From Newton to Hawking: A History of Cambridge University's Lucasian Professors of Mathematics
Cambridge University Press
Edition: Illustrated, 8/21/2008
EAN 9780521663939, ISBN10: 0521663938
Paperback, 516 pages, 23.4 x 15.5 x 2.5 cm
Language: English
Cambridge University's Lucasian Professorship of Mathematics is one of the most celebrated academic positions in the world. Since its foundation in 1663, the chair has been held by seventeen men who represent some of the best and most influential minds in science and technology. Principally a social history of mathematics and physics, the story of these great natural philosophers and mathematical physicists is told here by some of the finest historians of science. The journey begins with the search for a benefactor able to establish a 'mathematicus professor honorarius', and travels through the life and work of the professors, exploring aspects from the heroic to the absurd. Covering both the great similarities and the extreme differences in mathematical physics over the last four centuries, this informative work offers interesting perspectives on world-famous scientists including Isaac Newton, Charles Babbage, G. G. Stokes, Paul Dirac and Stephen Hawking.
List of illustrations
List of contributors
Foreword Stephen Hawking
Preface
Timeline of the Lucasian professorship
Introduction
'Mind almost divine' Kevin C. Knox and Richard Noakes
1. Isaac Barrow and the foundation of the Lucasian professorship Mordechai Feingold
2. 'Very accomplished mathematician, philosopher, chemist'
Newton as Lucasian professor Rob Iliffe
3. Making Newton easy
William Whiston in Cambridge and London Stephen D. Snobelen and Larry Stewart
4. Sensible Newtonians
Nicholas Saunderson and John Colson John Gascoigne
5. The negative side of nothing
Edward Waring, Isaac Milner and Newtonian values Kevin C. Knox
6. Paper and brass
the Lucasian professorship 1820–39 Simon Schaffer
7. Arbiters of Victorian science
George Gabriel Stokes and Joshua King David B. Wilson
8. 'That universal æthereal plenum'
Joseph Larmor's natural history of physics Andrew Warwick
9. Paul Dirac
the purest soul in an atomic age Helge Kragh
10. Is the end in sight for the Lucasian chair? Stephen Hawking as Millennium Professor Hélène Mialet
Appendix. The statutes of the Lucasian professorship
a translation Ian Stewart
Index.