and proposed using a GRAPHfor plotting VARIABLEs. He taught
against Aristotle’s astronomy more than 100 years before the
birth of Copernicus, but ultimately decided that his ideas about
the motion of the Earth were wrong. He also worked on
FRACTIONAL EXPONENTSand the science of light.Oughtred, William (1574–1660) A British theologian who tutored
students in mathematics, including JOHN WALLIS, Oughtred is
famous for his book Clavis Mathematicae,which introduced
the symbol x for MULTIPLICATIONand covered Hindu-Arabic
numbers and DECIMAL FRACTIONs. He is also known for
inventing the predecessor to the slide rule, and is often credited
as the inventor of the circular slide rule, which he wrote about
in his book Circles of Proportion and the Horizontal
Instrument,although there is some argument that another
mathematician might have invented it prior to Oughtred.Pacioli, Lucas (Luca Pacioli, Lucas de Burgo, Lucas Paciolus)
(ca. 1445–1517) Italian theologian and mathematician whose
importance to the field of mathematics lies in the books he
compiled of the work of others. He wrote three books that
were intended for his students and were unpublished, in 1470,
1477, and 1480, of which only one still exists. His first
published work, Summa de Arithmetica, Geometria,
Proporzioni e Proporziolalita,a 600-page book published in
1494, is considered his most famous work, and included
everything known about mathematics at the time, with
information on arithmetic, algebra, geometry, money, weights
and measures, bookkeeping, and gaming. He published Divina
Proportionein 1509, a series of three books dealing with the
golden RATIO, also known as the divine proportion, some of
Euclid’s THEOREMs, and POLYGONs. This book was illustrated
by his close friend Leonardo da Vinci.Pascal, Blaise (1623–62) A French mathematician forbidden to study
mathematics as a child, Pascal went on to make important
contributions to the disciplines of algebra and geometry. Pascal
saw his first mathematics book, Euclid’s Elements,at the age of- At 14 he began to attend weekly meetings with some of
France’s visionary mathematicians, who eventually went on to
start the French Academy. His first geometry paper, regarding
conics, was written at the age of 16 and ultimately gave us a
BIOGRAPHIES Oughtred – Pascal
BIOGRAPHIES Oughtred – Pascal