MATHEMATICIANS FOR TEST 3
Nicolai Lobachevsky (1793 - 1853)
Lobachevsky, a Russian mathematician, is credited with the first investigations into the geometry
of Euclid. In particular, he established a consistent model of geometry using the idea that given a
line and a point not on the line there are at least two lines through the point and parallel to the line.
Niels Hendrik-Abel (1802 - 1829)
A Norwegian mathematician, Abel was unable to obtain a teaching position and his poverty
compounded a pulmonary condition which caused his death at the age of 26. His mathematical
interests included works on function theory, infinite series and abstract algebra. He found that
there is no formula for solving equations above degree four.
William Rowan Hamilton (1805 - 1865)
An Irish mathematician, Hamilton was orphaned at an early age. His education was influenced
by an uncle who was a linguist and Hamilton read Greek, Hebrew and Latin by age five. His most
notable contributions in mathematics were in abstract algebra and graph theory. He devised a
system that did not have the commutative property. He did not do much after age 30. He was an
alcoholic.
Evariste Galois (1811 - 1832)
A French mathematician, Galois died tragically in a duel at the age of 21. His mathematical
contribution was most notable in group theory and in the area of algebra dealing with the solution
of polynomial equations.
quadratic formula:
to find the 2 values of x in ax2 + bx + c = 0
-b +
x
=
b2 - 4ac
2a
George Boole (1815 - 1864)
Boole was the link between the mathematical logic of Leibniz and Whitehead and Russell's
Principia. His most famous work is The Mathematical Analysis of Logic, Being an Essay
Towards a Calculus of Deductive Reasoning.
Boole was an Englishman. He gave us Boolean Algebra which deals with the binary digits
0 and 1. In Computer Science, a bit is the basic unit for storing data in main computer memory.
A bit which contains the value zero (0) is said to be “off,” and a bit which contains the value one
(1) is said to be “on.”
Karl Weierstrass (1815 - 1897)
One of the great teachers of mathematics, Weierstrass' early papers were largely ignored because
he was a high school teacher at the time. At the age of 40, he obtained an instructorship at the
University of Berlin. His greatest contributions were to geometry and function theory, much of
his work being credited to his students with whom he freely shared his mathematical findings.
Georg Friedrich Bernhard Riemann (1826 - 1866)
The son of a Lutheran pastor, Riemann's mathematical contributions were most influential in
complex variables and geometry. In particular, he offered alternative geometries to those of
Euclid and Lobachevsky which were later used by Einstein in developing the theory of relativity.
Lewis Carroll (1832-1898)
Lewis Carroll was the pen name for Charles Dodgson. Dodgson taught at Oxford University in
England and delighted in thinking up challenging mathematical problems to amuse his friends and
educate his pupils. His books, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking
Glass, contain many subtle allusions to mathematical concepts and many adults have enjoyed
analyzing the clever wit and twisted logic found in them.
George Cantor (1845 - 1918)
Born of Danish parents in Russia, Cantor moved with his family to Germany in 1856. Cantor
established the basis for modern set theory and the theory of the infinite. After a long teaching
career at the University of Halle, he died at a mental hospital in Halle in 1918.
Sonja Kovalevsky (1850 - 1891)
Kovalevsky recalls that she first was exposed to mathematics when her father papered the nursery
with notes from his calculus class. Unable to enter the Russian University system, she went to
Germany and studied unofficially with Weierstrass in Berlin. He persuaded another German
university to give her a Ph.D. in absentia. Her work on celestial mechanics won the Prix Bordin
in 1888.