disease (malignant abscess) had passed, Struve's strength was forever broken. He handed over the management of the observatory to his son O. V. Struva and almost did not engage in science. In the autumn of 1863, the fiftieth anniversary of his scientific activity was celebrated, and in next year, November 23, 1864, Struve died.
In addition to the main works mentioned, he left more than 100 memoirs, relating almost exclusively to geodesy and practical astronomy, reports on various expeditions, reviews, etc. Struve occupied one of the most prominent places among astronomers in the first half of the 19th century, when astronomy of the “position” was developing. . Struve was not a genius who opened up new paths for science, but he was able to significantly improve the old methods of observation and give some new techniques; he showed the need for a rigorous study of both instrumental errors and the influence of personal errors of the observer in the field of measuring stellar astronomy, and his name undoubtedly stands next to Bessel.
Struve's research on binary stars will long remain the subject of study and the starting point for many astronomers' work in this field. No less merit of Struve is the excellent organization and organization of work at the Pulkovo Observatory. He managed to furnish it with excellent instruments, which for a long time served as types and models; in a short time, he brought the Pulkovo Observatory to the worldwide recognition of its "astronomical capital of the globe": from all sides began to come to Pulkovo to study practical astronomy, and if Pulkovo retains one of the leading places among all observatories, then to a large extent this owes to the fact that the scientific spirit and precepts of its famous founder are preserved in the observatory.
The merits of V. Ya. Struve were recognized during his lifetime: he was an honorary member and corresponding member of 12 foreign academies and a very large number of scientific societies.
Michael Faraday didn't have to study in any systematic way. The son of a London blacksmith, an apprentice bookbinder, he completed only elementary school and continued to self-educate all his life. From the age of 12, Faraday worked as a newspaper peddler, then as an apprentice in a bookbinding workshop. He was engaged in self-education, read books on chemistry and electricity. In 1813, one of the customers presented Faraday with invitation cards to G. Davy's lectures at the Royal Institute, which played a decisive role in Faraday's fate. Thanks to Davy, he got a position as an assistant in the Royal Association.
In the early years, Faraday devoted himself to chemistry, but then became interested in experiments with magnetic and electrical phenomena. He did not start these experiments immediately, although he always carried a pendulum with him, so as not to forget that it was high time to study magnetism. By the autumn of 1831, he had obtained an electric current in a wire under the influence of magnetism and called the new phenomenon electromagnetic induction. Faraday observed how rods of various substances behave between the poles of a magnet. Their behavior made it possible to divide all substances into paramagnetic and diamagnetic. The rods of the first are installed between the poles along the lines of force, the rods of the second - perpendicular to them. This phenomenon was explained later, when the structure of the atom became clear.
In 1813-1815, traveling with Davy in Europe, Faraday visited the laboratories of a number of countries. He helped Davy in chemical experiments, and then began independent research in chemistry - he carried out the liquefaction of gases, received benzene.
In 1821, Faraday first observed the rotation of a magnet around a current-carrying conductor and a current-carrying conductor around a magnet and created the first model of an electric motor. Over the next 10 years, he studied the relationship between electrical and magnetic phenomena, and in 1831 he discovered electromagnetic induction, which underlies the operation of all direct and alternating current electric generators.
In 1824 Faraday was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, and in 1825 he became director of a laboratory in the Royal Association. From 1833 he was Fuller's professor of chemistry at the Royal Institution, leaving this post in 1862.
Faraday's public lectures were widely known.
Using a huge experimental material, Faraday proved the identity of the then known “types” of electricity: “animal”, “magnetic”, thermoelectricity, galvanic electricity, etc. The desire to reveal the nature of electric current led him to experiments on the passage of current through solutions of acids, salts and alkalis. The result of the research was the discovery in 1833 of the laws of electrolysis (Faraday's laws). In 1845, Faraday discovered the phenomenon of rotation of the plane of polarization of light in a magnetic field (the Faraday effect). In the same year he discovered diamagnetism, in 1847 - paramagnetism. Faraday introduced a number of concepts - mobility (1827), cathode, anode, ions, electrolysis, electrodes (1834); he invented the voltmeter (1833). In the 1830s he proposed the concept of a field, in 1845 he first used the term "magnetic field", and in 1852 he formulated the concept of a field.
Faraday presented the main works on electricity and magnetism to the Royal Society in the form of a series of reports called "Experimental Research on Electricity". In addition to the Researches, Faraday published Chemical Manipulations (1827). His book The History of the Candle (1861) is widely known.
It is interesting to note that the main work of Faraday - the 3-volume book "Experimental Research on Electricity" does not contain formulas, but is universally recognized as a work of genius.
Russian chemist Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev was born in Tobolsk in the family of the director of the gymnasium. While studying at the gymnasium, Mendeleev had very mediocre grades, especially in Latin. In 1850 he entered the Department of Natural Sciences of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of the Main Pedagogical Institute in St. Petersburg. Among the institute's professors at that time were such outstanding scientists as the physicist E. Kh. Lenz, the chemist A. A. Voskresensky, and the mathematician N. V. Ostrogradsky. In 1855, Mendeleev graduated from the institute with a gold medal and was appointed senior teacher at a gymnasium in Simferopol, but because of the outbreak of the Crimean War, he transferred to Odessa, where he worked as a teacher at the Richelieu Lyceum.
In 1856, Mendeleev defended his master's thesis at St. Petersburg University, in 1857 he was approved as a Privatdozent of this university and taught a course in organic chemistry there. In 1859-1861. Mendeleev was on a scientific trip to Germany, where he worked in the laboratory of R. Bunsen and G. Kirchhoff at the University of Heidelberg. One of the important discoveries of Mendeleev belongs to this period - the definition of the “absolute boiling point of liquids”, now known as the critical temperature. In 1860, Mendeleev, together with other Russian chemists, took part in the work of the International Congress of Chemists in Karlsruhe, where S. Cannizzaro presented his interpretation of A. Avogadro's molecular theory. This speech and discussion about the distinction between the concepts of atom, molecule and equivalent served as an important prerequisite for the discovery of the periodic law.
Returning to Russia in 1861, Mendeleev continued lecturing at St. Petersburg University. In 1861, he published the textbook Organic Chemistry, which was awarded the Demidov Prize by the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In 1864, Mendeleev was elected professor of chemistry at the St. Petersburg Technological Institute. In 1865, he defended his doctoral thesis "On the combination of alcohol with water" (the topic of the dissertation is often used to substantiate the legend of his invention of 40-degree vodka). In the same year, Mendeleev was approved as a professor of technical chemistry at St. Petersburg University, and two years later he headed the department of inorganic chemistry.
