The War of guns and mathematics: mathematical practices and communities in France and its Western allies around World War I

2015 ◽  
Vol 52 (08) ◽  
pp. 52-4262-52-4262
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
World War ◽  
Mathematical Practices ◽  
And Mathematics

The Remarkable Story

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven J. Osterlind
Keyword(s):  
Probability Theory ◽  
World War I ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Conditional Probabilities ◽  
World War ◽  
Bell Curve ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
History Of ◽  
Napoleonic Era ◽  
And Mathematics

This chapter introduces the extraordinary story of “quantification,” the perception of seeing things—both the everyday and the extraordinary—through the lens of quantifiable events (i.e., via odds, probability, and likelihood). This concept arose when people learned how to measure uncertainty, through the development of probability theory. The chapter presents many examples of using probability for measuring uncertainty and sets the historical context for the following chapters by showing how the idea of quantification developed during a relatively brief period in history, roughly from the end of Napoleonic era through the start of World War I. This era saw a torrent of mathematical developments, specifically, the invention of probability theory, the bell curve, regressions, Bayesian conditional probabilities, and psychometrics. The chapter also explains that this book is not a history of probability theory but a story of how history and mathematics came together to fashion the current worldview.

scholarly journals George Paget Thomson, 3 May 1892 - 10 September 1975

1977 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 529-556 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Trinity College ◽  
World War ◽  
Chain Reaction ◽  
Cavendish Laboratory ◽  
Corpus Christi ◽  
Public Work ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
Mathematical Skill ◽  
Intractable Problem

George Paget Thomson was born in Cambridge on 3 May 1892 and died there on 10 September 1975. His father, Joseph John Thomson, had been Cavendish Professor for seven years when he was born, while his mother (Rose Paget) was the daughter of another very distinguished Cambridge professor, and before marrying J. J. Thomson had worked as one of his students in the Cavendish Laboratory. Cambridge, physics and mathematics were in George’s blood and he greatly enriched the first two of these. Best known for the discovery of the diffraction of electrons, he was a substantial contributor, scientifically and politically, to the early stages of the study of neutrons and to their use by way of the uranium chain-reaction; he also independently initiated work on the still-intractable problem of releasing energy by controlled nuclear fusion. Largely, though not originally, through his service in World War I, aerodynamics was an important interest for Thomson; in this, his mathematical skill was joined with a spirit of practical enquiry, for he flew aircraft as well as theorizing about them. After professorships in Aberdeen and London, during which the bulk of his scientific and public work was done, he returned to Cambridge as Master of Corpus Christi College, where he had been a young Fellow after graduating from Trinity College. Through this appointment, Corpus gained a still vigorous and a far-sighted Head, while Thomson had the satisfaction of guiding new college ventures and the enjoyment of being a superb host in Hall, Combination Room and Master’s Lodge.

scholarly journals Polish mathematicians and mathematics in World War I. Part I: Galicia (Austro-Hungarian Empire)

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 23-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanisław Domoradzki ◽  
Małgorzata Stawiska ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Mathematical Community ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Education ◽  
World War ◽  
Scientific Societies ◽  
Academic Level ◽  
Research And Teaching ◽  
Traditional Institutions ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
Polytechnical School

In this article we present diverse experiences of Polish mathematicians (in a broad sense) who during World War I fought for freedom of their homeland or conducted their research and teaching in difficult wartime circumstances. We discuss not only individual fates, but also organizational efforts of many kinds (teaching at the academic level outside traditional institutions, Polish scientific societies, publishing activities) in order to illustrate the formation of modern Polish mathematical community. In Part I we focus on mathematicians affiliated with the existing Polish institutions of higher education: Universities in Lwów in Kraków and the Polytechnical School in Lwów, within the Austro-Hungarian empire.

scholarly journals Polish mathematicians and mathematics in World War I. Part II. Russian Empire

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 55-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanisław Domoradzki ◽  
Małgorzata Stawiska
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Mathematical Community ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Broad Sense ◽  
World War ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The University

In the second part of our article we continue presentation of individual fates of Polish mathematicians (in a broad sense) and the formation of modern Polish mathematical community against the background of the events of World War I. In particular we focus on the situations of Polish mathematicians in the Russian Empire (including those affiliatedwith the University of Warsaw, reactivated by Germans, and the Warsaw Polytechnics, founded already by Russians) and other countries. Polscy matematycy i polska matematyka w czasach I wojny światowej. Część II. Cesarstwo Rosyjskie Abstrakt W drugiej części artykułu kontynuujemy przedstawianie indywidualnych losów matematyków polskich (w szerokim sensie) oraz kształtowanie się nowoczesnego polskiego środowiska matematycznego na tle wydarzeń pierwszej wojny światowej. W szczególności skupiamy się na sytuacji matematyków polskich w Cesarstwie Rosyjskim (także tych związanych z reaktywowanym przez Niemców Uniwersytetem Warszawskim i utworzoną jeszcze przez Rosjan Politechniką Warszawską) i innych krajach.

Through the prism of Spain. Socio-economic causes of different outcomes of Russian and Spanish civil wars

2017 ◽  
pp. 142-155
Author(s):  
I. Rozinskiy ◽  
N. Rozinskaya
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
World War I ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Spanish Civil War ◽  
Statistical Data ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Russian Civil War ◽  
World War ◽  
Common Features ◽  
Economic Well Being

The article examines the socio-economic causes of the outcome of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1936), which, as opposed to the Russian Civil War, resulted in the victory of the “Whites”. Choice of Spain as the object of comparison with Russia is justified not only by similarity of civil wars occurred in the two countries in the XX century, but also by a large number of common features in their history. Based on statistical data on the changes in economic well-being of different strata of Spanish population during several decades before the civil war, the authors formulate the hypothesis according to which the increase of real incomes of Spaniards engaged in agriculture is “responsible” for their conservative political sympathies. As a result, contrary to the situation in Russia, where the peasantry did not support the Whites, in Spain the peasants’ position predetermined the outcome of the confrontation resulting in the victory of the Spanish analogue of the Whites. According to the authors, the possibility of stable increase of Spanish peasants’ incomes was caused by the nation’s non-involvement in World War I and also by more limited, compared to Russia and some other countries, spending on creation of heavy (primarily military-related) industry in Spain.

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