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Henri Poincaré
Times obituary
MATHEMATICIAN AND PHILOSOPHER.
FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.
PARIS, JULY 17.
M. Henri Poincaré, Professor of Mathematical Astronomy at the University of Paris, Member of the French Academy and of the Académie des Sciences, died suddenly this morning of an embolism of the heart. M. Henri Poincaré, although the majority of his friends were unaware of it, recently underwent an operation in a nursing home. He seemed to have made a good recovery and was about to drive out for the first time this morning. He died suddenly while dressing. Mme. Poincaré, who had been constantly with him throughout his illness, was present when he died.
The death of Henri Poincaré at the comparatively early age of 58 deprives the world of one of its most eminent mathematicians and thinkers Readers of The Times will remember the great reception which accorded him so recently as last May, when he delivered at London University a series of lectures on higher mathematics and the "Logic of the Infinite."
He was born at Nancy in 1854 and was a member of an old bourgeois family. His father was a Lorraine doctor of some eminence, and his grandfather had been a chemist. His uncle, an inspector of roads and bridges, was father of another eminent Academician, M. Raymond Poincaré, now Prime Minister of France and Minister for Foreign Affairs. A sister of Henri Poincaré, she is the wife of M. Emile Boutroux, the well-known writer on moral philosophy, member of the Institute, and Director of the Thiers Foundation for the Promotion of Higher Education.
Henri Poincaré began his education at the Lycée of Nancy. During the war of 1870 he served, as a mere boy, in the Ambulance Corps with his father. He passed with great distinction through the Ecole Polytechnique, intending to devote himself to the scientific study of mining. He made several expeditions to Austria as a mining school pupil and actually obtained an appointment as a mining engineer at Vesoul. But in 1879 he had taken his degree as Docteur ès Sciences and shortly after accepted an appointment as lecturer at Caen. His work was so brilliant that he was transferred to the University of Paris in 1881, where he lectured first on physical mechanics, then on mathematical physics and the calculation of probabilities, and ultimately on astronomical mechanics. In 1887 he was elected a member of the Académie des Sciences. In 1889 he won the prize offered by the King of Sweden, and open to mathematicians of the whole world, for a treatise on "Le problème des trais corps et les équations de la dynamique." From this time onward, his activity as a great mathematician and teacher was extraordinary. In 1887, when he came up for election to the Académie des Sciences, the number of his books and published writings had reached 300; in 1908, when he was elected a member of the Académie Française, the number was 1,300.
Only higher mathematicians are competent to appraise the value of his work, and their tribute to his eminence is universal. He was a corresponding member of learned bodies in Amsterdam, Berlin, Boston, Edinburgh, Stockholm, Copenhagen, St. Petersburg, Roine, Munich, and Washington, and of the Royal Society of London. The highest honorary degrees had been conferred upon him by the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Glasgow. Among the features of his mathematical and astronomical labors which the layman can merely enumerate was his evolution of an order of functions more general than those of the ellipse He gave these the name "Fuchsian Functions" in honor of the mathematician Fuchs. He applied these functions to the non-Euclidean geometry founded by Lobatchevski. In astronomy, he supported the theory that the ring of Saturn is formed of a multitude of small solid satellites. He proved that if the mass of the ring were fluid, its density ought not to be inferior to a limit which is higher than the highest limit established on other grounds by Maxwell. In physics, he did a great deal of most important work on the electromagnetic theory of light and on electric oscillations and kindred subjects. Among his numerous great works are "Cours de Physique Mathématique," in ten volumes; "Méthodes Nouvelles de la Mécanique Céleste," three volumes; "La Théorie de Maxwell et les Oscillations Hertziennes"; and "La Théorie du Potentiel Newtonienne."
PHILOSOPHICAL WORK.
By his "Science et Hypothèse," his "La Valeur de la Science," and his "Science et Méthode," as well as by lectures such as those which he recently delivered in London, he showed that his intellect had a wider scope than that of the pure mathematician and that he was able to connect his examination of the fundamental principles of mathematical and scientific reasoning with the great problems of psychology and metaphysics. His lectures were delivered with great vigour and eloquence, and he was able, in developing his hypotheses, to exercise an imagination which was almost poetic in its intensity and scope. He was always an advocate of an education based on literas humaniores, even for men of science, and he thus worthily perpetuated the great French tradition of Descartes and Pascal. One of his works ends with a metaphor not unworthy of Pascal himself. Human thought, he said in effect, is merely a flash of lightning, but that lightning is everything.