Starting to read the course of inorganic chemistry at St. Petersburg University, Mendeleev, not finding a single manual that he could recommend to students, began to write his classic work "Fundamentals of Chemistry". In the preface to the second edition of the first part of the textbook, published in 1869, Mendeleev gave a table of elements entitled "Experience of a system of elements based on their atomic weight and chemical similarity", and in March 1869, at a meeting of the Russian Chemical Society, N. A Menshutkin reported on behalf of Mendeleev his periodic table of elements. The periodic law was the foundation on which Mendeleev created his textbook. During the life of Mendeleev, "Fundamentals of Chemistry" was published in Russia 8 times, five more editions were published in translations into English, German and French.
Over the next two years, Mendeleev made a number of corrections and clarifications to the original version of the periodic system, and in 1871 he published two classic articles - “ natural system elements and its application to the indication of the properties of certain elements” (in Russian) and “The Periodic Law of Chemical Elements” (in German in the “Annals” by J. Liebig). On the basis of his system, Mendeleev corrected the atomic weights of some known elements, and also made an assumption about the existence of unknown elements and ventured to predict the properties of some of them. At first, the system itself, the corrections made and Mendeleev's forecasts were met scientific community very restrained. However, after Mendeleev predicted "ekaaluminium" (gallium), "ekabor" (scandium) and "ekasilicon" (germanium) were discovered respectively in 1875, 1879 and 1886, periodic law began to receive recognition.
Made in the late XIX - early XX centuries. the discoveries of inert gases and radioactive elements did not shake the periodic law, but only strengthened it. The discovery of isotopes explained some irregularities in the sequence of elements in ascending order of their atomic weights (the so-called "anomalies"). The creation of a theory of the structure of the atom finally confirmed the correct arrangement of the elements by Mendeleev and made it possible to resolve all doubts about the place of the lanthanides in the periodic system.
Mendeleev developed the doctrine of periodicity until the end of his life. Among other scientific works of Mendeleev, one can note a series of works on the study of solutions and the development of the hydrate theory of solutions (1865−1887). In 1872, he began studying the elasticity of gases, which resulted in the generalized equation of state of an ideal gas proposed in 1874 (the Claiperon-Mendeleev equation). In 1880-1885. Mendeleev dealt with the problems of oil refining, proposed the principle of its fractional distillation. In 1888, he proposed the idea of underground coal gasification, and in 1891-1892. developed a technology for the manufacture of a new type of smokeless powder.
In 1890, Mendeleev was forced to leave St. Petersburg University due to contradictions with the Minister of Public Education. In 1892, he was appointed custodian of the Depot of Exemplary Weights and Measures (which in 1893, on his initiative, was transformed into the Main Chamber of Weights and Measures). With the participation and under the leadership of Mendeleev, the prototypes of the pound and arshin were renewed in the chamber, and Russian standards of measures were compared with English and metric ones (1893−1898). Mendeleev considered it necessary to introduce the metric system of measures in Russia, which, at his insistence, was admitted optionally in 1899.
Mendeleev was one of the founders of the Russian Chemical Society (1868) and was repeatedly elected its president. In 1876, Mendeleev became a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, but Mendeleev's candidacy for academician was rejected in 1880. The balloting of Mendeleev by the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences provoked a sharp public outcry in Russia.
D. I. Mendeleev was a member of more than 90 academies of sciences, scientific societies, universities of different countries. The name of Mendeleev is the chemical element No. 101 (Mendelevium), an underwater mountain range and a crater on the far side of the Moon, a number of educational institutions and scientific institutes. In 1962, the Academy of Sciences of the USSR established the Prize and the Gold Medal. Mendeleev for the best works in chemistry and chemical technology, in 1964 the name of Mendeleev was entered on the board of honor of the University of Bridgeport in the USA along with the names of Euclid, Archimedes, N. Copernicus, G. Galileo, I. Newton, A. Lavoisier.
After suffering from scarlet fever in childhood, he almost completely lost his hearing: deafness did not allow him to continue his studies at school, and from the age of 14 he studied independently. From the age of 16 to 19 he lived in Moscow, studied physical and mathematical sciences in the cycle of secondary and higher education. In 1879, Tsiolkovsky externally passed the exams for the title of teacher and in 1880 was appointed teacher of arithmetic and geometry at the Vorovsky district school of the Kaluga province. The first scientific studies of Tsiolkovsky date back to this time. Not knowing about the discoveries already made, in 1880-81 he wrote the work "The Theory of Gases", in which he outlined the foundations of the kinetic theory of gases. His second work, The Mechanics of the Animal Organism (the same years), received a favorable review from I. M. Sechenov, and Tsiolkovsky was accepted into the Russian Physical and Chemical Society.
The main works of Tsiolkovsky after 1884 were associated with four big problems: the scientific justification of an all-metal balloon (airship), a streamlined airplane, a hovercraft and a rocket for interplanetary travel. Since 1896, Tsiolkovsky systematically studied the theory of the movement of rocket vehicles and proposed a number of schemes for long-range rockets and rockets for interplanetary travel. After the October Revolution of 1917, he worked hard and fruitfully on the creation of a theory of the flight of jet aircraft, invented his own scheme of a gas turbine engine; in 1927 he published the theory and scheme of the hovercraft.
The first printed work on airships was "Metal Controlled Balloon" (1892), which provided a scientific and technical justification for the design of an airship with a metal shell. The Tsiolkovsky airship project, progressive for its time, was not supported: the author was denied a subsidy for the construction of the model. Tsiolkovsky's appeal to the General Staff of the Russian Army was also unsuccessful. In 1892, Tsiolkovsky moved to Kaluga, where he taught physics and mathematics at a gymnasium and a diocesan school. During this period, he turned to a new and little studied field - the creation of aircraft heavier than air.
Tsiolkovsky came up with the idea of building an airplane with a metal frame. The article “Airplane, or Bird-like (Aircraft) Flying Machine” (1894) gives a description and drawings of a monoplane, which, in its appearance and aerodynamic layout, anticipated the designs of aircraft that appeared 15–18 years later. In Tsiolkovsky's airplane, the wings have a thick profile with a rounded leading edge, and the fuselage is streamlined.
In 1897, Tsiolkovsky built the first wind tunnel in Russia with an open working part, developed an experimental technique in it, and in 1900, with a subsidy from the Academy of Sciences, made blowings of the simplest models and determined the drag coefficient of a ball, flat plate, cylinder, cone and other bodies. But work on an airplane, just like on an airship, did not receive recognition from the official representatives of Russian science. For further research, Tsiolkovsky had neither the means nor even moral support. Many years later, in Soviet time, in 1932 he developed the theory of the flight of jet aircraft in the stratosphere and schemes for the design of aircraft for flight at hypersonic speeds.
