Download or read book Calculus and Analytical Mechanics in the Age of Enlightenment written by Craig G. Fraser and published by Variorum Publishing. This book was released on 1997 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of 13 articles relating to developments in the history of 18th-century exact science, focusing on the writings of such figures as Jean d'Alembert, Leonhard Euler, and Joseph Louis Lagrange. The volume presents their work on the principles of calculus and the theory of motion, and serves to clarify the conceptual foundation of analysis and mechanics in the century following Newton. A detailed historical and critical study of conceptual change involving fundamental links between pure and applied mathematics is provided.

Download or read book Lacroix and the Calculus written by João Caramalho Domingues and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2008-06-17 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Silvestre François Lacroix was not a prominent mathematical researcher, but he was certainly a most influential mathematical book author. His most famous work is the three-volume Traité du calcul différentiel et du calcul intégral, which is an encyclopedic appraisal of 18th-century calculus that remained the standard reference on the subject through much of the 19th century. This book provides the first global and detailed study of Lacroix's Traité Traité du calcul.

Download or read book Leonhard Euler written by Ronald Calinger and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-12-03 with total page 689 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This is the first full-scale biography of Leonhard Euler (1707-83), one of the greatest mathematicians and theoretical physicists of all time. In this comprehensive and authoritative account, Ronald Calinger connects the story of Euler's eventful life to the astonishing achievements that place him in the company of Archimedes, Newton, and Gauss. Drawing chiefly on Euler's massive published works and correspondence, which fill more than eighty volumes so far, this biography sets Euler's work in its multilayered context--personal, intellectual, institutional, political, cultural, religious, and social. It is a story of nearly incessant accomplishment, from Euler's fundamental contributions to almost every area of pure and applied mathematics--especially calculus, number theory, notation, optics, and celestial, rational, and fluid mechanics--to his advancements in shipbuilding, telescopes, ballistics, cartography, chronology, and music theory. The narrative takes the reader from Euler's childhood and education in Basel through his first period in St. Petersburg, 1727-41, where he gained a European reputation by solving the Basel problem and systematically developing analytical mechanics. Invited to Berlin by Frederick II, Euler published his famous Introductio in analysin infinitorum, devised continuum mechanics, and proposed a pulse theory of light. Returning to St. Petersburg in 1766, he created the analytical calculus of variations, developed the most precise lunar theory of the time that supported Newton's dynamics, and published the best-selling Letters to a German Princess--all despite eye problems that ended in near-total blindness. In telling the remarkable story of Euler and how his achievements brought pan-European distinction to the Petersburg and Berlin academies of sciences, the book also demonstrates with new depth and detail the central role of mathematics in the Enlightenment."--Publisher's description.

Download or read book Science Philosophy and Religion in the Age of the Enlightenment written by John Gascoigne and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-10-28 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taking as its focus the wide-ranging character of the Enlightenment, both in geographical and intellectual terms, this second collection of articles by John Gascoigne explores this movement's filiation and influence in a range of contexts. In contrast to some recently influential views it emphasises the evolutionary rather than the revolutionary character of the Enlightenment and its ability to change society by adaptation rather than demolition. This it does by reference, firstly, to developments in Britain tracing the changing views of history in relation to the Biblical account, the ideological uses of science (and particularly the work of Newton) and their connections to developments in moral philosophy and the teaching of science and philosophy in response to Enlightenment modes of thought. The collection then turns to the wider global setting of the Enlightenment and the way in which that movement served to provide a justification for European exploration and expansion, developments which found one of their most potent embodiments in the diverse uses of mapping. The collection concludes with an exploration of the interplay between the experience of Pacific contact and the currents of thought which characterised the Enlightenment in Germany.

Download or read book Discovering the Principles of Mechanics 1600 1800 written by David Speiser and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2008-09-18 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book assembles 21 essays on the history of mechanics and mathematical physics written by David Speiser. Covering a period from the beginning of the seventeenth century to the eighteenth, the essays discuss developments in elasticity, rigid bodies, gravitation, the principle of relativity, optics, and first principles. They examine the work of Galileo, Huygens, Newton, Leibniz, the Bernoullis, Euler, Maupertuis, and Lambert.

