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History Of Optics
Optics began with the development of lenses by the ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians, followed by theories on light and vision developed by ancient Greek philosophers, and the development of geometrical optics in the Greco-Roman world. The word ''optics'' is derived from the Greek term meaning 'appearance, look'. Optics was significantly reformed by the developments in the medieval Islamic world, such as the beginnings of physical and physiological optics, and then significantly advanced in early modern Europe, where diffractive optics began. These earlier studies on optics are now known as "classical optics". The term "modern optics" refers to areas of optical research that largely developed in the 20th century, such as wave optics and quantum optics. Early history In the fifth century BCE, Empedocles postulated that everything was composed of four elements; fire, air, earth and water. He believed that Aphrodite made the human eye out of the four elements and that she ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Orbit 2
In celestial mechanics, an orbit (also known as orbital revolution) is the curved trajectory of an object such as the trajectory of a planet around a star, or of a natural satellite around a planet, or of an artificial satellite around an object or position in space such as a planet, moon, asteroid, or Lagrange point. Normally, orbit refers to a regularly repeating trajectory, although it may also refer to a non-repeating trajectory. To a close approximation, planets and satellites follow elliptic orbits, with the center of mass being orbited at a focal point of the ellipse, as described by Kepler's laws of planetary motion. For most situations, orbital motion is adequately approximated by Newtonian mechanics, which explains gravity as a force obeying an inverse-square law. However, Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity, which accounts for gravity as due to curvature of spacetime, with orbits following geodesics, provides a more accurate calculation and understanding o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Classical Element
The classical elements typically refer to Earth (classical element), earth, Water (classical element), water, Air (classical element), air, Fire (classical element), fire, and (later) Aether (classical element), aether which were proposed to explain the nature and complexity of all matter in terms of simpler Substance theory, substances. Ancient cultures in Ancient Greece, Greece, Angola, Ancient Tibet, Tibet, Ancient India, India, and Mali had similar lists which sometimes referred, in local languages, to "air" as "wind", and to "aether" as "space". These different cultures and even individual philosophers had widely varying explanations concerning their attributes and how they related to observable phenomena as well as cosmology. Sometimes these theories overlapped with mythology and were personification, personified in deities. Some of these interpretations included atomism (the idea of very small, indivisible portions of matter), but other interpretations considered the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Buddhist
Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or 5th century Before the Common Era, BCE. It is the Major religious groups, world's fourth-largest religion, with about 500 million followers, known as Buddhists, who comprise four percent of the global population. It arose in the eastern Gangetic plain as a movement in the 5th century BCE, and gradually spread throughout much of Asia. Buddhism has subsequently played a major role in Asian culture and spirituality, eventually spreading to Western world, the West in the 20th century. According to tradition, the Buddha instructed his followers in a path of bhavana, development which leads to Enlightenment in Buddhism, awakening and moksha, full liberation from ''Duḥkha, dukkha'' (). He regarded this path as a Middle Way between extremes su ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hero Of Alexandria
Hero of Alexandria (; , , also known as Heron of Alexandria ; probably 1st or 2nd century AD) was a Greek mathematician and engineer who was active in Alexandria in Egypt during the Roman era. He has been described as the greatest experimentalist of antiquity and a representative of the Hellenistic scientific tradition. Hero published a well-recognized description of a steam-powered device called an '' aeolipile'', also known as "Hero's engine". Among his most famous inventions was a windwheel, constituting the earliest instance of wind harnessing on land. In his work ''Mechanics'', he described pantographs. Some of his ideas were derived from the works of Ctesibius. In mathematics, he wrote a commentary on Euclid's ''Elements'' and a work on applied geometry known as the ''Metrica''. He is mostly remembered for Heron's formula; a way to calculate the area of a triangle using only the lengths of its sides. Much of Hero's original writings and designs have been lost, bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Atomism
Atomism () is a natural philosophy proposing that the physical universe is composed of fundamental indivisible components known as atoms. References to the concept of atomism and its Atom, atoms appeared in both Ancient Greek philosophy, ancient Greek and Ancient Indian philosophy, ancient Indian philosophical traditions. Leucippus is the earliest figure whose commitment to atomism is well attested and he is usually credited with inventing atomism. He and other ancient Greek atomists theorized that nature consists of two fundamental Principle (philosophy), principles: ''atom'' and Void (philosophy), ''void''. Clusters of different shapes, arrangements, and positions give rise to the various macroscopic Substance (philosophy), substances in the world.Berryman, Sylvia, "Ancient Atomism", ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)online/ref> Indian Buddhists, such as Dharmakirti ( 6th or 7th century) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Rome
