Jean le Rond d'Alembert
Jean le Rond d'Alembert | |
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Awards | ForMemRS (1748) |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Mathematics Mechanics Physics Philosophy |
Notable students | Pierre-Simon Laplace |
Jean-Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert
Early years
Born in Paris, d'Alembert was the
You will never be anything but a philosopher—and what is that but an ass who plagues himself all his life, that he may be talked about after he is dead.[8]
Destouches secretly paid for the education of Jean le Rond, but did not want his
Studies and adult life
D'Alembert first attended a private school. The chevalier Destouches left d'Alembert an
In his later life, d'Alembert scorned the Cartesian principles he had been taught by the Jansenists: "physical promotion, innate ideas and the vortices". The Jansenists steered d'Alembert toward an ecclesiastical career, attempting to deter him from pursuits such as poetry and mathematics. Theology was, however, "rather unsubstantial fodder" for d'Alembert. He entered law school for two years, and was nominated avocat in 1738.
He was also interested in medicine and mathematics. Jean enrolled first as Jean-Baptiste Daremberg and subsequently changed his name, perhaps for reasons of euphony, to d’Alembert.[9]
Later, in recognition of d'Alembert's achievements, Frederick the Great of Prussia proposed the name "d'Alembert" for a suspected (but non-existent) moon of Venus, however d'Alembert refused the honor.[10]
Career
Part of a series on |
Classical mechanics |
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In July 1739 he made his first contribution to the field of mathematics, pointing out the errors he had detected in Analyse démontrée (published 1708 by Charles-René Reynaud) in a communication addressed to the Académie des Sciences. At the time L'analyse démontrée was a standard work, which d'Alembert himself had used to study the foundations of mathematics. D'Alembert was also a Latin scholar of some note and worked in the latter part of his life on a translation of Tacitus, for which he received wide praise including that of Denis Diderot.
In 1740, he submitted his second
In 1741, after several failed attempts, d'Alembert was elected into the Académie des Sciences. He was later elected to the Berlin Academy in 1746[11] and a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1748.[12]
In 1743, he published his most famous work, Traité de dynamique, in which he developed his own laws of motion.[13]
When the Encyclopédie was organised in the late 1740s, d'Alembert was engaged as co-editor (for mathematics and science) with Diderot, and served until a series of crises temporarily interrupted the publication in 1757. He authored over a thousand articles for it, including the famous
In 1752, he wrote about what is now called
In 1754, d'Alembert was elected a member of the
In 1757, an article by d'Alembert in the seventh volume of the Encyclopedia suggested that the Geneva clergymen had moved from
He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1781.[17]
Music theories
D'Alembert's first exposure to music theory was in 1749 when he was called upon to review a Mémoire submitted to the Académie by
Two years later, in 1752, d'Alembert attempted a fully comprehensive survey of Rameau's works in his Eléments de musique théorique et pratique suivant les principes de M. Rameau.
Although initially grateful, Rameau eventually turned on d'Alembert while voicing his increasing dissatisfaction with
D'Alembert also discussed various aspects of the state of music in his celebrated Discours préliminaire of
Personal life
D'Alembert was a participant in several Parisian
Death
He suffered bad health for many years and his death was as the result of a
Legacy
In France, the fundamental theorem of algebra is known as the d'Alembert/Gauss theorem, as an error in d'Alembert's proof was caught by Gauss.
He also created his ratio test, a test to determine if a series converges.
The D'Alembert operator, which first arose in D'Alembert's analysis of vibrating strings, plays an important role in modern theoretical physics.
While he made great strides in mathematics and physics, d'Alembert is also famously known for incorrectly arguing in Croix ou Pile that the
In
Fictional portrayal
List of works
- D'Alembert, Jean Le Rond (1743). Traité de dynamique (2nd ed.). Gabay (1990 reprint).
- D'Alembert, Jean Le Rond (1747a). "Recherches sur la courbe que forme une corde tenduë mise en vibration (Researches on the curve that a tense cord forms [when] set into vibration)". Histoire de l'académie royale des sciences et belles lettres de Berlin. Vol. 3. pp. 214–219.