Download or read book Reactionary Mathematics written by Massimo Mazzotti and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2023-05-12 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A forgotten episode of mathematical resistance reveals the rise of modern mathematics and its cornerstone, mathematical purity, as political phenomena. The nineteenth century opened with a major shift in European mathematics, and in the Kingdom of Naples, this occurred earlier than elsewhere. Between 1790 and 1830 its leading scientific institutions rejected as untrustworthy the “very modern mathematics” of French analysis and in its place consolidated, legitimated, and put to work a different mathematical culture. The Neapolitan mathematical resistance was a complete reorientation of mathematical practice. Over the unrestricted manipulation and application of algebraic algorithms, Neapolitan mathematicians called for a return to Greek-style geometry and the preeminence of pure mathematics. For all their apparent backwardness, Massimo Mazzotti explains, they were arguing for what would become crucial features of modern mathematics: its voluntary restriction through a new kind of rigor and discipline, and the complete disconnection of mathematical truth from the empirical world—in other words, its purity. The Neapolitans, Mazzotti argues, were reacting to the widespread use of mathematical analysis in social and political arguments: theirs was a reactionary mathematics that aimed to technically refute the revolutionary mathematics of the Jacobins. Reactionaries targeted the modern administrative monarchy and its technocratic ambitions, and their mathematical critique questioned the legitimacy of analysis as deployed by expert groups, such as engineers and statisticians. What Mazzotti’s penetrating history shows us in vivid detail is that producing mathematical knowledge was equally about producing certain forms of social, political, and economic order.

Download or read book Mechanics and Waves written by Remington Pitts and published by Scientific e-Resources. This book was released on 2018-09-12 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A mechanical wave is a an oscillation of matter, and therefore transfers energy through a medium. While waves can move over long distances, the movement of the medium of transmission-the material-is limited. Therefore, the oscillating material does not move far from its initial equilibrium position. Mechanical waves transport energy. This energy propagates in the same direction as the wave. Any kind of wave (mechanical or electromagnetic) has a certain energy. Mechanical waves can be produced only in media which possess elasticity and inertia. Mechanics is the study of the motion of matter and the forces required to cause its motion. Mechanics is based on the concepts of time, space, force, energy, and matter. The knowledge of mechanics is needed for the study of all branches of physics, chemistry, biology and engineering. The consideration of all aspects of mechanics would be too large a task for us. Instead, in this course, we shall study only the classical mechanics of non-polar continua. We shall concern ourselves with the basic principles common to fluids and solids. The mechanics are a physical science, since it deals with the study of physical phenomena. However, some associate mechanics with mathematics, while many consider it as an engineering subject. Both these views are justified in part. Mechanics is the foundation of most engineering sciences and is an indispensable prerequisite to their study. This book aim to provide the necessary foundation in wave mechanics which prepare the students for an intensive study of advanced topics at a later stage, much of wave mechanics requires a good knowledge of mathematics.

Download or read book The Routledge Companion to Eighteenth Century Philosophy written by Aaron Garrett and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-03-21 with total page 874 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Eighteenth century is one of the most important periods in the history of Western philosophy, witnessing philosophical, scientific, and social and political change on a vast scale. In spite of this, there are few single volume overviews of the philosophy of the period as a whole. The Routledge Companion to Eighteenth Century Philosophy is an authoritative survey and assessment of this momentous period, covering major thinkers, topics and movements in Eighteenth century philosophy. Beginning with a substantial introduction by Aaron Garrett, the thirty-five specially commissioned chapters by an outstanding team of international contributors are organised into seven clear parts: Context and Movements Metaphysics and Understanding Mind, Soul, and Perception Morals and Aesthetics Politics and Society Philosophy in relation to the Arts and Sciences Major Figures. Major topics and themes are explored and discussed, ranging from materialism, free will and personal identity; to the emotions, the social contract, aesthetics, and the sciences, including mathematics and biology. The final section examines in more detail three figures central to the period: Hume, Rousseau and Kant. As such The Routledge Companion to Eighteenth Century Philosophy is essential reading for all students of the period, both in philosophy and related disciplines such as politics, literature, history and religious studies.

