Ernest William Hobson
FRS (27 October 1856 – 19 April 1933) was an
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
mathematician
A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems.
Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change.
History
On ...
, now remembered mostly for his books, some of which broke new ground in their coverage in English of topics from
mathematical analysis
Analysis is the branch of mathematics dealing with continuous functions, limit (mathematics), limits, and related theories, such as Derivative, differentiation, Integral, integration, measure (mathematics), measure, infinite sequences, series (m ...
. He was
Sadleirian Professor of Pure Mathematics at the
University of Cambridge
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
from 1910 to 1931.
Life
He was born in
Derby
Derby ( ) is a city and unitary authority area in Derbyshire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Derwent in the south of Derbyshire, which is in the East Midlands Region. It was traditionally the county town of Derbyshire. Derby gai ...
, and was educated at
Derby School
Derby School was a school in Derby in the English Midlands from 1160 to 1989. It had an almost continuous history of education of over eight centuries. For most of that time it was a grammar school for boys. The school became co-educational an ...
, the
Royal School of Mines
The Royal School of Mines comprises the departments of Earth Science and Engineering, and Materials at Imperial College London. The Centre for Advanced Structural Ceramics and parts of the London Centre for Nanotechnology and Department of Bioe ...
, and
Christ's College, Cambridge
Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 170 graduate students. The college was founded by William Byngham in 1437 as ...
, graduating
Senior Wrangler in 1878.
He was the brother of the
economist
An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics.
The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...
John A. Hobson
John Atkinson Hobson (6 July 1858 – 1 April 1940) was an English economist and social scientist. Hobson is best known for his writing on imperialism, which influenced Vladimir Lenin, and his theory of underconsumption.
His principal and e ...
.
He became a Fellow of Christ's almost immediately after graduation. He made his way into research mathematics only gradually, becoming an expert in the theory of
spherical harmonics
In mathematics and physical science, spherical harmonics are special functions defined on the surface of a sphere. They are often employed in solving partial differential equations in many scientific fields.
Since the spherical harmonics form a ...
.
His 1907 work on
real analysis was something of a watershed in the British mathematical tradition; and was lauded by
G. H. Hardy
Godfrey Harold Hardy (7 February 1877 – 1 December 1947) was an English mathematician, known for his achievements in number theory and mathematical analysis. In biology, he is known for the Hardy–Weinberg principle, a basic principle of pop ...
.
[lms newsletter]
It included material on
general topology and
Fourier series
A Fourier series () is a summation of harmonically related sinusoidal functions, also known as components or harmonics. The result of the summation is a periodic function whose functional form is determined by the choices of cycle length (or ''p ...
that was topical at the time; and included mistakes that were picked up later (for example by
R. L. Moore
Robert Lee Moore (November 14, 1882 – October 4, 1974) was an American mathematician who taught for many years at the University of Texas. He is known for his work in general topology, for the Moore method of teaching university mathematics, ...
).
From 1924 to 1927
Robert Pollock Gillespie
Robert Pollock Gillespie FRSE (1903–1977) was a Scottish mathematician. He was twice President of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society (1946–7 and 1968–9). He published several important books on mathematics.
Life
He was born on 21 Novembe ...
studied under him.
He is buried in the
Parish of the Ascension Burial Ground in Cambridge, with his wife Seline, born 25 March 1860, died 10 June 1940, by whom he had four sons, one of whom Walter William (1894 - 1930) is buried with them in the same grave.
Works
* ''A Treatise on Trigonometry'' (1891)
''Theory of Functions of a Real Variable''(1907)
*
*
** Vol. I, 3rd edition (1927)
* ''
Mathematics, from the points of view of the Mathematician and of the Physicist'' (1912)
''Squaring the Circle''(1913)
''John Napier and the Invention of Logarithms, 1614''(1914)
''The Domain of Natural Science''(1923)
Gifford Lectures
* ''The Theory of Spherical and Ellipsoidal Harmonics'' (1931)
See also
*
Tonelli–Hobson test
In mathematics, the Tonelli–Hobson test gives sufficient criteria for a function ''ƒ'' on R2 to be an integrable function. It is often used to establish that Fubini's theorem may be applied to ''ƒ''. It is named for Leonida Tonelli an ...
*
Symmetry of second derivatives
In mathematics, the symmetry of second derivatives (also called the equality of mixed partials) refers to the possibility of interchanging the order of taking partial derivatives of a function
:f\left(x_1,\, x_2,\, \ldots,\, x_n\right)
of ''n'' ...
*
Squaring the circle
Squaring the circle is a problem in geometry first proposed in Greek mathematics. It is the challenge of constructing a square with the area of a circle by using only a finite number of steps with a compass and straightedge. The difficulty ...
References
External links
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hobson, E.W.
1856 births
1933 deaths
English mathematicians
20th-century British mathematicians
Fellows of the Royal Society
People educated at Derby School
Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge
Royal Medal winners
Senior Wranglers
De Morgan Medallists
Fellows of Christ's College, Cambridge
People from Derby
Sadleirian Professors of Pure Mathematics