Nicola Fergola (29 October 175321 June 1824) was an Italian
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 ...
, professor in the
University of Naples
The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...
.
Life and work
Fergola studied in the
Jesuit school; he then went to the
university of Naples
The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...
in 1767, but he studied mathematics by his own because the university was only strong in law and medicine. From 1770 he was teaching, by royal appointment, in the ''Liceo del Salvatore'', a school founded in the same building where the Jesuit school had been (the Jesuit order was suppressed three years before).
In 1799, during the
Napoleonic
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...
period, he lived in
Capodimonte but, when the Borbonic monarchy was restated, he was appointed to the mathematics chair in the Neapolitan university.
In 1821 he suffered a
stroke which left him disabled for the rest of his life.
Fergola was one of the protagonists of an ideological quarrel among the Neapolitan scientists at the end of 18th and the first half of the 19th century. In the field of mathematics, the quarrel was about the use of synthetic or analytic methods. These polemics were coincident with the politically conservative conceptions of the former and the progressive views of the followers of the analytic method.
The Borbonic restoration in the
kingdom of the Two Sicilies, with his ultraconservative profile, made possible the maintenance of this school until the
Risorgimento
The unification of Italy ( it, Unità d'Italia ), also known as the ''Risorgimento'' (, ; ), was the 19th-century political and social movement that resulted in the consolidation of different states of the Italian Peninsula into a single ...
, but at the end of 19th century it was absolutely forgotten.
[, page 1500.] To see a taste of the quarrel, here are the words pronounced by
Gioacchino Ventura di Raulica in the obituary of Nicola Fergola:
The only work of Fergola is ''Prelezioni sui Principi matematici della filosofia naturale del cavalier Isacco Newton'', published in two volumes in 1792 and 1793. It is interesting to see the religious point of view of the Newtonian ''
force'' concept.
This religious conception is seen in all of Fergola's mathematical works. In 1839, was published Fergola's manuscript entitled
''Teorica de miracoli esposta con metodo dimostrativo''in which Fergola tried to demonstrate the possibility of the miracles in a mathematical way: proposition, demonstration, theorem, lemma, scolium, i.e.
References
Bibliography
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Fergola, Nicola
1753 births
1824 deaths
18th-century Italian people
18th-century Italian mathematicians
Italian Roman Catholics