The most important scientific results were obtained by Tsiolkovsky in the theory of rocket motion (rocket dynamics). Thoughts about their use in space were expressed by Tsiolkovsky as early as 1883, but his creation of a mathematically rigorous theory of jet propulsion dates back to 1896. Only in 1903 did he manage to publish a part of the article "Investigation of world spaces by jet devices", in which he substantiated the real possibility of their use for interplanetary communications. In this article and its subsequent continuations (1911, 1914), he laid the foundations for the theory of rockets and a liquid-propellant rocket engine (LPRE). Consideration of the practical problem of rectilinear motion of a rocket led Tsiolkovsky to solve new problems in the mechanics of bodies of variable mass. He was the first to solve the problem of landing a spacecraft on the surface of planets devoid of an atmosphere. In 1926-29 Tsiolkovsky developed the theory of multi-stage rockets. He was the first to solve the problem of rocket motion in an inhomogeneous gravitational field and considered (approximately) the influence of the atmosphere on rocket flight, and also calculated the necessary fuel reserves to overcome the resistance forces of the Earth's air shell.
Tsiolkovsky is the founder of the theory of interplanetary communications. His research for the first time showed the possibility of achieving cosmic speeds, proving the feasibility of interplanetary flights. He was the first to study the issue of a rocket - an artificial satellite of the Earth (AES) and expressed the idea of creating near-Earth stations as artificial settlements using the energy of the Sun and intermediate bases for interplanetary communications; considered the biomedical problems that arise during long-term space flights. Tsiolkovsky wrote a number of works in which he paid attention to the use of satellites in the national economy, etc.
Tsiolkovsky put forward a number of ideas that have found application in rocket science. They proposed gas rudders (made of graphite) to control the flight of a rocket and change the trajectory of its center of mass; the use of propellant components for cooling the outer shell of the spacecraft (during entry into the Earth's atmosphere), the walls of the combustion chamber and the LRE nozzle; pumping system for supplying fuel components (to reduce the mass of the propulsion system); optimal trajectories of spacecraft descent when returning from space, etc.
Tsiolkovsky is the first ideologist and theorist of human space exploration, the ultimate goal of which seemed to him in the form of a complete restructuring of the biochemical nature of thinking beings generated by the Earth. In this regard, he put forward projects for a new organization of mankind, in which the ideas of social utopias of various historical eras are intertwined in a peculiar way. Tsiolkovsky is the author of a number of science fiction works, as well as research in other fields of knowledge: linguistics, biology, etc.
Under Soviet rule, Tsiolkovsky's living and working conditions changed radically. Tsiolkovsky was assigned a personal pension and provided the opportunity for fruitful activity. His works greatly contributed to the development of rocket and space technology in the USSR and other countries. For "Special services in the field of inventions of great importance for the economic power and defense of the USSR" Tsiolkovsky in 1932 was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. In connection with the 100th anniversary of the birth of Tsiolkovsky in 1954, the Academy of Sciences of the USSR established a gold medal to them. K. E. Tsiolkovsky "For outstanding work in the field of interplanetary communications." Monuments to the scientist were erected in Kaluga and Moscow; a memorial house-museum was created in Kaluga; the State Museum of the History of Cosmonautics and the Pedagogical Institute in Kaluga, the Moscow Aviation Technological Institute bear his name. A crater on the Moon is named after Tsiolkovsky.
Scientists who did not have special education in the fields in which they received recognition
ARISTOTLE(384 - 322 BC), self-taught, universal philosopher, wrote more than 30 books. Philosopher, logician, analyst, physicist, psychologist, writer, sociologist.
VINCI Leonardo yes(1452 - 1519) - self-taught. He was engaged in painting, music, sculpture, invention, physics, mathematics, mechanics, natural sciences, philosophy.
MOR Thomas(1478 - 1535) - self-taught. An enlightened man of his time. Engaged in politics, literature.
PARACELSUS- Philip Aureol Theophast Bombast von Hohenheim (1493 - 1541) - doctor - chemist, "the first professor of chemistry from the creation of the world" (A.I. Herzen)
COPERNICK Nicholas(1473 - 1543) - lawyer, physician. Studied astronomy. He created the heliocentric system of the world.
BRUNO Giordano(1548 - 1600) - self-taught. Studied philosophy and poetry. Developed the heliocentric system of the world.
BRAGE Tycho de(1546 - 1601) - lawyer, philosopher. He also studied astronomy. He created the helio-geocentric system of the world.
Gilbert William(5/24/1544, Colchester - 11/30/1603, London), - a doctor, the author of the first theories of electricity and magnetism.
VANINI Giulio Cesare(1585 - 1619) - philosopher. He also studied astronomy. He promoted the heliocentric system of the world.
pixie hippolyte(1608 - 1635) - inventor. Designed an alternator.
BURGY Jost(1552 - 1632) - watchmaker. He was engaged in physics, mathematics, and the manufacture of astro-devices. Built a clock with a pendulum. Independently of Napier, he invented logarithms.
CAMPANELLA Tommaso(1568 - 1639) - monk. Self-taught. Studied philosophy and politics.
Horrocks Jeremiah(1618 - 1641) - teacher. Studied astronomy. Developed, unlike Keplerian, his own model of the solar system.
GALILEO Galileo(1564 - 1642) - physician. I studied mathematics on my own. Studied mechanics and astronomy. One of the founders of exact natural science. Professor.
TORRICHELLI Evangelista(1608 - 1647) - studied privately. Studied mathematics and physics. Professor. The Torricelli experience. Torricelli formula. Torricellian vacuum.
MERSENN Marin(1588 - 1648) - monk. He studied acoustics, mathematics, the theory of musical instruments.
DECARTS René(1596 - 1650) - theologian, studied philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, cosmogony.
GASSENDI Pierre(1592 - 1655) - self-taught. He studied rhetoric, philosophy, astronomy. He supported the heliocentric system of the world.
PASCAL Blaise(1623 - 1662) - theologian. He studied mathematics, physics, philosophy, religion. Pascal's theorem. Pascal's law. The unit of pressure is Pascal.
Grimaldi Francesco Maria(1618 - 1663) - philosopher, physicist. He also studied astronomy. Grimaldi Crater on the Moon.
FARM Pierre(1601 - 1665) - lawyer. Studied mathematics and physics. Fermat's principle. Fermat's theorem.
ROBERVAL Gilles(1602 - 1675) - self-taught. He studied mathematics, astronomy, physics, cosmogony, and mechanics. Scales of Roberval.
BORELLI Giovanni Alfonso(1608 - 1679) - astronomer and founder of the school of "iatromathematicians". He developed questions of anatomy and physiology from the standpoint of mathematics and mechanics.
Guericke Otto fon(1602 -1686), lawyer, conducted experiments with the "Magdeburg hemispheres", discovered the electrostatic repulsion of objects.
Hevelius Jan(1611 - 1687) - lawyer, physicist. Studied astronomy. He gave names to the details of the lunar surface, to some constellations. Described contemporary astronomical information.
BOYLE Robert(1627 - 1691) - theologian. Studied chemistry, physics, philosophy. Boyle's Law - Mariotte.
HUYGENS Christian(1629 - 1695) - lawyer. He studied mechanics, optics, astronomy.
AMONTON Guillaume(1663 - 1705) - self-taught. He was engaged in physics, mathematics, astronomy, architecture, improved instruments.
