Isaac Todhunter
Isaac Todhunter | |
---|---|
Adams prize (1871) Burney prize | |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Mathematics |
Academic advisors | William Hopkins |
Isaac Todhunter FRS (23 November 1820 – 1 March 1884), was an English mathematician who is best known today for the books he wrote on mathematics and its history.
Life and work
The son of George Todhunter, a Nonconformist minister, and Mary née Hume, he was born at Rye, Sussex. He was educated at Hastings, where his mother had opened a school after the death of his father in 1826. He was at first at a school run by Robert Carr, moving then to one opened by John Baptist Austin.[1]
Todhunter became an assistant master at a school at
In 1844 Todhunter entered
He is buried in the Mill Road cemetery, Cambridge.[2]
Personal life
Todhunter married 13 August 1864 Louisa Anna Maria, eldest daughter of Captain (afterwards Admiral) George Davies, R.N. (at that time head of the county constabulary force). He died on 1 March 1884, at his residence, 6 Brookside, Cambridge. A mural tablet and medallion portrait were placed in the ante-chapel of his college by his widow, who, with four sons and one daughter, survived him.[2]
He was a sound Latin and Greek scholar, familiar with French, German, Spanish, Italian, and also Russian, Hebrew, and Sanskrit. He was well versed in the history of philosophy, and on three occasions acted as examiner for the moral sciences tripos.[2]
Selected writings
- Treatise on the Differential Calculus and the Elements of the Integral Calculus (1852, 6th ed., 1873)
- Treatise on Analytical Statics (1853, 4th ed., 1874)
- Treatise on the Integral Calculus (1857, 4th ed., 1874)
- Treatise on Algebra (1858, 6th ed., 1871)
- Treatise on differential Calculus
- Treatise on Plane Coordinate Geometry (1858, 3rd ed., 1861)
- Plane Trigonometry (1859, 4th ed., 1869)
- Spherical Trigonometry (1859)
- History of the Calculus of Variations (1861)
- Theory of Equations (1861, 2nd ed. 1875)
- Examples of Analytical Geometry of Three Dimensions (1858, 3rd ed., 1873)
- Mechanics for Beginners (1867)
- A History of the Mathematical Theory of Probability from the Time of Pascal to that of Laplace (1865)
- Researches in the Calculus of Variations (1871)
- History of the Mathematical Theories of Attraction and Figure of the Earth from Newton to Laplace (1873)
- Elementary Treatise on Laplace's, Lamé's and Bessel's Functions (1875)
- A history of the theory of elasticity and of the strength of materials from Galilei to the present time Vol I PtI Vol II Pt II
- Natural Philosophy for Beginners (1877).
An unfinished work, The History of the Theory of Elasticity, was edited and published posthumously in 1886 by Karl Pearson. A biographical work on William Whewell was published in 1876, in addition to many original papers in scientific journals.
Todhunter wrote textbooks on
Todhunter's major historical works include a history of the Probability theory from the time of Blaise Pascal to that of Pierre-Simon Laplace first published in 1865.[6][7]
Some of these are available at Isaac Todhunter's publications at Google Books.
References
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/27493. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ a b c d e Lee, Sidney, ed. (1898). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 56. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- ^ "Todhunter, Isaac (TDHR844I)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
- ^ "Todhunter; Isaac (1820–1884); Mathematician; Fellow of Royal Society". Search for Fellows. Royal Society. 5 June 1862. Retrieved 4 August 2008. [dead link]
- JSTOR 2301562.
- JSTOR 2333762.
- JSTOR 29787294.
Attribution: This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1898). "Todhunter, Isaac". Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 56. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
Further reading
- Obituary notices: Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. (1884) and Proc. Roy. Soc. 37, p. xxvvii (1884)
- A digital version of the above obituary is at the Gallica site.
- Obituary, The Eagle: A Magazine Support by Members of St. John's College. W. Metcalfe. 1885. pp. 94–98.
- Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 26 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 1044.
- Mullinger, J. B.; Rice, Adrian. "Todhunter, Isaac (1820–1884)". doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/27493. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
External links
- O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Isaac Todhunter", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews
- Isaac Todhunter (1873). The conflict of studies, and other essays on subjects connected with education. Macmilla and Company. p. 33.
- Isaac Todhunter (1876). William Whewell, D. D., Master of Trinity College, Cambridge: An Account of His Writings with Selections from His Literary and Scientific Correspondence. Macmillan and Company. ISBN 9780598006356.
- Works by Isaac Todhunter at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about Isaac Todhunter at Internet Archive