René DescartesRené Descartes (deɪˈkɑːrt or UKˈdeɪkɑːrt; ʁəne dekaʁt; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, widely considered a seminal figure in the emergence of modern philosophy and science. Mathematics was central to his method of inquiry, and he connected the previously separate fields of geometry and algebra into analytic geometry. Descartes spent much of his working life in the Dutch Republic, initially serving the Dutch States Army, later becoming a central intellectual of the Dutch Golden Age.
Christiaan HuygensChristiaan Huygens, Lord of Zeelhem, (ˈhaɪɡənz , USˈhɔɪɡənz , ˈkrɪstijaːn ˈɦœyɣə(n)s; also spelled Huyghens; Hugenius; 14 April 1629 – 8 July 1695) was a Dutch mathematician, physicist, engineer, astronomer, and inventor who is regarded as a key figure in the Scientific Revolution. In physics, Huygens made seminal contributions to optics and mechanics, while as an astronomer he studied the rings of Saturn and discovered its largest moon, Titan.
Pierre de FermatPierre de Fermat (pjɛʁ də fɛʁma; between 31 October and 6 December 1607 – 12 January 1665) was a French mathematician who is given credit for early developments that led to infinitesimal calculus, including his technique of adequality. In particular, he is recognized for his discovery of an original method of finding the greatest and the smallest ordinates of curved lines, which is analogous to that of differential calculus, then unknown, and his research into number theory.
Western philosophyWestern philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The word philosophy itself originated from the Ancient Greek (φιλοσοφία), literally, "the love of wisdom" φιλεῖν , "to love" and σοφία sophía, "wisdom").
CalculusCalculus is the mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizations of arithmetic operations. It has two major branches, differential calculus and integral calculus; the former concerns instantaneous rates of change, and the slopes of curves, while the latter concerns accumulation of quantities, and areas under or between curves.
Friedrich NietzscheFriedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (ˈniːtʃə,_ˈniːtʃi , ˈfʁiːdʁɪç ˈvɪlhɛlm ˈniːtʃə or ˈniːtsʃə; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer, whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. Nietzsche's work spans philosophical polemics, poetry, cultural criticism, and fiction while displaying a fondness for aphorism and irony.
StatisticsStatistics (from German: Statistik, () "description of a state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data. In applying statistics to a scientific, industrial, or social problem, it is conventional to begin with a statistical population or a statistical model to be studied. Populations can be diverse groups of people or objects such as "all people living in a country" or "every atom composing a crystal".
ProbabilityProbability is the branch of mathematics concerning numerical descriptions of how likely an event is to occur, or how likely it is that a proposition is true. The probability of an event is a number between 0 and 1, where, roughly speaking, 0 indicates impossibility of the event and 1 indicates certainty. The higher the probability of an event, the more likely it is that the event will occur. A simple example is the tossing of a fair (unbiased) coin.
Probability theoryProbability theory or probability calculus is the branch of mathematics concerned with probability. Although there are several different probability interpretations, probability theory treats the concept in a rigorous mathematical manner by expressing it through a set of axioms. Typically these axioms formalise probability in terms of a probability space, which assigns a measure taking values between 0 and 1, termed the probability measure, to a set of outcomes called the sample space.
VoltaireFrançois-Marie Arouet (fʁɑ̃swa maʁi aʁwɛ; 21 November 1694 - 30 May 1778) was a French Enlightenment writer, philosopher (philosophe) and historian. Known by his nom de plume M. de Voltaire (vɒlˈtɛər,_voʊl-; also USvɔːl-; vɔltɛːʁ), he was famous for his wit, in addition to his criticism of Christianity—especially of the Roman Catholic Church—and of slavery. Voltaire was an advocate of freedom of speech, freedom of religion and separation of church and state.