Gauskby Francis Senior(1665 - 1713) - self-taught. He was engaged in physics, designing devices. Built a glass electric machine.
LEIBNITZ Gottfried Wilhelm(1646 - 1716) - physiologist, philosopher, lawyer. I studied mathematics on my own. He studied physics, philosophy, mathematics, mechanics.
FLEMSTID John(1646 - 1719) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Then he graduated from the university. Observatory director.
NEWTON Isaac(1643 - 1727) - graduated from college. I studied mathematics on my own. He studied physics, astronomy, mathematics. One of the founders of modern natural science. The unit of force is the newton. Binomial theorem. Newton-Leibniz formula.
MELIER Jean(1654 - 1729) - priest. Self-taught. Studied politics and philosophy.
BRYUS Yakov Vilimovich(1670 - 1735) - self-taught. One of the most educated people in Russia at that time. Studied mathematics, astronomy, physics.
FAHRENHEIT Daniel Gabriel(1686 - 1735) - self-taught. Studied physics. Invented the thermometer and the temperature scale.
Reaumur René Antoine(1683 - 1757) - self-taught. He studied mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology. Invented the alcohol thermometer. Réaumur temperature scale.
BUGER Pierre(1698 - 1758) - self-taught. He was engaged in maritime affairs, navigation, physics.
DOLLOND John(1706 - 1761) - weaver. He was engaged in physics, designing devices. Built an achromatic telescope.
AKAYLE Nicola Louis de(1713 - 1762) - philosopher, theologian. Studied astronomy. He wrote textbooks on mathematics, mechanics, astronomy, optics. Stars: Lacaille 9352, Lacaille 8760, etc. Professor of Mathematics.
MAYER Tobias Johann(1723 - 1762) - self-taught. Studied astronomy and mathematics. Professor. Observatory director.
LOMONOSOV Mikhail Vasilievich(1711 - 1765) - encyclopedist. According to K. Timiryazev, self-taught.
CLERO Alexis Claude(1713 - 1765) - mathematician. At the age of 25 he became an academician. He studied astronomy and mechanics.
LAMBERT Johann Heinrich(1728 - 1777) - self-taught. He studied astronomy, mathematics, physics, philosophy, cosmology. Lambert's Law.
Bernoulli Daniel(1700 - 1782) - philosopher, physician, logician. I studied mathematics on my own. He studied physics and physiology.
SCHEELE Karl Wilhelm(1742 - 1786), apothecary. Studied chemistry. Discovery of tartaric, hydrofluoric, hydrocyanic (hydrocyanic), arsenic, urinary, oxalic, lactic, citric, malic, gallic acids, hydrogen sulfide, and glycerin.
GOODRICK John(1764 - 1786) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Discovered the periodicity of the star Algol. Member of the Royal Society of London.
FRANKLIN Benjamin(1706 - 1790) - self-taught. He studied physics, politics, philosophy.
Lavoisier Antoine Laurent(1743 - 1794) - lawyer. Studied chemistry. One of the founders of classical chemistry.
BABOEF Gracchus(1760 - 1797) - self-taught. Engaged in politics, literature.
BLACK Joseph(1728 - 1799) - physician, chemist. He also studied physics.
RAMSDEN Jesse(1735 - 1800) - self-taught. Studied physics and engineering. Ramsden car. Ramsden eyepiece.
KANT Immanuel(1724 - 1804) - theologian. Passionate about philosophy. Studied cosmology. Created one of the first hypotheses about the origin of the world.
BOME Antoine(1728 - 1804), pharmacist, engaged in chemistry, opened the production of ammonia, developed methods for the production of porcelain, whitening of raw silk, etc.
Priestley Joseph(1733 - 1804) - priest. Studied chemistry, physics, philosophy. Discovered photosynthesis and oxygen. Established the inverse relationship between electrical interaction and distance.
PENDANT Charles Augustin(1736 - 1806) - military engineer. Studied physics, including electrophysics. Coulomb's law. The unit of quantity of electricity is the coulomb. Coulomb scales. Coulometry.
Leblanc Nicola(1742 - 1806) - physician. Engaged in politics, chemistry. Established the production of soda, saltpeter, etc.
Cavendish Henry(1731 - 1810) - physicist and chemist. Conducted experiments and studied on them, studied and immediately conducted experiments. Made many discoveries before their official authors.
RUMFORD(THOMPSON) Benjamin (1753 - 1814) - military man. He was engaged in physics, design, improvement of instruments.
NICOLSON William(1753 - 1815) - self-taught. He was engaged in physics, chemistry, design, literature, published a magazine. Nicholson duplicator. Nicholson hydrometer.
MESSIER Charles(1730 - 1817) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Messier catalog.
KULIBIN Ivan Petrovich(1735 - 1818) - self-taught. Engaged in mechanics, invention.
WATT James(1736 - 1819) - self-taught. Inventor of the steam engine.
RUTHERFORD Daniel(1749 - 1819) - physician. Studied physics and botany. Discovered nitrogen. Professor.
HERSHEL William(1738 - 1822) - musician. He studied astronomy and telescope construction. The founder of stellar astronomy, discovered our galaxy.
PICTE Mark August(1752 - 1825) - lawyer. He was engaged in physics, philosophy, geology, geodesy, astronomy, meteorology, and publishing.
PIGOTT Edurad(1753 - 1825) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Studied variable stars. Discovered 3 comets. Determined the proper motions of some stars.
Fraunhofer Joseph(1787 - 1826) - glazier (mirror). Studied physics. Fraunhofer lines. Fraunhofer diffraction.
VOLTA Alessandro(1745 - 1827) - studied at the Jesuit school. He studied philosophy, physics, chemistry, physiology. Professor. Director of the Faculty of Philosophy. The unit of electric current voltage is volt.
LAPLACE Pierre Simon(1749 - 1827) - studied at the school of Benedictine monks. Self-taught. He studied astronomy, physics, mathematics, cosmogony. Laplace formula. Laplace operator. Laplace equation. Laplace's theorem.
FRENEL Augustin Jean(1788 - 1827) - engineer. Studied physics. Huygens-Fresnel principle. Fresnel formulas.
ERTOV Ivan Danilovich(1777 - 1828) - self-taught. Studied astronomy and cosmogony. Wrote an astronomical encyclopedia.
Yung Thomas(1773 - 1829) - self-taught. Physician, musician. He also studied physics.
DAVI Humphrey(1778 - 1829) - pharmacist, chemist. He also studied physics. Laid the foundations of electrochemistry. He suggested the kinetic nature of heat.
ABEL Niels Heinrich(1802 - 1829) - self-taught. Did mathematics. Abelian integrals.
FOURIER Jean Baptiste Joseph(1768 - 1830) - military man. Studied mathematical physics. Founder of the theory of heat conduction.
Goethe Johann Wolfgang(1749 - 1832) - worked mostly independently. He worked in the field of literature, philosophy, physics.