Download or read book The Growth of Mathematical Knowledge written by Emily Grosholz and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mathematics has stood as a bridge between the Humanities and the Sciences since the days of classical antiquity. For Plato, mathematics was evidence of Being in the midst of Becoming, garden variety evidence apparent even to small children and the unphilosophical, and therefore of the highest educational significance. In the great central similes of The Republic it is the touchstone ofintelligibility for discourse, and in the Timaeus it provides in an oddly literal sense the framework of nature, insuring the intelligibility ofthe material world. For Descartes, mathematical ideas had a clarity and distinctness akin to the idea of God, as the fifth of the Meditations makes especially clear. Cartesian mathematicals are constructions as well as objects envisioned by the soul; in the Principles, the work ofthe physicist who provides a quantified account ofthe machines of nature hovers between description and constitution. For Kant, mathematics reveals the possibility of universal and necessary knowledge that is neither the logical unpacking ofconcepts nor the record of perceptual experience. In the Critique ofPure Reason, mathematics is one of the transcendental instruments the human mind uses to apprehend nature, and by apprehending to construct it under the universal and necessary lawsofNewtonian mechanics.

Download or read book Electromotive Forces written by Aiden Hopkins and published by Scientific e-Resources. This book was released on 2018-01-10 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The word "e;force"e; in this case is not used to mean mechanical force, measured in newtons, but a potential, or energy per unit of charge, measured in volts. In electromagnetic induction, Electro-Motive force (emf) can be defined around a closed loop as the electromagnetic work that would be done on a charge, if it travels once around that loop. For a time-varying magnetic flux linking a loop, the electric potential scalar field is not defined due to circulating electric vector field, but nevertheless an emf does work, that can be measured as a virtual electric potential around that loop. The electromotive force EMF of a source of electric potential energy is defined as the amount of electric energy per Coulomb of positive charge as the charge passes through the source from low potential to high potential. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. Author believes that this book is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Download or read book Algorithmic Modernity written by Morgan G. Ames and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-01-24 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The rhetoric of algorithmic neutrality is more alive than ever-why? This volume explores key moments in the historical emergence of algorithmic practices and in the constitution of their credibility and authority since 1500. If algorithms are historical objects and their associated meanings and values are situated and contingent-and if we are to push back against rhetorical claims of otherwise-then the genealogical investigation this book offers is essential to understand the power of the algorithm. The fact that algorithms create the conditions for many of our encounters with social reality contrasts starkly with their relative invisibility. More than other artifacts, algorithms are easily black-boxed. Rather than contingent and modifiable, they are widely seen as obvious and unproblematic-without context and without history. As an antidote, this volume keeps a clear focus on the emergence and continuous reconstitution of algorithmic practices alongside the ascendance of modernity. Its essays highlight the trajectory of an algorithmic modernity, one characterized by attitudes and practices that are best emblematized by the modernist aesthetic and inhuman efficacy of the algorithm. The volume moves from early modern algorithmic practices, centered on heuristics for arithmetic operations, emphasizing ruptures, shifts, and variations across times and cultures. By the age of Enlightenment, the term algorithm had come to signify any process of systematic calculation that could be carried out mechanically, but its meaning and implications are still distant from those familiar to us . It's in the nineteenth and twentieth century that the meaning of algorithm is sharpened through a new discipline and by adding sets of specific conditions-such as the condition of finiteness-which acquire new and crucial significance in the age of digital computing. Throughout, the connection between algorithms and modernity is one of our central concerns. Through detailed historical reconstructions of specific moments, thinkers, and cultural phenomena over the last five hundred years, these essays lead us to the definitions of algorithm most legible today and to the pervasiveness of both algorithmic procedures and rhetoric. This volume contributes a multi-faceted exploration of the genealogies of algorithms, of algorithmic thinking, and of the distinctly modernist faith in algorithms as neutral tools that merely illuminate the natural and social world"--

Download or read book Variational Principles in Classical Mechanics written by Douglas Cline and published by . This book was released on 2018-08 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two dramatically different philosophical approaches to classical mechanics were proposed during the 17th - 18th centuries. Newton developed his vectorial formulation that uses time-dependent differential equations of motion to relate vector observables like force and rate of change of momentum. Euler, Lagrange, Hamilton, and Jacobi, developed powerful alternative variational formulations based on the assumption that nature follows the principle of least action. These variational formulations now play a pivotal role in science and engineering.This book introduces variational principles and their application to classical mechanics. The relative merits of the intuitive Newtonian vectorial formulation, and the more powerful variational formulations are compared. Applications to a wide variety of topics illustrate the intellectual beauty, remarkable power, and broad scope provided by use of variational principles in physics.The second edition adds discussion of the use of variational principles applied to the following topics:(1) Systems subject to initial boundary conditions(2) The hierarchy of related formulations based on action, Lagrangian, Hamiltonian, and equations of motion, to systems that involve symmetries.(3) Non-conservative systems.(4) Variable-mass systems.(5) The General Theory of Relativity.Douglas Cline is a Professor of Physics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York.