In the last article which he published a few days ago on his favourite topic of the stability of the universe, he raised the question whether it might not be better for him to abstain for a few years from publishing anything further on this subject until his studies and investigations had ripened. But he added, in words which now appear sadly significant, that he could not resign himself to abandoning the treatment of such a great topic, and one in which such considerable results had already been achieved, unless he were sure of being able some day to resume that subject which at his age he could not venture to guarantee.
The funeral will probably take place next Friday at 10 o'clock from the Church of St. Jacques du Haut Pas in Paris. The interment will be in the family vault at the Montparnasse cemetery.
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FUNERAL OF M. HENRI POINCARE.
FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.
PARIS, JULY 10.
The funeral of the eminent mathematician, M. Henri Poincaré, took place this morning. The religious ceremony was at the Church of Saint Jacques du Haut Pas, whither the coffin had been removed from M. Poincaré's house in the Rue Claude Bernard, followed by an illustrious funeral procession of French public men and men of science. A representative of M. Fallières conveyed to the widow the condolences of the President of the Republic. The President of the Senate and most of the members of the Ministry were present, and there were delegations from the French Academy, the Académie des Sciences, the Sorbonne, and many other public institutions. The Prince of Monaco was present, the Bey of Tunis was represented by his two sons, and Prince Roland Bonaparte attended as President of the Paris Geographical Society The Royal Society was represented by its secretary, Sir Joseph Larmor, and by the Astronomer Royal, Mr. F. W. Dyson. After the religious ceremony, all these deputations passed before the Prime Minister, M. Raymond Poincaré (cousin), M. Léon Poincaré (son), M. Lucien Poincaré (cousin), and M. Einile Boutroux (brother-in-law), who received their condolences on behalf of the family.
At the Montparnasse cemetery, where the interment took place, funeral orations were delivered by M. Guist'hau, Minister of Education; by M. Jules Claretie, on behalf of the French Academy; and by other representatives of scientific bodies and institutions. M. Claret, in his address, described M. Poincaré as a mathematician, geometer, philosopher, and man of letters, "who was a kind of poet of the infinite, a kind of bard of science." He applied to him the words of Pascal: "It reaches the extremes of science where the great names arrive." Both Henri Poincaré and his cousin, the Prime Minister, were born in Lorraine, and M. Claretie, alluding to this fact, said: "La Lorraine nous avait donné deux confrères dont les noms sont à eux âmes comme des revendications rétentives ... Je salue ici deux Lorrains de fière race qui ont bien servi, qui ont glorifié la patrie."
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MATHEMATICIAN AND PHILOSOPHER.
FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.
PARIS, JULY 17.
M. Henri Poincaré, Professor of Mathematical Astronomy at the University of Paris, Member of the French Academy and of the Académie des Sciences, died suddenly this morning of an embolism of the heart. M. Henri Poincaré, although the majority of his friends were unaware of it, recently underwent an operation in a nursing home. He seemed to have made a good recovery and was about to drive out for the first time this morning. He died suddenly while dressing. Mme. Poincaré, who had been constantly with him throughout his illness, was present when he died.
The death of Henri Poincaré at the comparatively early age of 58 deprives the world of one of its most eminent mathematicians and thinkers Readers of The Times will remember the great reception which accorded him so recently as last May, when he delivered at London University a series of lectures on higher mathematics and the "Logic of the Infinite."
He was born at Nancy in 1854 and was a member of an old bourgeois family. His father was a Lorraine doctor of some eminence, and his grandfather had been a chemist. His uncle, an inspector of roads and bridges, was father of another eminent Academician, M. Raymond Poincaré, now Prime Minister of France and Minister for Foreign Affairs. A sister of Henri Poincaré, she is the wife of M. Emile Boutroux, the well-known writer on moral philosophy, member of the Institute, and Director of the Thiers Foundation for the Promotion of Higher Education.
Henri Poincaré began his education at the Lycée of Nancy. During the war of 1870 he served, as a mere boy, in the Ambulance Corps with his father. He passed with great distinction through the Ecole Polytechnique, intending to devote himself to the scientific study of mining. He made several expeditions to Austria as a mining school pupil and actually obtained an appointment as a mining engineer at Vesoul. But in 1879 he had taken his degree as Docteur ès Sciences and shortly after accepted an appointment as lecturer at Caen. His work was so brilliant that he was transferred to the University of Paris in 1881, where he lectured first on physical mechanics, then on mathematical physics and the calculation of probabilities, and ultimately on astronomical mechanics. In 1887 he was elected a member of the Académie des Sciences. In 1889 he won the prize offered by the King of Sweden, and open to mathematicians of the whole world, for a treatise on "Le problème des trais corps et les équations de la dynamique." From this time onward, his activity as a great mathematician and teacher was extraordinary. In 1887, when he came up for election to the Académie des Sciences, the number of his books and published writings had reached 300; in 1908, when he was elected a member of the Académie Française, the number was 1,300.