GALUA Evarist(1811 - 1832) - self-taught. Did mathematics. He laid the foundation for modern algebra.
NOBILI Leopoldo(1784 - 1835) - military man. He studied physics and invention. Nobili's galvanometer.
AMPER André Marie(1773 - 1836) - self-taught. Works in the field of electromagnetism. Philosopher, botanist. Ampère's rule. Ampere's law. Ampère's theorem.
FOURIER Charles(1772 - 1837) - self-taught. He was engaged in politics, literature, psychology, pedagogy, philosophy, architecture.
PREVO Pierre(1751 - 1839) - lawyer. He studied physics, philosophy, literature. Professor of physics. Philosophy professor.
Olbers Heinrich Wilhelm(1758 - 1840) - physician. Studied astronomy. The Schese-Olbers paradox.
SAVAR Felix(1791 - 1841) - physician. He studied physics and invention. Professor. Savart wheel. Biot-Savart-Laplace law.
BOUVAR Alexis(1767 - 1843) - self-taught. Studied astronomy and meteorology. Laplace's assistant.
BAILEY Francos(1774 - 1844) - had a primary education. He studied sciences, including astronomy. President of the Royal Society of London.
DALTON John(1766 - 1844) - self-taught mathematician. Created chemical atomism. Discovered the laws of gas. Described visual impairment.
PELTIER Jean Charles Atinaz(1785 - 1845) - watchmaker. Studied physics and engineering. Peltier effect.
BESSEL Friedrich Widbhelm(1784 - 1846) - self-taught. Studied astronomy and geodesy. Bessel spheroid. Bessel fictitious year. Bessel elements of the eclipse.
HERSHEL Caroline Lucrezia(1750 - 1848) - self-taught. Engaged in astronomy, helping her brother William.
BERZELIUS Jens Jacob(1779 - 1848) - physician. Studied physics and chemistry. Research in chemical atomism. Professor.
STURGEN William(1783 - 1850) - self-taught. Engaged in invention, design, aerology. Invented the electromagnet, the dynamo.
ERSTED Hans Christian(1777 - 1851) - pharmacist, chemist. He was engaged in physics, popularized science.
GRUITHUISEN Franz Paula von(1774 - 1852) - astronomer and physician. He studied geology, geography, climatology.
ARAGO Dominique Francois Jean(1786 - 1853) - graduated from the Polytechnic School. He was engaged in physics, astronomy, mathematics, meteorology, popularization of astronomy. Director of the observatory, professor.
OM Georg Simon(1787 - 1854) - had an incomplete higher education: physicist. Ohm's law. The unit of electrical resistance is Ohm.
ACKERMANN Johann Peter(1792 - 1854) - self-taught. He studied physics, astronomy, philosophy. Assistant J. W. Goethe.
GAUSS Carl Friedrich(1777 - 1855) - studied independently, then entered the university. He studied mathematics, astronomy, geodesy, physics. Professor. Observatory director. The unit of magnetic induction is Gauss. Gauss law. System of Gaussian units. Gauss theorem.
AVOGADRO Amedeo(1776 - 1856) - lawyer. Laid the foundations of molecular theory, discovered the law. He calculated the atomic mass and established the exact atomic composition of certain substances. Avogadro's law.
BIELA Wilhelm(1782 - 1856) - military man. Discovered comet.
Comte Auguste(1798 - 1857) - Secretary and employee of Saint-Simon. Studied philosophy.
Cauchy Augustin Louis(1789 - 1857) engineer. Known as an outstanding mathematician (the theory of functions of a complex variable, the theory of differential equations, order, in geometry - the theory of polyhedra, in algebra - symmetric polynomials, number theory)
Kohlrausch Rudolf Hermann Arnaut(1809 - 1858) - teacher. Studied physics and engineering. Developed the mathematical theory of currents. Professor.
HUMBOLT Alexander(September 14, 1769, Berlin - May 6, 1859, ibid.), economist, jurist. Known as a naturalist, geographer and traveler, works on biology, physiology, geology, climatology.
SEMENOV Fedor Alekseevich(1794 - 1860) - entrepreneur. Independently studied mathematics, physics, astronomy. Studied astronomy.
BARLOW Peter(1776 - 1862) - self-taught. Studied physics and mathematics. Barlow tables. Barlow wheel. Lens Barlow.
BULL George(1815 - 1864) - self-taught. Known as a mathematician and logician. Boolean algebra creator.
Struve Vasily Yakovlevich(1793 - 1864) - philologist. He studied astronomy, mathematics, geodesy. "Organized" the Pulkovo observatory, its work, coordinated the work of Russian observatories. Professor. Observatory director. Russian-Scandinavian arc Struve.
HERAPAT John(1790 - 1865) - self-taught. He was engaged in physics, mathematics, editorial work. Wrote 3 volumes of Mathematical Physics. Deduced the basic equation of the gaseous state.
LENTS Emil Khristianovich(1804 - 1865) - incomplete higher education. Studied electrophysics. Joule-Lenz law.
GOLDSHMIDT Hermann Mayer Solomon(1802 - 1866) - artist. Studied astronomy. Discovered 11 asteroids.
FARADEUS Michael(1791 - 1867) - self-taught. Studied physics (electromagnetism). "Discovered" electric current. Faraday's laws. Faraday constant. Faraday effect. The unit of electric charge is the faraday. The unit of electrical capacitance is Farad.
FOUCAULT Jean Bernard Leon(1819 - 1868) - self-taught. Studied physics. Measure the speed of light in air and water. Foucault method. Foucault pendulum. Toki Fuko.
AUGUST Ernst Ferdinand(1795 - 1870) - teacher. He studied physics and invention. Professor.
RUMKORF Heinrich Daniel(1803 - 1877) - was engaged in invention. Ruhmkorff coil. Rumkorff machine.
LEVERIEUX Urban Jean Joseph(1811 - 1877) - graduated from the Polytechnic School. Studied chemistry, astronomy, meteorology. He predicted the planet Neptune independently of John Adams. Predicted the planet Vulcan. Observatory director.
MAYER Julius Robert(1814 - 1878) - physician. He was the first to formulate the law of conservation of energy.
KIBALCHICH Nikolay Ivanovich(1853 - 1881) - self-taught. Engaged in politics, invention. He developed an original project of an aircraft for man's journey into space.
PETERS Christian August Friedrich(1806 - 1880) - self-taught. Studied mathematics and astronomy. Professor, academician. Observatory director.
DRAPER Henry(1837 - 1882) - doctor. He studied astronomy and telescope construction.
SABIN Edward(1788 - 1883) - military man. He studied physics, astronomy, traveled.
Plateau Joseph Antoine Ferdinand(1801 - 1883) - lawyer. Studied physics. He put forward the idea of a stroboscope. Plateau experience.
SCHMIDT Johann Friedrich Julius(1825 - 1884) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Studied the moon. Observatory director.