In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC), the Roman Republic (50927 BC), and the Roman Empire (27 BC476 AD) until the fall of the western empire. Ancient Rome began as an Italic peoples, Italic settlement, traditionally dated to 753 BC, beside the River Tiber in the Italian peninsula. The settlement grew into the city and polity of Rome, and came to control its neighbours through a combination of treaties and military strength. It eventually controlled the Italian Peninsula, assimilating the Greece, Greek culture of southern Italy (Magna Graecia) and the Etruscans, Etruscan culture, and then became the dominant power in the Mediterranean region and parts of Europe. At its hei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( ; ; – October 15, 55 BC) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem '' De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, which usually is translated into English as ''On the Nature of Things''—and somewhat less often as ''On the Nature of the Universe''. Very little is known about Lucretius's life; the only certainty is that he was either a friend or client of Gaius Memmius, to whom the poem was addressed and dedicated. ''De rerum natura'' was a considerable influence on the Augustan poets, particularly Virgil (in his ''Aeneid'' and ''Georgics'', and to a lesser extent on the '' Eclogues'') and Horace. The work was almost lost during the Middle Ages, but was rediscovered in 1417 in a monastery in Germany by Poggio Bracciolini and it played an important role both in the development of atomism (Lucretius was an important influence on Pierre Gassendi) and the efforts of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzantine, Islamic science, Islamic, and Science in the Renaissance, Western European science. The first was his astronomical treatise now known as the ''Almagest'', originally entitled ' (, ', ). The second is the ''Geography (Ptolemy), Geography'', which is a thorough discussion on maps and the geographic knowledge of the Greco-Roman world. The third is the astrological treatise in which he attempted to adapt horoscopic astrology to the Aristotelian physics, Aristotelian natural philosophy of his day. This is sometimes known as the ' (, 'On the Effects') but more commonly known as the ' (from the Koine Greek meaning 'four books'; ). The Catholic Church promoted his work, which included the only mathematically sound geocentric model of the Sola ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Little Astronomy
''Little Astronomy'' ( ) is a collection of minor works in Ancient Greek mathematics and astronomy dating from the 4th to 2nd century BCE that were probably used as an astronomical curriculum starting around the 2nd century CE. In the astronomy of the medieval Islamic world, with a few additions, the collection became known as the ''Middle Books'' ( ), mathematical preparation for Claudius Ptolemy's ''Almagest'', intended for students who had already studied Euclid's ''Elements''. Works in the collection The works contained in the collection are: * '' Spherics'' by Theodosius of Bithynia: On spherical geometry, in the style of the ''Elements''. * '' On the Moving Sphere'' by Autolycus of Pitane: On the movements of points and arcs on a sphere as it rotates on its axis. * ''Optics'' by Euclid: On various effects involving propagation of light, including shadows, parallax, and perspective. * '' Phaenomena'' by Euclid: A treatise in 18 propositions, each dealing with important ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pappus Of Alexandria
Pappus of Alexandria (; ; AD) was a Greek mathematics, Greek mathematician of late antiquity known for his ''Synagoge'' (Συναγωγή) or ''Collection'' (), and for Pappus's hexagon theorem in projective geometry. Almost nothing is known about his life except for what can be found in his own writings, many of which are lost. Pappus apparently lived in Alexandria, where he worked as a Mathematics education, mathematics teacher to higher level students, one of whom was named Hermodorus.Pierre Dedron, J. Itard (1959) ''Mathematics And Mathematicians'', Vol. 1, p. 149 (trans. Judith V. Field) (Transworld Student Library, 1974) The ''Collection'', his best-known work, is a compendium of mathematics in eight volumes, the bulk of which survives. It covers a wide range of topics that were part of the ancient mathematics curriculum, including geometry, astronomy, and mechanics. Pappus was active in a period generally considered one of stagnation in mathematical studies, where, to s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Euclid
Euclid (; ; BC) was an ancient Greek mathematician active as a geometer and logician. Considered the "father of geometry", he is chiefly known for the '' Elements'' treatise, which established the foundations of geometry that largely dominated the field until the early 19th century. His system, now referred to as Euclidean geometry, involved innovations in combination with a synthesis of theories from earlier Greek mathematicians, including Eudoxus of Cnidus, Hippocrates of Chios, Thales and Theaetetus. With Archimedes and Apollonius of Perga, Euclid is generally considered among the greatest mathematicians of antiquity, and one of the most influential in the history of mathematics. Very little is known of Euclid's life, and most information comes from the scholars Proclus and Pappus of Alexandria many centuries later. Medieval Islamic mathematicians invented a fanciful biography, and medieval Byzantine and early Renaissance scholars mistook him for the earlier philo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greek Mathematics
Ancient Greek mathematics refers to the history of mathematical ideas and texts in Ancient Greece during Classical antiquity, classical and late antiquity, mostly from the 5th century BC to the 6th century AD. Greek mathematicians lived in cities spread around the shores of the ancient Mediterranean, from Anatolia to Italy and North Africa, but were united by Greek culture and the Ancient Greek, Greek language. The development of mathematics as a theoretical discipline and the use of deductive reasoning in Mathematical proof, proofs is an important difference between Greek mathematics and those of preceding civilizations. The early history of Greek mathematics is obscure, and traditional narratives of Theorem, mathematical theorems found before the fifth century BC are regarded as later inventions. It is now generally accepted that treatises of deductive mathematics written in Greek began circulating around the mid-fifth century BC, but the earliest complete work on the subje ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
