Paolo Frisi

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Paolo Frisi

Paolo Frisi (born April 13, 1729 in Melegnano , † November 22, 1787 in Milan ) was an Italian clergyman, mathematician, physicist, engineer and astronomer.

Life

Frisi was the second oldest of eight children - one of the brothers was the historian and clergyman (canon at the Cathedral of Milan) Antonio Francesco Frisi (1733–1817) - and grew up in a well-off family home, albeit financially after the early death of the father Got problems. From around 1741 he attended the Barnabite School in Milan (Arcimbolde School or College of St. Alexander), joined the Barnabite Order and began his novitiate in Monza in 1743 . In October 1744 he took his vows and continued his studies at the St. Alessandro College in Milan, where he also received lessons in mathematics and Newtonian mechanics from Francesco Maria de Regi (1720–1794). In 1747 he studied theology in Pavia , but also heard mathematics and physics at the university with Ramiro Rampinelli (1697–1759), who was also an expert in hydraulic engineering. He stayed in Pavia until 1749, where he also studied mathematical and physical works, such as by Leonhard Euler , Colin Maclaurin , Maria Agnesi , Alexis Claude Clairaut and Jean-Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert and the commentary on Newton's Principia by François Jacquier , with the he corresponded, and Thomas Le Seur . In 1749 he became a teacher at the college in Lodi . In 1751 he was ordained a priest. In 1751 he published a treatise on the figure of the earth (which he had printed despite objections from the church censors because he represented the heliocentric worldview ) and one on the regulation of rivers. In 1751 he became professor of philosophy at the Barnabite School in Casale Monferrato . Since his superiors did not like dealing with the liberal and free thinker Count Radicati, with whom Frisi corresponded for over twenty years, he was transferred to Novara as a preacher . In 1753 he became a corresponding member of the Académie des Sciences in Paris and professor at the Barnabite College St. Alexander in Milan. In 1756 he became professor of mathematics at the University of Pisa , where he maintained contacts with many natural scientists and mathematicians, such as the director of the observatory Tommaso Perelli (1704–1783), and also frequently visited Florence. In 1764 he became a professor at the Scuola Palatina in Milan. His reputation was already so high at that time that the Duke of Tuscany formally left him on the list of professors in Pisa. In 1760 he visited Rome and Naples and was in Rome by Pope Pius VI. received (who asked him about plans to regulate the Rhine), in 1766/67 he visited France, where he met d'Alembert, Diderot , Condorcet and others, and England (where he met David Hume , among others ) and in 1768 Vienna, where He was received by Emperor Joseph II and discussed various scientific topics (electricity, smallpox vaccination) and the relationship between church and state with him. After the suppression of the Jesuit order by the Pope in 1773, his school moved to the Palazzo di Brera , where the Jesuits were previously. Since he wanted to live with his family, he applied to leave the order, which was approved by the Pope in 1776. In 1778 he visited Switzerland. His health deteriorated and he restricted his lecturing activities, but in 1782 he published a selection of his works. In May 1784 the Swedish King Gustav III visited him . on a visit to Milan.

Commemorative plaque to Paolo Frisi at the Palazzo Beccaria in Milan

plant

He was in demand all over Europe as a consultant for hydraulic structures and introduced lightning rods in Italy. Frisi dealt with electricity and light and studied the motion of the earth and moon using Newton's theory of gravity. In mathematics, he dealt with the calculus of variations ( isoperimetric problems ). He drew up a plan for a canal between Milan and Pavia, which was built according to his plans in 1819. After a Jesuit criticized his book about the figure of the earth, he developed an aversion to Jesuits and was in league with well-known encyclopedists in Paris. In Milan he published a magazine, Il caffè , which disseminated the ideas of the Enlightenment.

Honors and memberships

In addition to his membership in the Paris Academy, he was a member of the Academy in St. Petersburg from 1757, and a foreign member of the Royal Society , 1758 a member of the Berlin Academy, 1766 of the Royal Swedish Academy and 1770 of the Academies in Bern and Copenhagen. The Austrian Empress Maria Theresa awarded him an annual pension of 100 sequins. In 1764 he received an honorary professorship for mathematics in Bologna.

Streets in Milan, Pavia, Rome, Melegnano, Bologna and Lissone and schools in Milan, Melegnano and Monza are named after him.

In 2003 the asteroid (19523) Paolofrisi was named after him.

Fonts

  • Disquisitio mathematica in causam physicam figurae et magnitudinis telluris nostrae, 1751
  • Del modo di regolare fiumi e torrenti, 1751
  • Nova electricitatis theoria quam ... JB Landriani publice propugnabat, 1755
  • Saggio morale di filosofia 1755
  • De motu diurno terrae, Pisa 1756 (for the book he received a prize from the Berlin Academy)
  • Memorie sopra la fisica e l'istoria naturale, 1757
  • De aberratione lucis opusculum, 1757
  • De atmaera caelestium corporum dissertatio physico-mathematica, 1759
  • Piano de 'lavori da farsi per liberare, e assicurare dalle acque le provincie di Bologna, di Ferrara, e di Ravenna, Lucca 1761.
  • De problematis quibusdam isoperimetricis, 1761
  • Del modo di regolare i fiumi, ei torrenti, principalmente del Bolognese, e della Romagna, Lucca, 1762 (the book was translated into French in 1774 and several English editions were published)
  • De gravitate universali corporum, Milan 1768 (dedicated to Emperor Joseph II)
  • De 'canali navigabili trattato del PD Paolo Frisi, Florence 1770.
  • Cosmographiae physicae et mathematicae, 1774, 1775
  • Elogio del Galilei, 1775
  • Instituzioni di meccanica, d'idrostatica, d'idrometria e dell'architettura statica e idraulica, Milan 1777.
  • Elogio di Bonaventura Cavalieri, 1778
  • Elogio del cavaliere Isacco Newton, 1778.
  • Algebra e geometrica analitica, 1782
  • Meccanica, 1783
  • Cosmografia 1785
  • Elogio del signor D'Alembert, Milan 1786.

literature

  • Ugo Baldini :  FRISI, Paolo. In: Fiorella Bartoccini (ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 50:  Francesco I Sforza-Gabbi. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 1998.
  • Gennaro Barbarisi (ed.): Ideologia e scienza nell'opera di Paolo Frisi (1728-1784): atti del Convegno internazionale di studi: Politecnico di Milano, 3-4 giugno 1985 , 2 volumes, Franco Angeli, Milan 1987.

Web links

Commons : Paolo Frisi  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Minor Planet Circ. 48159
personal data
SURNAME Frisi, Paolo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian mathematician
DATE OF BIRTH April 13, 1728
PLACE OF BIRTH Melegnano
DATE OF DEATH November 22, 1784
Place of death Milan