Castle Paradox

[jabbercat]

James: http://www2.nau.edu/tas3/wtc/i16.html#movie Self-replicating structures are amazing! If you're interested in mathematics and musical composition I have more mathematical marvels up my sleeves!

I would say Beethoven would also be worthy to mention on the list. You can't really have Bach without Beethoven or vise versa. There is a saying that Bach is the 'Old Testament' of music, and Beethoven is the new. It's pretty apt; Beethoven made more musical innovations in his lifetime than any other composer. The face of music today would be very different if Beethoven had either lived longer, or hadn't lived at all!
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Moogle no longer owes prizes.

[Bob the Hamster]

[msw188]

Indeed, Beethoven is the other composer, as he should be I believe. He is higher on the list than Bach actually, but I don't have the book on me at the moment.

In the original post I mentioned this somewhat, but I'll say it again. The book was published in the mid-seventies, and although Babbage gets an honorable mention, there is no one else involved with computers, which I think would be the main difference if the book were written today.

I'm surprised we have Kepler, and yet are missing some of his famous contemporaries (relatively speaking of course).
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My first completed OHR game, Tales of the New World:
http://castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=161

This website link is for my funk/rock band, Euphonic Brew:
www.euphonicbrew.com

[Bob the Hamster]

I could have sworn I posted this a couple days ago, but now I can't find it: Are either Martin Luther King or Mahatma Ghandi mentioned?

(I mention them both in the same sentence because they were both leaders of largely successful, explicitly nonviolent, movements to liberate oppressed minorities who were expected by many to fight their oppressors with violence)

[msw188]

Both are honorable mentions. The author remarks about Ghandi that it is hard to decide how influential he really was on the world as a whole, since the majority of liberation movements still end up relying on violence.

Looking back, I realize that I never addressed Bagne's call for an Arab algebrist. I am not aware of any outstanding names in that field, either in the development of the algebra or in introducing it to other peoples. Certainly algebra itself is a hugely influential and necessary development, but could you name an individual who stands out and really influenced either its development or its growth throughout the world?

This reminds me though that there is one other pure mathematician on the list, rather low, who is fairly unknown outside of mathematics and some of its applications in physics. There, however, his name typically rules all. He's almost certainly the most prolific mathematician ever, and although no single achievement of his is anywhere near as influential as, say, the initial invention of the calculus, his contributions on the whole could not be ignored.
_________________
My first completed OHR game, Tales of the New World:
http://castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=161

This website link is for my funk/rock band, Euphonic Brew:
www.euphonicbrew.com

[Nepenthe]

What about John Harington? I guess it depends on how you define influence, but we all use his invention daily.

@James: I'm not really sure where I read that, but there was a series of biographies aimed at young adults that I read a lot as a kid. I think one of them was on Darwin, so that's my best guess. I can't remember the authors of that series though.
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[Bagne]

Re: Muslim mathematicians:
I don't know the history very well. I only know that Muslims scholars were a critical factor in spreading algebra to the West.
Wikipedia drops this name: Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, but also lists a bunch of Persians.

I often feel cheated by my education in history: we learned about the Renaissance in school, but we didn't learn anything about its Muslim influences - and they were central to the whole process!
More generally, I really only learned a "Western" history. I didn't learn a thing about Africa, Asia, or even North America ... and I live there!
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[msw188]

Sorry about the delay in response. I'm afraid I am not familiar with John Harington. What did he invent that we use every day?

I've also found it interesting how poorly history ends up being taught in most grade schools. So much time is devoted to discussing American history (rather poorly at that) that I'm fairly certain most teenagers leave high school essentially ignorant of real world history besides the World Wars. I can understand that the complexities and subtleties of reality are often not for teenage minds to soak in, but they should at least know some of the accomplishments of the Muslims, or the Mongols before them, and certainly the Chinese.

Then again, I went to a high school where I graduated with 80-some kids, and that's including vocational-tech graduates. We read Harry Potter for AP English 12. We had maybe three or four AP courses total in the school. So maybe I'm just tainted by my own poor experience.

EDIT: I forgot, I was going to mention that the other pure mathematician on the list was Leonhard Euler. Anyone with real math or physics experience won't question that one. We've missed some big names, but I'll give this thread a couple more days in case anyone else wants to throw some guesses in.
_________________
My first completed OHR game, Tales of the New World:
http://castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=161

This website link is for my funk/rock band, Euphonic Brew:
www.euphonicbrew.com

[Bagne]

How about Lyell? Oh, and Hubble.
Did we mention them?

What about Krishna or Zoroaster?
Are they perhaps left out because the factual details of the corresponding religions are unclear?

How about Laozi?
Confucius?
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Working on rain and cloud formation

[Nepenthe]

Harington invented the flush toilet.
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[J.A.R.S.]

Sun Tzu.