“Letters from a Father to His Daughter” echo strong sentiments among most young girls in India. A similar series of letters was written in about 1750s in Europe and was equally popular in the then society. Jawaharlal Nehru told stories of civilization and natural history to his daughter Indira Gandhi where as the earlier edition was written to give basic lessons in mechanics, physical optics, astronomy, sound etc. “letters to a German Princess” as it is known was intended for the niece of the Emperor Fredrick, the Great of Prussia, Princess Anhalt Dessau. These letters were circulated in seven languages in book form across several countries including the US. The writer of this book was surprisingly a mathematician, of an order to which belong Sir Issac Newton and Rene Descartes. His name was Leonhard Euler.
In 18th century, every nation attempted control over seas as it conferred great military advantage. The long and almost unending British hegemony over a large part of the world was chiefly due to its naval power. Naval power essentially constituted in determining the coordinates of a ship in an ocean. In 1727, the prize problem of The Paris Academy was to determine mathematically the place where the mast should be placed on the deck of the ship. Leonhard Euler stood second in this competition losing only to Pierre Bouguer, Father of naval architecture. He later won this prize twelve times.
Euler introduced ideas in mathematics that we take as given today. The concept of function f(x) to denote the function f applied to argument x, modern notations of Sine, Cosine, Tan etc in trigonometry, popularized use of π to denote the ratio between circumference and diameter of a circle, began the use of ∑ for summation, i for imaginary numbers and e for the base of natural algorithm. He is also credited with the famous statement made to the philosopher Denis Diderot in the court of the Russian Empress Catherine the Great:
Sir, (a+b̂n)/n=x, hence God exists.
Leonhard Euler, a Swiss mathematician but a universal hero who is worshipped every day when any student anywhere in the world rejoices in mathematics. For Euler, the world existed for mathematics and If the world did not fit in to his mathematical equations, too bad for the world. He was a mathematician valued by two powerful Kings, Frederick of Prussia and Catherine the Great of Russia. They not only rewarded him handsomely monetarily for his mathematical work but also accorded great respect in their court. This helped him greatly in taking care of a family of 18 and also his life in last 17 years when he worked without eyesight. Blindness made his ability keener and efforts more relentless, no wonder he was more prolific when blind.
Euler was a contemporary of several greats. He shared a love-hate relationship with Voltaire, the famous French author who continuously teased Euler by tying him into metaphysical knots, and French philosopher Denis Diderot who had to leave Great Catherine’s court after the famous repartee mentioned above. His life and work was also influenced by Daniel Bernoulli and Johann Bernoulli the famous physicists. He took over the position of the Head of Berlin Academy after Daniel Bernoulli and this position was refused bluntly by the great mathematician D’Alembert, when offered by King Frederick citing the offer as outrageous as it was inconceivable for him to put any other mathematician above Euler.
Euler was born in 1707, the year of Newton’s death. The time was ripe for Euler, the then mathematics comprised isolated branches and solutions to the problems therein but not a coherent whole. He unleashed the force of his genius on attempts at unification of mathematics. Today, time is again ripe, for another EULER.
In 18th century, every nation attempted control over seas as it conferred great military advantage. The long and almost unending British hegemony over a large part of the world was chiefly due to its naval power. Naval power essentially constituted in determining the coordinates of a ship in an ocean. In 1727, the prize problem of The Paris Academy was to determine mathematically the place where the mast should be placed on the deck of the ship. Leonhard Euler stood second in this competition losing only to Pierre Bouguer, Father of naval architecture. He later won this prize twelve times.
Euler introduced ideas in mathematics that we take as given today. The concept of function f(x) to denote the function f applied to argument x, modern notations of Sine, Cosine, Tan etc in trigonometry, popularized use of π to denote the ratio between circumference and diameter of a circle, began the use of ∑ for summation, i for imaginary numbers and e for the base of natural algorithm. He is also credited with the famous statement made to the philosopher Denis Diderot in the court of the Russian Empress Catherine the Great:
Sir, (a+b̂n)/n=x, hence God exists.
Leonhard Euler, a Swiss mathematician but a universal hero who is worshipped every day when any student anywhere in the world rejoices in mathematics. For Euler, the world existed for mathematics and If the world did not fit in to his mathematical equations, too bad for the world. He was a mathematician valued by two powerful Kings, Frederick of Prussia and Catherine the Great of Russia. They not only rewarded him handsomely monetarily for his mathematical work but also accorded great respect in their court. This helped him greatly in taking care of a family of 18 and also his life in last 17 years when he worked without eyesight. Blindness made his ability keener and efforts more relentless, no wonder he was more prolific when blind.
Euler was a contemporary of several greats. He shared a love-hate relationship with Voltaire, the famous French author who continuously teased Euler by tying him into metaphysical knots, and French philosopher Denis Diderot who had to leave Great Catherine’s court after the famous repartee mentioned above. His life and work was also influenced by Daniel Bernoulli and Johann Bernoulli the famous physicists. He took over the position of the Head of Berlin Academy after Daniel Bernoulli and this position was refused bluntly by the great mathematician D’Alembert, when offered by King Frederick citing the offer as outrageous as it was inconceivable for him to put any other mathematician above Euler.
Euler was born in 1707, the year of Newton’s death. The time was ripe for Euler, the then mathematics comprised isolated branches and solutions to the problems therein but not a coherent whole. He unleashed the force of his genius on attempts at unification of mathematics. Today, time is again ripe, for another EULER.
No comments:
Post a Comment