Giuseppe Barilli (20 April 1812 – 18 December 1894), also known under his pseudonym Quirico Filopanti, 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 ...

and politician.

Biography

Barilli was born in Budrio, near

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...

, Italy, on 20 April 1812. He graduated in 1834 in mathematics and became professor of mechanics and hydraulics in 1848. He was actively committed in the political affairs of the Italian unification movement and in 1849 took part in the establishment of the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Ki ...

. He was appointed secretary of the Assemblea Costituente (constituent assembly) and was the author of the ''Decreto Fondamentale'' ("Fundamental Decree") which on 9 February 1849 declared the temporal government of the Pope as forfeited and proclaimed the Republic. After the fall of the Republic he found shelter in the United States and afterwards in London, United Kingdom. Even after the formation of the

Kingdom of Italy The Kingdom of Italy ( it, Regno d'Italia) was a state that existed from 1861, when Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia was proclaimed King of Italy, until 1946, when civil discontent led to an institutional referendum to abandon the monarchy and f ...

and his return to Italy, he had to leave his appointment as teacher of

mechanics Mechanics (from Ancient Greek: μηχανική, ''mēkhanikḗ'', "of machines") is the area of mathematics and physics concerned with the relationships between force, matter, and motion among physical objects. Forces applied to object ...

at the

University of Bologna The University of Bologna ( it, Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna, UNIBO) is a public research university in Bologna, Italy. Founded in 1088 by an organised guild of students (''studiorum''), it is the oldest university in continu ...

since he repeatedly refused to take his oath of allegiance to the monarchy. In 1876 he was elected as a member of the Parliament for the Republican Party. He died poor in Bologna in 1894. In his work ''Miranda'' in 1858 he develops the idea of

time zone A time zone is an area which observes a uniform standard time for legal, commercial and social purposes. Time zones tend to follow the boundaries between countries and their subdivisions instead of strictly following longitude, because it ...

s. Filopanti's hypothesis was to ideally split up the earth into 24 areas (zones) along the lines of the meridians, each of which should have its own time. Each time zone should differ from the next by one hour, whereas minutes and seconds should coincide. The first time zone should be centred on Rome's

meridian Meridian or a meridian line (from Latin ''meridies'' via Old French ''meridiane'', meaning “midday”) may refer to Science * Meridian (astronomy), imaginary circle in a plane perpendicular to the planes of the celestial equator and horizon * ...

. The splitting into time zones should establish the local time (L). His hypothesis provided also with the establishing of a universal time (U) that should be used as only datum line in

astronomy Astronomy () is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, g ...

and telegraph communications.

Filopanti as paradoxer

Filopanti authored several books with peculiar titles, as ''Cesar at the Rubicon'' (1847), ''On the Uses of Canvas in Hydraulics'' (1866), ''God Exists'' (1881), ''God is a Liberal'' (1880), ''Synopsis of the Geouranian Theory, or On Some Singular Relations Between the Earth and the Sky'' (1862). His book ''Miranda. A Book Divided Into Three Parts, Entitled Souls, Numbers, Stars, on the Neo-Christian Religion'', London, 1858, was listed by Augustus De Morgan in his ''A Budget of Paradoxes''. A Budget of Paradoxes, London, 1915, volume II, page 93-94

References

External links

Cenni SISM
{{DEFAULTSORT:Filopanti, Quirico 1812 births 1894 deaths People from the Province of Bologna 19th-century Italian mathematicians Italian politicians