of Hanoi, and wrote a classic book on “recreational”
mathematics called Récréations mathématiques.Maclaurin, Colin(1698–1746) Scottish mathematician who entered
Scotland’s University of Glasgow at the age of 11 and became
devoted to mathematics after finding a copy of EUCLID’s
Elementsin another student’s room. Maclaurin received his
M.A. degree from the university at the age of 14 with a thesis
that expanded on Newton’s ideas, entitled On the Power of
Gravity.In 1719 he traveled to London and became a member
of the Royal Society, and soon became friends with Newton.
He worked to expand the Medical Society of Edinburgh to
include other branches of education, which ultimately became
the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His most important works are
Geometrica Organica,published in 1720, his 763-page
Treatise of Fluxionsregarding Newton’s calculus, and his
Treatise on Algebra,published in 1748. Unlike many of the
mathematicians of his time, he was highly regarded as a kind
and caring person who made himself available to anyone
interested in the ideas of mathematics.
Mahavira (Mahaviracharya) (ca. 800–70) Indian mathematician
whose only known book, Ganita Sera Samgraha,is the first
Indian text dedicated solely to the study of mathematics. Its
nine chapters include work on arithmetical OPERATIONS, the
place-value number system, FRACTIONs, squaring numbers,
INDETERMINATE EQUATIONs, calculating the VOLUMEof a
SPHERE,CUBE ROOTs, and AREA. This book, an elaboration on
BRAHMAGUPTA’s work, is considered all-inclusive of the
mathematics known during the ninth century.
Mandelbrot, Benoit(1924– ) French-born American mathematician
who spent his early years learning math mostly on his own due
to World War II, and for which he credits his success in being
able to think in unconventional ways. His greatest contribution
is in geometry. He is credited with creating the field of fractal
geometry, which he explained in his book Les objects fractals,
forn, hazard et dimension,published in 1975, and in his 1982
publication The Fr actal Geometry of Nature.
Mori, Shigefumi(1951– ) Japanese mathematician dedicated to
classification of algebraic varieties in algebraic geometry,
Maclaurin – Mori BIOGRAPHIES
Maclaurin – Mori BIOGRAPHIES