- D'Alembert, Jean Le Rond (1747b). "Suite des recherches sur la courbe que forme une corde tenduë mise en vibration (Further researches on the curve that a tense cord forms [when] set into vibration)". Histoire de l'académie royale des sciences et belles lettres de Berlin. Vol. 3. pp. 220–249.
- D'Alembert, Jean Le Rond (1750). "Addition au mémoire sur la courbe que forme une corde tenduë mise en vibration". Histoire de l'académie royale des sciences et belles lettres de Berlin. Vol. 6. pp. 355–60.
- Recherches sur differens points importans du systeme du monde (in French). Vol. 1. Paris: Michel Antoine David. 1754.
- Recherches sur differens points importans du systeme du monde (in French). Vol. 2. Paris: Michel Antoine David. 1754.
- Recherches sur differens points importans du systeme du monde (in French). Vol. 3. Paris: Michel Antoine David. 1756.
- D'Alembert, Jean Le Rond (1995). Preliminary Discourse to the Encyclopedia of Diderot. Translated by Schwab, Richard N.; Rex, Walter E. University of Chicago Press.
- Traité de dynamique (in French). Paris: Jean-Baptiste Coignard (3.). 1743.
- Mémoire sur le calcul intégral (1739), prima opera pubblicata
- Traité de l'équilibre et du mouvement des fluides (1744)
- Réflexions sur la cause générale des vents (1746)
- Recherches sur les cordes vibrantes (1747)
- Recherches sur la précession des equinoxes, et sur la mutation de l'axe de la terre, dans le systême newtonien. A Paris: Jean Baptiste Coignard. 1749.
- Éléments de musique, théorique et pratique. Lyon: Jombert, Charles Antoine; Bruyset, Jean-Marie (1.). 1759.
- Essai d'une nouvelle théorie de la résistance des fluides[permanent dead link] (1752)
- Essai sur les éléments de philosophie (1759)
- Nouvelles expériences sur la résistance des fluides (in French). Paris: Jean François Louis Chardon. 1777.
- Éloges lus dans les séances publiques de l'Académie française (1779)
- Opuscules mathématiques[permanent dead link] (8 tomi 1761-1780)
- Œuvres complètes, Éditions CNRS, 2002. ISBN 2-271-06013-3
- ISBN 2-08-070426-5
- Nouvelles expériences sur la résistance des fluides, par mm. D'Alembert ... & l'Abbé Bossut ... A Paris: rue Dauphine, chez Claude-Antoine Jombert, fils ainé, libraire du Roi pour le Génie & l'Artillerie. 1777.
- Mélanges de littérature, de philosophie et d'histoire. London: printed for C. Henderson : and sold by T. Becket and P. A. De Hondt, in the Strand. 1764.
- [Opere] (in French). Vol. 1. Paris: A. Belin. 1821.
- [Opere] (in French). Vol. 2. Paris: A. Belin. 1821.
- [Opere] (in French). Vol. 3. Paris: A. Belin. 1821.
- [Opere] (in French). Vol. 4. Paris: A. Belin. 1822.
- [Opere] (in French). Vol. 5. Paris: A. Belin. 1822.
- Oeuvres et correspondances inedites (in French). Paris: Librairie Académique Didier. 1887.
See also
Notes
- ^ His last name is also written as D'Alembert in English.
- ^ "Alembert, d'". Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary.
- ^ "Jean Le Rond d'Alembert | French mathematician and philosopher". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 26 June 2021.
- ^ D'Alembert 1747a.
- ^ D'Alembert 1747b.
- ^ D'Alembert 1750.
- ^ Hall 1906, p. 5.
- ^ The National Cyclopaedia of Useful Knowledge, Vol I, London, Charles Knight, 1847, p.417.
- ^ "Jean Le Rond d'Alembert | French mathematician and philosopher". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 10 April 2023.
- ^ Ley, Willy. 1952. Article "Moon of Venus" in Galaxy Science Fiction July 1952. MDP Publishing Galaxy Science Fiction Digital Series, 2016. Retrieved from Google Books.
- ^ Hankins 1990, p. 26.
- ^ "Library and Archive Catalogue". Royal Society. Archived from the original on 10 April 2020. Retrieved 3 December 2010.