Kirchhoff Gustav Robert(1824 - 1887) - physicist. In chemistry, he began the era of spectral analysis. Discovered cesium and rubidium.
JOUL James Prescott(1818 - 1889) - was educated at home. Studied physics. Experimentally substantiated the law of conservation of energy. Joule-Lenz law. The unit of energy, work and quantity of heat is the Joule.
TEMPEL Ernst Wilhelm(1821 - 1889) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Discovered many comets and asteroids. Worked with Schiaparelli.
GIRD Gustav Adolf(1815 - 1890) - self-taught. Studied physics, chemistry, meteorology. Wrote "The Mechanical Theory of Heat"
SIEMENS Ernst Werner(1816 - 1892) - military man. He was engaged in invention, physics. Built the first tram. The unit of electrical conductivity is Siemens.
HIND John Russell(1823 - 1893) - studied privately. Studied astronomy and meteorology. Many new celestial bodies have been discovered.
HELMHOLTZ Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand(1821 - 1894) - physician. He was engaged in physics, biophysics, physiology, psychology. Substantiated the law of conservation of energy.
ENGELS Friedrich(1820 - 1896) - self-taught. He was engaged in the philosophy of natural science, politics.
Schliemann Heinrich(1822 - 1896) - self-taught. Discovered the location of Troy and excavated it.
HALL Asaf(1829 - 1907) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Professor of mathematics, taught astronomy.
Leroux Francois Pierre(1832 - 1907) - a connoisseur of arts and crafts. Studied physics.
MENDELEEV Dmitry Ivanovich(1834 - 1907) - had a physical and mathematical education. He was also engaged in chemistry, engineering, mining, agronomy, pedagogy, art history, and metrology.
NEWCOM Simon(1835 - 1909) - self-taught. Studied astronomy and mathematics. Professor.
HOggins William(1824 - 1910) - studied privately. Studied astronomy. One of the pioneers of astrospectroscopy.
CANNIFIARO Stanislao(1826 - 1910) - physician. He studied politics, chemistry, physics. One of the founders of the atomic-molecular theory. Professor.
SCHUMANN Victor(1841 - 1913) - self-taught. Studied physics. Founder of vacuum spectroscopy. Schumann plates.
GILL David(1843 - 1914) - watchmaker. Studied astronomy. Observatory director. President of the Royal Society of London (astronomical).
KLEIN Hermann Joseph(1844 - 1914) - bookseller. Passionate about astronomy. Discovered volcanism on the moon. He popularized astronomy and meteorology.
ENGELHARDT Vasily Pavlovich(1828 - 1915) - lawyer. He studied astronomy, music, art history.
LOVELL Percival(1855 - 1916) - entrepreneur, traveler. Engaged in astronomy and its popularization. Pluto predicted.
TYLOR Edward Burnet(1832 - 1917) - self-taught. He took up photography. Described primitive culture.
ZAMENHOF Ludwig(1859 - 1917) - physician. Created the international language Esperanto.
Morley Edward Williams(1838 - 1919) - theologian. Studied chemistry and physics. Michelson-Morley experiment.
Lockyer Joseph Norman(1836 - 1920) - privately educated. Studied astronomy. Professor of astrophysics. Observatory director.
BROOKS William Robert(1844 - 1921) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Professor. Observatory director. Comet Brooks. Comet Pons-Brooks.
SOLVE Ernst Gaston(1838 - 1922) - industrialist. Worked in chemical engineering. Solvay's method.
Benoit Rene(1844 - 1922) - physician. Studied physics. President of the French Physical Society.
X-ray Wilhelm Conrad(1845 - 1923) - graduated from the Polytechnic. Studied physics. opened X-rays. X-ray camera. X-ray topography. The unit of radiation is Roentgen.
Barnard Edward Emerson(1857 - 1923) - did not have a systematic education. Studied astronomy. Professor. Barnard's fast flying star.
LENIN(Ulyanov) Vladimir Ilyich (1879 - 1924) - lawyer. He was engaged in economics, philosophy, politics, founded the world's first proletarian state.
Flammarion Nicola Camille(1842 - 1925) - self-taught. He was engaged in astronomy, popularization of the science of the sky, volcanology, climatology. Observatory director.
HEAVYSIDE Oliver(1850 - 1925) - telegraph operator. Studied physics and mathematics. Developed Maxwell's theory of the electromagnetic field. One of the creators of operational calculus.
ABETTI Antonio(1846 - 1928) - engineer. Interested in astronomy. Director of the observatory, professor of astronomy.
BOGDANOV(Malinovsky) A. A. (1873 - 1928) - doctor. A prominent economist, philosopher, politician, natural scientist. Created tectology - the science of organizing systems, founder and director of the Institute of Blood Transfusion, died as a result of experiments on himself.
Michelson Albert Abraham(1852 - 1931) - sailor. Measured the speed of light. Tried to detect the motion of the Earth relative to the ether. Professor. Echelon (spectral instrument) Michelson.
Edison Thomas Alva(1847 - 1931) - telegraph operator. Engaged in invention. Over 1000 inventions. Edison effect.
TSERASKAYA Lydia Petrovna(1855 - 1931) - philologist. Studied astronomy. Discovered 219 variable stars.
BELOPOLSKY Aristarkh Apollonovich(1854 - 1934) - mechanical technician. Studied astronomy.
ESPIN Thomas(1858 - 1934) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Based on his observations, he compiled a catalog of red stars.
TSIOLKOVSKY Konstantin Eduardovich(1857 - 1935) - self-taught. He was engaged in astronomy, mathematics, physics, invention. One of the founders of astronautics and rocket technology.
SCHMIDT Bernhard(1879 - 1935) - worker. Worked in optics. Invented a new telescope system.
RUTHFORD, Ernest (8/30/1871, Nelson, New Zealand - 10/19/1937, Cambridge, England), Master of Arts. Studied physics. Creator of the planetary model of the atom - the basis of quantum mechanics.
MARCONI Guglielmo(1874 - 1937) - self-taught. Developed devices for wireless telegraph (radio).
Blondel Andre(1853 - 1938) - engineer. He studied physics and invention. Invented the electromagnetic oscilloscope.
WILLIAMS A. Stanley (1861 - 1938) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. He was the first to study motions in Jupiter's atmosphere.
FREUD Sigmund(1856 - 1939) - physician, physiologist. Worked in psychiatry. Developed psychoanalytic therapy. Freudianism.
YASHNOV Petr Ivanovich(1874 - 1940) - brewer. Studied astronomy. active observer. One of the authors of a textbook on practical astronomy.
FLORIA Nikolai Fyodorovich(1912 - 1941) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Scientific Secretary of the Astronomical Institute.
LAZAREV Petr Petrovich(1878 - 1942) - physician. Externally passed the exams for physics and mathematics. Studied physics. Institute Director.
DEFROY Felix(1883 - 1942) - journalist. He also studied astronomy. Performed 90 thousand observations of variable stars.