Only higher mathematicians are competent to appraise the value of his work, and their tribute to his eminence is universal. He was a corresponding member of learned bodies in Amsterdam, Berlin, Boston, Edinburgh, Stockholm, Copenhagen, St. Petersburg, Roine, Munich, and Washington, and of the Royal Society of London. The highest honorary degrees had been conferred upon him by the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Glasgow. Among the features of his mathematical and astronomical labors which the layman can merely enumerate was his evolution of an order of functions more general than those of the ellipse He gave these the name "Fuchsian Functions" in honor of the mathematician Fuchs. He applied these functions to the non-Euclidean geometry founded by Lobatchevski. In astronomy, he supported the theory that the ring of Saturn is formed of a multitude of small solid satellites. He proved that if the mass of the ring were fluid, its density ought not to be inferior to a limit which is higher than the highest limit established on other grounds by Maxwell. In physics, he did a great deal of most important work on the electromagnetic theory of light and on electric oscillations and kindred subjects. Among his numerous great works are "Cours de Physique Mathématique," in ten volumes; "Méthodes Nouvelles de la Mécanique Céleste," three volumes; "La Théorie de Maxwell et les Oscillations Hertziennes"; and "La Théorie du Potentiel Newtonienne."
PHILOSOPHICAL WORK.
By his "Science et Hypothèse," his "La Valeur de la Science," and his "Science et Méthode," as well as by lectures such as those which he recently delivered in London, he showed that his intellect had a wider scope than that of the pure mathematician and that he was able to connect his examination of the fundamental principles of mathematical and scientific reasoning with the great problems of psychology and metaphysics. His lectures were delivered with great vigour and eloquence, and he was able, in developing his hypotheses, to exercise an imagination which was almost poetic in its intensity and scope. He was always an advocate of an education based on literas humaniores, even for men of science, and he thus worthily perpetuated the great French tradition of Descartes and Pascal. One of his works ends with a metaphor not unworthy of Pascal himself. Human thought, he said in effect, is merely a flash of lightning, but that lightning is everything.
In the last article which he published a few days ago on his favourite topic of the stability of the universe, he raised the question whether it might not be better for him to abstain for a few years from publishing anything further on this subject until his studies and investigations had ripened. But he added, in words which now appear sadly significant, that he could not resign himself to abandoning the treatment of such a great topic, and one in which such considerable results had already been achieved, unless he were sure of being able some day to resume that subject which at his age he could not venture to guarantee.
The funeral will probably take place next Friday at 10 o'clock from the Church of St. Jacques du Haut Pas in Paris. The interment will be in the family vault at the Montparnasse cemetery.
____________________________________________
FUNERAL OF M. HENRI POINCARE.
FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.
PARIS, JULY 10.
The funeral of the eminent mathematician, M. Henri Poincaré, took place this morning. The religious ceremony was at the Church of Saint Jacques du Haut Pas, whither the coffin had been removed from M. Poincaré's house in the Rue Claude Bernard, followed by an illustrious funeral procession of French public men and men of science. A representative of M. Fallières conveyed to the widow the condolences of the President of the Republic. The President of the Senate and most of the members of the Ministry were present, and there were delegations from the French Academy, the Académie des Sciences, the Sorbonne, and many other public institutions. The Prince of Monaco was present, the Bey of Tunis was represented by his two sons, and Prince Roland Bonaparte attended as President of the Paris Geographical Society The Royal Society was represented by its secretary, Sir Joseph Larmor, and by the Astronomer Royal, Mr. F. W. Dyson. After the religious ceremony, all these deputations passed before the Prime Minister, M. Raymond Poincaré (cousin), M. Léon Poincaré (son), M. Lucien Poincaré (cousin), and M. Einile Boutroux (brother-in-law), who received their condolences on behalf of the family.
At the Montparnasse cemetery, where the interment took place, funeral orations were delivered by M. Guist'hau, Minister of Education; by M. Jules Claretie, on behalf of the French Academy; and by other representatives of scientific bodies and institutions. M. Claret, in his address, described M. Poincaré as a mathematician, geometer, philosopher, and man of letters, "who was a kind of poet of the infinite, a kind of bard of science." He applied to him the words of Pascal: "It reaches the extremes of science where the great names arrive." Both Henri Poincaré and his cousin, the Prime Minister, were born in Lorraine, and M. Claretie, alluding to this fact, said: "La Lorraine nous avait donné deux confrères dont les noms sont à eux âmes comme des revendications rétentives ... Je salue ici deux Lorrains de fière race qui ont bien servi, qui ont glorifié la patrie."
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