- ^ D'Alembert 1743.
- ^ History of Materialism and Critique of its Present Importance, "Kantand Materialism"
- ^ Jean LE ROND, dit d’ ALEMBERT (1717-1783) Secrétaire perpétuel www.academie-francaise.fr/immortels Archived 31 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Smith Richardson 1858, pp. 8–9.
- ^ "Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter A" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 14 April 2011.
- ^ a b Christensen 1989, p. 415.
- ^ Bernard 1980.
- ^ The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., s.v. "Alembert, Jean le Rond d'"
- ^ D'Alembert 1995, p. 38.
- ^ D'Alembert 1995, p. 69.
- ^ D'Alembert 1995, p. 100.
- ^ Israel 2011, p. 115: "D'Alembert, though privately an atheist and materialist, presented the respectable public face of 'la philosophie' in the French capital while remaining henceforth uninterruptedly aligned with Voltaire."
- ^ Force & Popkin 1990, p. 167: "Unlike the French and English deists, and unlike the scientific atheists such as Diderot, d'Alembert, and d'Holbach, such English scientists as David Hartley and Joseph Priestley presented their scientific theories as evidence for their scriptural views."
- ^ Horowitz 1999, pp. 52–53: "In positive theory there was a wide divergence between Voltaire's panpsychic deism and Diderot's physiological materialism, or d'Alembert's agnostic positivism and Helvetius' sociological materialism."
References
- Bernard, Jonathan W. (1980). "The Principle and the Elements: Rameau's Controversy with D'Alembert". Journal of Music Theory. 24 (1): 37–62. JSTOR 843738.
- Briggs, J. Morton (1970). "Jean le Rond d'Alembert". ISBN 0-684-10114-9.
- Christensen, Thomas (1989). "Music Theory as Scientific Propaganda: The Case of D'Alembert's Élémens [JSTOR 2709569.
- Crépel, Pierre (2005). "Traité de dynamique". In ISBN 9780444508713.
- Elsberry, Kristie Beverly (1984). Elémens de musique théorique et pratique suivant les principles de M. Rameau: an Annotated New Translation and a Comparison to Rameau's Theoretical Writings (PhD Dissertation). Florida State University.
- Force, James E.; Popkin, Richard Henry (1990). Essays on the Context, Nature, and Influence of Isaac Newton's Theology. Springer. ISBN 9780792305835.
- Grimsley, Ronald (1963). Jean d'Alembert. Oxford University Press.
- Hall, Evelyn Beatrice (1906). The Friends of Voltaire. Smith, Elder & Co.
- Hankins, Thomas L. (1990). Jean d'Alembert: Science and the Enlightenment. New York: Gordon and Breach. ISBN 978-2-88124-399-8.
- Horowitz, Irving Louis (1999). Behemoth: Main Currents in the History and Theory of Political Sociology. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 9781412817929.
- Israel, Jonathan (2011). Democratic Enlightenment: Philosophy, Revolution, and Human Rights 1750–1790. ISBN 978-0-19-954820-0.
- Smith Richardson, Nathaniel (1858). "Voltaire and Geneva". The Church Review. 10. G.B. Bassett: 1–14.
External links
- Works by or about Jean le Rond d'Alembert at Internet Archive
- Works by Jean le Rond d'Alembert at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
- D'Alembert's accusation of Euler's plagiarism at Convergence
- English translation of part of the Encyclopédie of Diderot and d'Alembert
- An Account of the Destruction of the Jesuits in France by Jean Le Rond d' Alembert (1766)
- Select Eulogies of the Members of the French Academy, With Notes by Jean Le Rond d' Alembert (1799)
- Correspondence with Frederick the Great
- Jean D'Alembert – Œuvres complètes Gallica-Math
- The ARTFL Encyclopédie, a project at the University of Chicago (articles in French, scans of 18th century print copies provided)
- O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Jean le Rond d'Alembert", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews
- The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project, product of the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library (an effort to translate the Encyclopédie into English)
- The Encyclopédie, BBC Radio 4 discussion with Judith Hawley, Caroline Warman and David Wootton (In Our Time, Oct. 26, 2006)