ANTONIADI Eugene(1870 - 1944) - self-taught. He was engaged in astronomy (studied Mars) and archeology.
MOROZOV Nikolai Alexandrovich(1854 - 1946) - self-taught. He studied chemistry, physics, astronomy, mathematics, meteorology, history of material culture. After the conclusion - a teacher. Institute Director.
JARRY-DELOGES Rene (1868 - 1951) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Mars observed. Created a number of observatories.
STALIN(Dzhugashvili) Iosif Vissarionovich (1879 - 1953) - self-taught generalist. Led the CPSU and the USSR for 30 years, commander-in-chief during the Great Patriotic War. Brought the USSR to second place in the world in terms of industrial potential. “He accepted Russia with a plow, and left it equipped with atomic weapons (W. Churchill).
Hubble Edwin Powell(1839 - 1953) - lawyer. Studied astronomy. Discovered the expansion of the universe. Hubble law. Hubble constant.
SEA Theophilus(1867 - 1954) - meteorologist. Studied astronomy. Observatory director. Wrote the book Life on Mars.
KOBEKO Pavel Pavlovich(1897 - 1954) - agronomist. He studied physics, chemistry, physical chemistry. Professor.
EINSTEIN Albert(1879 - 1955) - graduated from the Polytechnic, patent specialist. Studied physics and astronomy. Creator of the theory of relativity.
DOJ-MARTERE Maurice (1891 - 1955) - physician. Studied astronomy. General Secretary of the Geneva Astronomical Society.
Peridieu Julien(1882 - 1957) - engineer. Studied astronomy. Versatile exploration of Mars at our own observatory.
BAK Ernst(1881 - 1959) - lawyer. Studied physics. Palen-Back effect.
RENODE Gabriel(1877 - 1962) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. General Secretary of the French Astronomical Society. Wife of K. Flammarion.
WIENER Norbert(1894 - 1964) - self-taught, received a degree at the age of 14. Studied mathematics and physics. Formulated the main provisions of cybernetics.
CHIZHEVSKY Alexander Leonidovich(1897 - 1964) - archaeologist. He was engaged in history, medicine, zoopsychology, biology and space biology, astronomy, designing space technology, music, invention.
HERTZSHPRUNG Einar(1873 - 1967) - chemical engineer. Studied astronomy. Observatory director. Hertzsprung-Russell diagram.
HOFMEISTER Kuno(1892 - 1968) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Observed variable stars and meteors. Observatory director.
BABAKIN Georgy Nikolaevich(1914 - 1971) - graduated from high school. He worked as a designer of space technology and Lunokhod. He received his university diploma externally in his mature years.
HUMASON Milton(1891 - 1972) - self-taught. Engaged in astronomy: spectral radiation of stars and galaxies.
bisbrook dhorge van(1880 - 1974) - engineer. Studied astronomy. Professor, consultant. Van Bisbroek's Star.
MENZEL Donald Howerd(1901 - 1976) - chemist. Studied astronomy. Professor. Observatory director.
KUKARKIN Boris Vasilievich(1909 - 1977) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Professor. Director of the Astronomical Institute (GAISH)
Kolmogorov Andrey Nikolaevich(1903 - 1987) - independently studied mathematics. Academician.
ZELDOVICH Yakov Borisovich(1914 - 1987) - received a secondary education. Self-taught. He studied physics, nuclear physics, astrophysics, cosmology. Carried out the calculation of the principle of the reaction of fission of uranium. Academician.
TOMBO Clyde William(1906 - 19??) - self-taught. Studied astronomy. Discovered the planet Pluto. Then he entered the university.
CARLSON Chester- self-taught. Invented the photocopier in 1938.
WEBER Joseph(1919 - -) - naval specialist. Does physics. Substantiated the principle of operation of the laser.
The popular science magazine Nautilus published a poignant material about a self-taught scientist, widely known in narrow circles interested in artificial intelligence.
A detailed biography of Pitts was restored by the editors of the journal from Pitts' personal letters, preserved in the archives of the American Philosophical Society.
Outcast childhood
Walter Pitts has been an outcast among his peers since childhood; add to this a difficult family headed by a boiler-maker father, who often used his fists, and the criminogenic situation of Detroit. From the cruel ridicule of the neighborhood kids, Walter hid in the local library. There he studied the basics of Greek, Latin, logic and mathematics. Here, in the quiet canopy of bookshelves, he was much more comfortable than at home, where his father urged Walter to leave school and get a job.
Homeless genius and alcoholic, Walter Pitts. Source: nautilus
On one of these evenings in the library, Pitts came across the three-volume Principia Mathematica (Bertrand Russell and Alfred Whitehead, 1910-1913). It is a fundamental work on the logic and philosophy of mathematics and one of the most influential in history. For three days, Pitts devoured the 2,000 pages of this scientific work without interruption, and eventually discovered several errors. Deciding that Bertrand Russell needed to know about them, the boy wrote a detailed letter to the mathematician indicating them. Russell not only responded to the boy's message, but also invited Pitts to become a master's student at Cambridge University.
Pitts, perhaps, would have agreed, but he could not - he was only 12 years old at that time.
But three years later, when Russell was due to pay a visit to the University of Chicago, Pitts ran away from home and headed to Illinois. He never saw his family again.
The intersection of two destinies
In 1923, a year after Pitts was born, Warren McCulloch was nibbling on the granite of Principia Mathematica. This is where the similarities between Pitts and Warren end. McCulloch was 25 years old at that time, he came from an educated family of lawyers, doctors and engineers and received an excellent education - he studied mathematics at Haverford College in Pennsylvania, and then philosophy and psychology at Yale University. In 1923, Warren was preparing to receive his doctorate in neurophysiology, while remaining a philosopher at heart. At that time, the theory of psychoanalysis flourished, but Warren was not a supporter of it. He was sure that all the hidden corners and mysteries of our consciousness basically have purely mechanical connections between neurons in the brain.
Despite the fact that the fates of McCulloch and Pitts followed such different paths, in the end they were destined to become true friends and colleagues for the rest of their lives. Together, these two people will create the first mechanistic theory of consciousness, the first mathematical models of the neuron, develop computer logic and become the founders of the theory of artificial intelligence.
And yet this story is not only about fruitful scientific collaboration. This is a story about friendship, the fragility of the mind and the helplessness of the great mathematical logic in our imperfect cruel world.
Warren McCulloch. Source: nesfa.org
This alliance looked strange - McCulloch and Pitts. McCulloch at the time of meeting Pitts was 42 years old: a self-confident gray-eyed bearded man and night owl, a pipe lover, enjoying poetry, philosophy and a glass of whiskey. Pitts is a modest short eighteen-year-old boy with a high forehead that added to his age, glasses, with plump lips on a square face. They were introduced by medical student Jerome Lettwin. At their first conversation, the two found out that they had a common idol: Gottfried Leibniz. They were both fascinated by the 17th-century philosopher's attempt to create an ABC of human thoughts, each letter of which would correspond to a concept, which would allow them to operate in the same way as numbers.