Download or read book The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution written by David Marshall Miller and published by . This book was released on 2022-01-06 with total page 551 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of cutting-edge scholarship on the close interaction of philosophy with science at the birth of the modern age.

Download or read book Introduction to Metaphysics written by Gabby Mccarthy and published by Scientific e-Resources. This book was released on 2018-10-09 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of existence, being and the world. Arguably, metaphysics is the foundation of philosophy: Aristotle calls it "e;first philosophy"e; (or sometimes just "e;wisdom"e;), and says it is the subject that deals with "e;first causes and the principles of things"e;.It asks questions like: "e;What is the nature of reality?"e;, "e;How does the world exist, and what is its origin or source of creation?"e;, "e;Does the world exist outside the mind?"e;, "e;How can the incorporeal mind affect the physical body?"e;, "e;If things exist, what is their objective nature?"e;, "e;Is there a God (or many gods, or no god at all)?"e; Originally, the Greek word "e;metaphysika"e; (literally "e;after physics"e;) merely indicated that part of Aristotle's oeuvre which came, in its sequence, after those chapters which dealt with physics. Later, it was misinterpreted by Medieval commentators on the classical texts as that which is above or beyond the physical, and so over time metaphysics has effectively become the study of that which transcends physics. This book provides a detailed resume of current knowledge about the Metaphysics.

Download or read book Magic Memory and Natural Philosophy in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries written by Stephen Clucas and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-10-28 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of Stephen Clucas's articles addresses the complex interactions between religion, natural philosophy and magic in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe. The essays on the Elizabethan mathematician and magus John Dee show that the angelic conversations of John Dee owed a significant debt to medieval magical traditions and how Dee's attempts to communicate with spirits were used to serve specific religious agendas in the mid-seventeenth century. The essays devoted to Giordano Bruno offer a reappraisal of the magical orientation of the Italian philosopher's mnemotechnical and Lullist writings of the 1580s and 90s and show his influence on early seventeenth-century English understandings of memory and intellection. Next come three studies on the atomistic or corpuscularian natural philosophy of the Northumberland and Cavendish circles, arguing that there was a distinct English corpuscularian tradition prior to the Gassendian influence in the 1640s and 50s. Finally, two essays on the seventeenth-century Intelligencer Samuel Hartlib and his correspondents shows how religion alchemy and natural philosophy interacted during the 'Puritan Revolution'.

Download or read book The Collapse of Mechanism and the Rise of Sensibility written by Stephen Gaukroger and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2010-11-25 with total page 516 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did we come to have a scientific culture -- one in which cognitive values are shaped around scientific ones? Stephen Gaukroger presents a rich and fascinating investigation of the development of intellectual culture in early modern Europe, a period in which understandings of the natural realm began to fragment.

Download or read book Renaissance Astrolabes and their Makers written by Gerard L'E. Turner and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-10-28 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is about the archaeology of science, or what can be learnt from the systematic examination of the artefacts made by precision craftsmen for the study of the natural world. An international authority on historical scientific instruments, Gerard Turner has collected here his essays on European astrolabes and related topics. By 1600 the astrolabe had nearly ceased to be made and used in the West, and before that date there was little of the source material for the study of instruments that exists for more modern times. It is necessary to 'read' the instruments themselves, and astrolabes in particular are rich in all sorts of information, mathematical, astronomical, metallurgical, in addition to what they can reveal about craftsmanship, the existence of workshops, and economic and social conditions. There is a strong forensic element in instrument research, and Gerard Turner's achievements include the identification of three astrolabes made by Gerard Mercator, all of whose instruments were thought to have been destroyed. Other essays deal with the discovery of an important late 16th-century Florentine workshop, and of a group of mid-15th-century German astrolabes linked to Regiomontanus.