Johann Tobias Mayer (5 May 1752 – 30 November 1830) was a German
physicist
A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe.
Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...
. He was mainly well known for his mathematics and natural science
textbook
A textbook is a book containing a comprehensive compilation of content in a branch of study with the intention of explaining it. Textbooks are produced to meet the needs of educators, usually at educational institutions. Schoolbooks are textboo ...
s. ''Anfangsgründe der Naturlehre zum Behuf der Vorlesungen über die Experimental-Physik'', an 1801 physics text, was the most influential of its time in the German-speaking countries. Mayer's research in experimental
physics
Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...
and
astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...
appeared in ''
Annalen der Physik
''Annalen der Physik'' (English: ''Annals of Physics'') is one of the oldest scientific journals on physics; it has been published since 1799. The journal publishes original, peer-reviewed papers on experimental, theoretical, applied, and mathe ...
''. He is not to be confused with his famous father, the astronomer
Tobias Mayer
Tobias Mayer (17 February 172320 February 1762) was a German astronomer famous for his studies of the Moon.
He was born at Marbach, in Württemberg, and brought up at Esslingen in poor circumstances. A self-taught mathematician, he earned a l ...
.
Personal and professional life
Mayer, born in
Göttingen
Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...
, was the first child of Maria and Tobias Mayer. The elder Mayer, himself a well-known Göttingen professor of geography, physics, and astronomy, died in 1762 when Johann was only ten.
In 1769, Johann Mayer began studying theology and philosophy at the relatively new
Georg-August University of Göttingen under
Abraham Gotthelf Kästner
Abraham Gotthelf Kästner (27 September 1719 – 20 June 1800) was a German mathematician and epigrammatist.
He was known in his professional life for writing textbooks and compiling encyclopedias rather than for original research. Georg Chr ...
(and later also with
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1 July 1742 – 24 February 1799) was a German physicist, satirist, and Anglophile. As a scientist, he was the first to hold a professorship explicitly dedicated to experimental physics in Germany. He is remembered for ...
). After graduating in 1773, Mayer worked as a lecturer in mathematics and as an astronomer. On 17 November 1779, he was called to the
University of Altdorf
The University of Altdorf () was a university in Altdorf bei Nürnberg, a small town outside the Free Imperial City of Nuremberg. It was founded in 1578 and received university privileges in 1622 and was closed in 1809 by Maximilian I Joseph of ...
, where he worked from 1780 to 1786. He later taught mathematics and physics at
Friedrich-Alexander-University, Erlangen-Nuremberg, and in 1799, he succeeded Lichtenberg at Göttingen. His students included
Enno Heeren Dirksen, who, after obtaining his doctorate in 1820, advised
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi (; ; 10 December 1804 – 18 February 1851) was a German mathematician who made fundamental contributions to elliptic functions, dynamics, differential equations, determinants, and number theory. His name is occasiona ...
.
Mayer and his wife, Johanna, had five children. Mayer died in Göttingen.
The Leonardo da Vinci Proof of the Pythagorean Theorem
A proof of the
Pythagorean theorem
In mathematics, the Pythagorean theorem or Pythagoras' theorem is a fundamental relation in Euclidean geometry between the three sides of a right triangle. It states that the area of the square whose side is the hypotenuse (the side opposite t ...
ascribed to
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
is now claimed to have been authored by Mayer in 1772.
"On Leonardo da Vinci's proof of the Theorem of Pythagoras"
Franz Lemmermeyer, ArXiv
arXiv (pronounced "archive"—the X represents the Greek letter chi ⟨χ⟩) is an open-access repository of electronic preprints and postprints (known as e-prints) approved for posting after moderation, but not peer review. It consists of ...
, November 4, 2013
See also
* Lorentz force
References
External links
Entry
in the Mathematics Genealogy Project
The Mathematics Genealogy Project (MGP) is a web-based database for the academic genealogy of mathematicians.. By 31 December 2021, it contained information on 274,575 mathematical scientists who contributed to research-level mathematics. For a ty ...
Astronomie in Nürnberg (in German)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mayer, Johann Tobias
1752 births
1830 deaths
18th-century German mathematicians
University of Göttingen alumni
University of Göttingen faculty
19th-century German physicists
19th-century German mathematicians
18th-century German physicists