McCulloch told Pitts in that conversation that he was trying to model the human brain using Leibniz's formal logic. He was inspired by the ideas of the "Principles of Mathematics", in which all mathematics was reduced to logic with the help of some set of axioms. Between the axioms there were relations of fundamental logical operations - conjunction ("and"), disjunction ("or") or negation ("not"). With the help of these simplest operations, the creators of the "Principles" proved the most complex theorems of modern mathematics.
McCulloch, while reading this work, was thinking about neurons. He knew that a neuron in the brain only fires when enough signals are sent from nearby neurons to the synapse. McCulloch suggested that neurons operate in a binary fashion - they are either on or off. In this sense, the signal of a neuron is an axiom, and neurons work like a logical funnel - absorbing several signals, and releasing only one.
And then came a fresh study by a young British mathematician Alan Turing, which proved that a machine is capable of performing any mathematical calculations, and McCulloch was convinced that our brain works almost like a Turing machine, that is, it uses the logic of neural networks to perform calculations. He believed that neurons are connected to each other according to the laws of formal logic, and with the help of these connections, the most complex mental chains are built.
Pitts immediately understood McCulloch's intent and knew exactly what mathematical tools to use to prove this hypothesis. Encouraged, McCulloch invited the young man to live in his country house near Chicago with his family. It was a typical abode of the creative intelligentsia, where representatives of its various strata gathered in the evenings, discussed issues of psychology, argued about politics, read poetry and listened to music on a phonograph.
And late at night, when McCulloch's wife and children were already sleeping peacefully, two scientists, emptying another bottle of whiskey, tried to create a computerized model of a neuron.
Before meeting Pitts, McCulloch could not get out of the research impasse: the output signal of the last neuron in the circuit could well become the input signal of the first - nothing prevented the neurons from looping. McCulloch had no idea. how to model such a situation mathematically. From the point of view of logic, the cycle has all the signs of a paradox: the effect becomes the cause and vice versa. McCulloch assigned a time stamp to each neural connection: the first neuron in the chain fired at time t, the next at t+1, and so on. But when the chain closed, the logic broke.
Pitts knew how to solve this problem. He used modular arithmetic, where the values in the number system are repeated after reaching a certain fixed module (this happens with the designation of hours in a day, for example). Pitts showed his friend that in his calculations, the concepts of "before" and "after" had lost all meaning, so the time value should be removed from the equation altogether. If you see lightning in the sky, your vision sends a signal to the brain, to the neural circuitry. You can reconstruct the signal path starting from any neuron in the circuit and determine the duration of the lightning flash. This does not work if the neural circuit is looped. In this case, the information in which the lightning flash is encrypted simply goes around in circles endlessly. It has nothing to do with the time period in which this outbreak occurred. This information becomes an "idea in timelessness". In other words, memory.
Pitts' calculations helped his friends to get a mechanistic model of thinking - the first argument in favor of the fact that the human brain is essentially a processor that processes information.
By combining simple binary neurons into chains and loops, scientists have shown that the brain can perform any possible logical operation and perform any calculation available to a hypothetical Turing machine.
This helped to understand how the brain extracts information and builds hierarchical structures from the received elements - in other words, how thinking occurs.
McCulloch and Pitts published their observations in A Logical Calculus of Ideas Relating to Nerve Activity, published in 1943. Their model of the brain was too simplistic to be biologically accurate, but it brilliantly proved the basic principles. According to their guess, human thinking cannot be described by Freud's mystical justifications. Here is what McCulloch said to his philosophy students:
For the first time in the history of science, we finally know how we get knowledge.
The relationship with McCulloch provided Pitts with many things that he lacked as a child - acceptance of interests, friendship, intellectual partnership. McCulloch became a father to Pitts.
great ambition
Pitts soon met one of the leading intellectuals of the 20th century, the great mathematician and philosopher, the founder of cybernetics, Norbert Wiener. They met in Wiener's office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Without noticing it, Wiener and Pitts during the first meeting neatly covered two huge educational boards hanging in the office - they were so carried away by the complex proof of one mathematical problem.
Viner suggested that Pitts get a PhD in mathematics from MIT. This was against all the rules since Pitts did not graduate.
But already in 1943, Pitts became a student at MIT, where he began his studies under the mentorship of one of the most influential scientists in the world.
Wiener wanted Pitts to continue working on a more realistic model of the brain. In the continuation of such research, he saw the future possibility of using neural networks in robotics and the future accomplishment of the cyber revolution. He understood that in order to create a realistic model of the brain, consisting of hundreds of billions of neurons, it is necessary to have at hand a sufficient amount of statistical data. And in statistical analysis and probability theory, Wiener was strong like no other.
Pitts began his work by understanding one simple principle: despite the fact that information about basic properties is encrypted in human genes nervous activity, they cannot predetermine the development of a huge number of synaptic connections in the brain. Therefore, it was possible to start by studying randomly selected neural circuits, which, most likely, would contain the necessary information. Using statistical mechanics and the process of randomly modifying the number of neural connections, he was going to model the process of structuring information in the brain. Creating such a working model will pave the way for machine learning.
In a letter to his friend McCulloch in 1943, Pitts writes:
[my work with Wiener] will be the first competent substantiation of statistical mechanics in the very general sense and its possible application in the derivation of the psychological principles of human behavior from the neurophysiological laws of the microcosm... Isn't it great?
Soon Pitts met the legendary John von Neumann at a conference in Princeton. This is how the first scientific group of cybernetics gradually formed: Wiener, Pitts, McCulloch, Lettvin (remember, the student who introduced McCulloch to Pitts?) and von Neumann. And it was the self-taught Pitts, who once ran away from home, was the head center of the group. No article was published without the consent and revisions of Pitts. Lettwin recalls:
He was without a doubt our genius. He was well versed in chemistry, physics, history, botany ... His answer to any question could be recorded and published as a textbook. In his perception, the world seemed to be an extremely complex and intricate structure.
In 1945, von Neumann began work on the first draft of the EDVAC report, which published a description of the logical design of a stored-program computer, a concept that would become known as the "von Neumann architecture".
it is a descendant of the cult computer ENIAC, the imperfection of which quickly became apparent. ENIAC behaved more like a giant electronic calculator than a computer. In order to make changes to the calculation program, a tedious process of re-switching and a long work of several operators were needed to replace and sort punched cards, as well as to replace burned-out lamps. After each reprogramming, ENIAC seemed to become a new computer, and all work had to be started anew. Von Neumann suggested that eliminating the need to rewire the machine when reprogramming could greatly speed up the data processing process. If the computer could remember its configuration, things would go much faster. This was the idea of EDVAC.
John von Neumann next to the IAS computer, ca. 1950. On the right is the cover of the draft report on EDVAC.