Arthur William Conway PRIA (2 October 1875 – 11 July 1950) was a distinguished Irish mathematician and mathematical physicist who wrote one of the first books on relativity and co-edited two volumes of

William Rowan Hamilton Sir William Rowan Hamilton (4 August 1805 – 2 September 1865) was an Irish astronomer, mathematician, and physicist who made numerous major contributions to abstract algebra, classical mechanics, and optics. His theoretical works and mathema ...

's collected works. He also served as President of

University College Dublin University College Dublin (), commonly referred to as UCD, is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a collegiate university, member institution of the National University of Ireland. With 38,417 students, it is Ireland's largest ...

between 1940 and 1947.

Life and career

Born in

Wexford Wexford ( ; archaic Yola dialect, Yola: ''Weiseforthe'') is the county town of County Wexford, Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Wexford lies on the south side of Wexford Harbour, the estuary of the River Slaney near the southeastern corner of the ...

, he received his early education in St Peter's College, Wexford and proceeded to enter old University College, Dublin in 1892. He received his BA degree from the

Royal University of Ireland The Royal University of Ireland was a university in Ireland that existed from 1879 to 1909. It was founded in accordance with the University Education (Ireland) Act 1879 as an examining and degree-awarding university based on the model of the ...

in 1896 with honours in

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

, English,

Mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

and

Natural Philosophy Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe, while ignoring any supernatural influence. It was dominant before the develop ...

. In 1897, he received his MA degree with highest honours in mathematics and proceeded to

Corpus Christi College, Oxford Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517 by Richard Fo ...

, becoming University Scholar there in 1898, and studying under Augustus Love. Also in 1901, he was appointed to the professorship of

Mathematical Physics Mathematical physics is the development of mathematics, mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The ''Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the de ...

in the old University College Dublin and held the chair until the creation of the new college in 1909 until 1940. He also taught for a short time at St. Patrick's College, Maynooth. He married Agnes Christina Bingham on 19 August 1903; they had three daughters and one son. One of Conway's students was

Éamon de Valera Éamon de Valera (; ; first registered as George de Valero; changed some time before 1901 to Edward de Valera; 14 October 1882 – 29 August 1975) was an American-born Irish statesman and political leader. He served as the 3rd President of Ire ...

, whom he introduced to Hamilton's

quaternion In mathematics, the quaternion number system extends the complex numbers. Quaternions were first described by the Irish mathematician William Rowan Hamilton in 1843 and applied to mechanics in three-dimensional space. The algebra of quater ...

s. De Valera warmed to the subject and engaged in research of this novelty of

abstract algebra In mathematics, more specifically algebra, abstract algebra or modern algebra is the study of algebraic structures, which are set (mathematics), sets with specific operation (mathematics), operations acting on their elements. Algebraic structur ...

. Later, when de Valera became Taoiseach (he was also subsequently

President of Ireland The president of Ireland () is the head of state of Republic of Ireland, Ireland and the supreme commander of the Defence Forces (Ireland), Irish Defence Forces. The presidency is a predominantly figurehead, ceremonial institution, serving as ...

), he called upon Conway while forming the

Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies The Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS) () is a statutory independent research institute in Dublin, Ireland. It was established, under the Institute For Advanced Studies Act 1940, by the government of the then Taoiseach, Éamon de Vale ...

. Conway's earliest publications, dating back to 1903, were on the electromagnetic theory. He is remembered for his application of

biquaternion In abstract algebra, the biquaternions are the numbers , where , and are complex numbers, or variants thereof, and the elements of multiply as in the quaternion group and commute with their coefficients. There are three types of biquaternions cor ...

algebra to the

special theory of relativity In physics, the special theory of relativity, or special relativity for short, is a scientific theory of the relationship between space and time. In Albert Einstein's 1905 paper, "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies", the theory is presen ...

, and in 1915 published a 43-page tract "Relativity" in Edinburgh. He published an article in 1911, and in 1912 asserted priority over

Ludwik Silberstein Ludwik Silberstein (May 17, 1872 – January 17, 1948) was a Polish-American physicist who helped make special relativity and general relativity staples of university coursework. His textbook '' The Theory of Relativity'' was published by Macmill ...

, who also applied biquaternions to relativity. This claim was backed up by George Temple in his book ''100 Years of Mathematics''. In 1947 Conway put quaternions to use with rotations in hyperbolic space. The next year he published

quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics is the fundamental physical Scientific theory, theory that describes the behavior of matter and of light; its unusual characteristics typically occur at and below the scale of atoms. Reprinted, Addison-Wesley, 1989, It is ...

applications which were referred to in a PhD thesis by J. Lambek in 1950. In 1918, he was the

Irish Parliamentary Party The Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP; commonly called the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) was formed in 1874 by Isaac Butt, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish nati ...

candidate in South Londonderry and in the

National University A national university is mainly a university created or managed by a government, but which may also at the same time operate autonomously without direct control by the state. In the United States, the term "national university" connotes the highe ...

, coming second in both. Arthur Conway continued his scholarship in the fields of mathematics and theoretical physics, and made a special study of

. With J. L. Synge, he edited the first volume of Hamilton's mathematical papers and with A. J. McConnell he edited the second volume of Hamilton's mathematical papers. Conway was also active in college life, being appointed Registrar, a position he occupied until his election as president in 1940. He retired in 1947 from the presidency of UCD. In 1953, some of his writings were edited by J. McConnell for publication by the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. He was an Invited Speaker of the ICM in Toronto in 1924, in 1932 in Zurich, and in 1936 in Oslo. He was elected President of the

Royal Irish Academy The Royal Irish Academy (RIA; ), based in Dublin, is an academic body that promotes study in the natural sciences, arts, literature, and social sciences. It is Ireland's premier List of Irish learned societies, learned society and one of its le ...

from 1937 to 1940. In October 1975, to mark the centenary of his birth, UCD hosted the AC Conway Memorial Mathematical Symposium. Speakers included

Roger Penrose Sir Roger Penrose (born 8 August 1931) is an English mathematician, mathematical physicist, Philosophy of science, philosopher of science and Nobel Prize in Physics, Nobel Laureate in Physics. He is Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics i ...

, Ian Sneddon, and William B. Bonnor. In his obituary, E.T. Whittaker referred to Conway as the "most distinguished Irish Catholic man of science of his generation."

Books

* 1915
Relativity
G. Bell & Sons (Edinburgh Mathematical Tracts No. 3) via

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

* 1931: ''The Mathematical Papers of Sir William Rowan Hamilton: Volume 1, Geometrical Optics'', Cambridge (edited with J L Synge) * 1940: ''The Mathematical Papers of Sir William Rowan Hamilton: Volume 2, Dynamics'', Cambridge (edited with J L Synge)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Conway, Arthur W. 1875 births 1949 deaths Scientists from County Wexford Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford Alumni of the Royal University of Ireland Presidents of University College Dublin Irish relativity theorists Presidents of the Royal Irish Academy Fellows of the Royal Society People educated at St Peter's College, Wexford 20th-century Irish physicists 20th-century Irish mathematicians