Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier

Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier was born in 1768. After dabbling in religion and teaching he was swept up in the French Revolution although he was a revolutionary he ended up being thrown in jail for his support for the victims of the Reign of Terror, by other revolutionaries. After a while and change in politics he was released.

At the age of 27 in 1795, Fourier took a job as a faculty member at the Ecole Polytechnique. Although after a bit of time the politics once again found him and he was put back into jail for his past offense. After some input from some well-known colleagues, he was release and posted overseas working for Napoleon during his takeover of parts of Egypt, in 1798. It is thought that his “heat obsession” started while he was posted in Egypt.

Napoleon made Fourier the secretary of the Institute of Egypt, and then soon after he was appointed Baron. To avoid being entangled in Napoleons downfall he cut ties and resigned his post.

After this he started back on his research, mainly on heat flow. He published a paper on the analytical theory of heat, to the Academy of Science. In this paper he reported how to show heat as solid bodies and he also created mathematics that allowed scientist to be able to solve problems that were once thought impossible. He introduced the idea that “an arbitrary function, even one defined by different analytic expressions in adjacent segments of its range (such as a staircase waveform), could nevertheless be represented by a single analytic expression”.

Formula:

x/2 = sin x - (sin 2x)/2 + (sin 3x)/3 + � � �

Fourier considered heat flow in a ring, or bar that has been bent into a circle. By doing this, the temperature distribution is forced to be spatially periodic. There is almost no loss of generality because the circumference of the ring is supposed larger than the greatest distance that could be of physical interest on a straight bar conducting heat.

 Like most great inventors his works were subject to many skeptics, some of which were his past colleagues. He fought for 15 years to get his works published. Finally in 1822 it was published and by this time it had evolved in to an entire book.

www.uh.edu/engines/epi186.htm

www.uh.edu/engines/epi1878.htm

http://www.swarthmore.edu/NatSci/echeeve1/Ref/Fourier/FourierBio.html

Marin Mersenne

http://www.imss.fi.it/vuoto/emerse.html

Marin Mersenne was born on September 8th 1588 in the town on Oize, He was baptized on the day that he was born. His family was not well off, but despite this they sent him to the College du Mans to study grammar. When he was sixteen he attended the new established Jesuit school in La Fleche. This was a school that provided for students no matter their financial situation. After a while he decided to to venture to Paris to further his education. Once he was there he attended the College Royale du France. At this college he studied philosophy and attended many classes in theology at the Sorbonne. He also obtained the degree of Magister Atrium in philosophy. In 1611 he decided to be done with his studies and start a life in the monastery.

On July 16 1611 Mersenne enter the Order of Minims. This particular order was set up in 1436 by the St Francis of Paula. They are devoted to prayer, study and scholarships. They were very simple and wore robes of wool tied with a cord. In July 1612 Mersenne was ordained as a priest in Paris.  He was first posted to the monastery in Nevers. There he taught philosophy and theology.

He published his first two paper in 1623, L’usage de la raison and L’analyse de la vie spirituelle. These two papers were against atheism and skepticism.  He then wanted to write a paper on disproving magic. But after having another monk point out that this might not be the best idea he reconsidered. At this time there was a large anti magic and the expelling of sorceres in France. He then published L’impiete des deists. This paper was aimed at the French public, to help them understand what was going on.

“Mathematics was the area he studied in greatest depth, believing that without it no science was possible.” He put together a group of scientists and scholars from all over Europe. they would get together to compare notes and discuss the different experiments that they had been doing and were going to do. This group of was known as Academie Parisienis. They would meet weekly at each other’s houses.

Mersenne also had an interest in music. He spent a lot of time researching the speed of sound and acoustics. He published a paper on vibrating strings, L’harmonie universelle.

He spent most of his life teaching and helping other scholars further their scientific research. He died on September 1 1648. Even in death he wanted to further science, so he left his body for science.