◀ ▲ ▶History / 18th-century / Person: Boscovich, Ruggero Giuseppe

Person: Boscovich, Ruggero Giuseppe

Ruggero Boscovich's main work was in mathematical physics. He was the first to give a procedure to compute a planet's orbit from three observations of its position.

Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):

• There are at least three commonly used: the Italian version Ruggero Giuseppe Boscovich, the Croatian version Ruđer Josip Bošković, and the English version Roger Joseph Boscovich.
• Two less common forms are the French version Rogér Joseph Boskovic and the Latin version Rogerio Josepho Boscovich.
• The Dubrovnik Republic was, in the first few years of Boscovich's life, isolated from the wars and fighting which went on around it.
• Despite appearing in the middle of a war zone, the city was peaceful and it is doubtful whether the young Boscovich was aware of the fighting.
• The first education that Boscovich received was from the local priest who taught him the basics of reading and writing.
• Boscovich left Dubrovnik on 16 September 1725, crossed the Adriatic, then travelled by stage-coach to Rome.
• The year 1740 also marked the advent of a new Pope, Benedict XIV, and he would soon involve Boscovich in important roles.
• In 1742 Boscovich was asked to give an opinion on the cracks which had been evident in the dome of St Peter's for many years.
• (Poleni was also consulted about the problem and gave the same advice.) The Pope was well pleased with Boscovich's advice and he was given various other architectural tasks.
• Boscovich was the first to give a procedure to compute a planet's orbit from three observations of its position and he also gave a procedure for determining the equator of a planet from three observations of a surface feature.
• Boscovich published Theoria philosophiae naturalis reducta ad unicam legem virium in natura existentium in 1758.
• The influence of Boscovich's theory was wide in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries especially in Britain.
• Boscovich assumed point-atoms in opposition to hard, extended atoms.
• Earlier we analysed his treatise from this point of view in an attempt to cast light upon Boscovich's ideas concerning the question, much debated at the time, of what one might call 'the nature and constitution of the geometric continuum', a problem associated with the question of geometric indivisibles, which originated with the works of Bonaventura Cavalieri and was debated at length.
• Boscovich was therefore able to conceive of matter as made up of nonextensive material points acted upon by forces that not only are attractive, as determined by Newton's law of gravitation, but can also become repulsive at short distances; this explains the phenomenon of cohesion no less than that of the impenetrability and solidity of matter.
• Although Boscovich was a staunch Christian, he found his position in Rome becoming rather uncomfortable.
• Boscovich had submitted a memoir for the Grand Prix of the Academy of Sciences in 1752 on his study of Saturn and Jupiter.
• The prize was given to Euler but Boscovich had received an honourable mention.
• Boscovich, who attended meetings of the Academy of Sciences during his stay in Paris, was known in France for his studies on astronomy, the aurora borealis, and the measurement of the arch of the meridian through Rome and Rimini which he had carried out in 1739.
• After six months in Paris, Boscovich went to London where he was elected to the Royal Society on 15 January 1761.
• Boscovich planned to be in Istanbul to observe the transit himself, but due to the Venetian ambassador to Istanbul who was his travelling companion, he arrived too late to observe this important astronomical event.
• This criticism aroused more than a few perplexities in scientific circles, particularly in Lalande, one of Boscovich's assiduous correspondents.
• The Portuguese crown had expelled the Jesuits in 1759 and Boscovich had been openly critical of the lack of support given by Rome for his Order.
• What was Boscovich to do?
• Of course this was not the sort of post that the French would be happy to see held by a foreigner, so Boscovich became a French citizen.
• Finally let us look at Boscovich's scientific methodology.
• Boscovich describes with clarity the logical procedure by means of which he constructs his 'new world'.
• If Boscovich accepts in his statements on scientific methodology neither pure rationalism, nor Baconian induction, and appears as an adept of the experimental method, he has only slight recourse to this method.

Born 18 May 1711, Ragusa, Dubrovnik Republic (now Dubrovnik, Croatia). Died 13 February 1787, Milan, Hapsburg Empire (now Italy).

View full biography at MacTutor

Tags relevant for this person:

Astronomy, Origin Croatia

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@J-J-O'Connor

@E-F-Robertson

References

Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:

1. O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive