Johann Gustav Hermes

Johann Gustav Hermes (born June 20, 1846 in Königsberg , † June 8, 1912 in Bad Oeynhausen ) was a German mathematician .

Life

After graduating from the Kneiphöfischen Gymnasium in Königsberg in 1866 , Hermes studied mathematics in his hometown from 1866 to 1870 . He completed his studies after an interruption by participating in the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871) on December 14, 1872 with the state examination in mathematics and received his doctorate on April 5, 1879 with a dissertation on “ Reducing the problem of circular healing linear equations (for prime numbers of the form 2 ^m +1) ”.

After a year of probation at the Realgymnasium Insterburg , Hermes worked from 1873 as a teacher at the Progymnasium of the Royal Orphanage in Königsberg in Prussia , from 1883 on as a senior teacher. In 1893 he became a professor at the Georgianum grammar school in Lingen , and on April 1, 1899, he became professor and director of the Osnabrück grammar school (today Ernst-Moritz-Arndt grammar school). On December 31, 1906, he requested early release from active service due to illness. After his death, he was buried in Osnabrück on June 12, 1912.

Special achievement

In 1889, Hermes completed over a decade of efforts to find and write down a method for constructing the regular 65537 corner using only compasses and ruler. According to Carl Friedrich Gauß (1796), a constructible polygon had to correspond to a Fermat's prime number ( Fermat numbers ) in terms of the number of sides , five of which were known (to this day no others are known): 3, 5, 17, 257 and 65537. Gauss himself constructed the 17 gon explicitly with compasses and ruler, and the 257 gon was then also explicitly constructed ( Magnus Georg Paucker 1822, Friedrich Julius Richelot 1832). The last case that Hermes tackled remained open. His large-format, 221-page manuscript, accurately provided with many tables and drawings, is now stored in the Mathematical Institute of the University of Göttingen in a wooden case that was specially made for it at the time and is an attraction there for visitors who visit the institute for this reason. He published a summary in the news of the Göttingen Academy.

In his introductory speech as director of the Realgymnasium Osnabrück on April 11, 1899, he praised Kant's mandatory term and concluded with the words: “ Patience is the gateway to joy. "

Publications

• First and second degree equations, schematically resolved in whole numbers . BG Teubner, Leipzig 1882.
• By dividing the circle into 65537 equal parts . In: News from the Society of Science in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class . Göttingen 1894, pp. 170-186.
• Speed ​​theory in school . Liesecke, Osnabrück 1901. ( online )

literature

• Walter Kaufmann (Ed.): 100 years of Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Gymnasium, formerly Real-Gymnasium (near Osnabrück). Historical excerpts, pictures, documents . H. Th. Wenner, Osnabrück 1967, ISBN 3-87898-039-6 .

Web links

• Facsimile of the dissertation
• Facsimile of the work on the division of the circle into 65537 equal parts (see literature)
• Frank Fischer: A suitcase full of numbers , in: Die Zeit No. 34, August 16, 2012, p. 33.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Johann Gustav Hermes in the Mathematics Genealogy Project (English)
2. ↑ Heidi Niemann, Numbers, Numbers, Numbers , Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung, January 29, 2018, p. 8