Lawyers in Engineering, Math & Science
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Ibn Sina (Avicenna) |
12th Century physician and jurist who wrote extensively on topics |
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(980 -1037) |
ranging from Aristotle to astronomy. |
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Nicolaus Copernicus |
Studied canon law at Bologna and was appointed a canon. He |
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(1473 -1543) |
eventually received his doctorate in law from Ferrara and served as |
| counsel to his uncle, a bishop, before engaging in full time scientific | |
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pursuits. |
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François Viète |
Received his law degree from the University of Poitiers. After brief |
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(1540 -1603) |
period of practice, he became engaged as councillor to various |
| governments and eventually, Henry IV of France. A self-professed | |
| non-mathematician, he was nonetheless actively involved in numerous, | |
| seminal practical and theoretical projects. He introduced the first | |
| cohesive symbolic algebra system, which influenced Descartes' work. | |
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He is sometimes called "the father of algebra". |
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Francis Bacon |
Holder of many public British legal offices, including that of Lord |
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(1561 -1626) |
Chancellor, Bacon's prolific writing is credited with the establishment |
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of the scientific method and birth of the scientific age. |
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Claude Mydorge |
Educated as an attorney in France. Prolific writer in the areas of |
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(1585 -1647) |
geometry and optics. Designed and built optical instruments, including |
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ones used by his friend, René Descartes. |
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| René Descartes | Said to have studied law and obtained degree from Poitiers. |
| (1596 -1650) | Inspirations during life as a soldier led to seminal work in mathematical |
| philosophy. His theories provided groundwork for computational | |
| framework pursued by Leibniz through Turing and beyond. | |
| Catalog of the Scientific Community |
| Wolfgang Lochman | German lawyer, mathematician and engineer. Wrote Instrumentum |
| (1594 -1642) | mathematicorum in 1626, which describes numerous self-developed, |
| scientific measuring devices which improved upon the work of such | |
| predecessors as Kepler. | |
| Catalog Description of Lochman's Book |
| Claude Hardy | Active French parliamentary lawyer. He engaged in theoretical |
| (1598 -1678) | work concerning the problem of duplication of the cube. More |
| significantly, he brought mathematicians together, including | |
| Descartes and Mydorge and supported their efforts, particularly | |
| those of Descartes. | |
| U. of St. Andrews: History of Mathematics |
| Pierre de Fermat | Received law degree from Orléans and became parliamentary |
| (1601 -1665) | councillor, achieving membership in elite circles of law. Throughout |
| life, he maintained active mathematical friendships. His work in | |
| number theory is the most famous of his numerous contributions to | |
| theoretical and applied mathematics. | |
| U. of St. Andrews: History of Mathematics |
| Otto von Guericke | Studied law at Jena and entered public life at Magdeburg as alderman |
| (1602 -1686) | magistrate, and mayor. Developed air pumps, static machines and |
| mercury barometers. He maintained correspondence with Leibniz and | |
| other prominent scientific and mathematical personalities. | |
| Catalog of the Scientific Community |
| Wm. G. von Leibniz | Received doctorate of law from Altdorf. His work in philosophy and |
| (1646 -1716) | mathematics, aimed at the representation and unification of knowledge, |
| formed a groundwork for modern computation. | |
| U. of St. Andrews: History of Mathematics |
| Willem 'sGravesande | Legal education from Leiden. Practiced law and diplomacy in the |
| (1688 -1742) | Netherlands. Working in England, he was elected to the Royal Society |
| & associated with Newton, becoming a key proponant of Newtonian | |
| theory. Eventually made professor of mathematics, astronomy and | |
| philosophy at Leiden. | |
| U. of St. Andrews: History of Mathematics |
| Chester Moore Hall | British attorney. Invented, in 1729-30, the compound achromatic |
| (1703 -1771) | lens system, significantly contributing to the improvement of tools |
| used in astronomical investigation. | |
| Greater Hartford Astronomical Society Description |
| Ezra Stiles | Member of Connecticut Bar Association and president of Yale |
| (1727 -1795) | University. A correspondent of Benjamin Franklin and an early |
| investigator of electrical phenomena, he is credited with the early | |
| encouragement of science at Yale and within the new nation. | |
| eMuseum - Brief Biography |
| Johann von Goethe | Practiced law with his father in Frankfurt. Left to develop his writing |
| (1749 -1832) | abilities. In addition to his humanistic and literary work, he wrote |
| about the place of the senses in scientific investigation and studied | |
| numerous scientific fields, including geology, color, meteorology and | |
| plant physiology. | |
| Minn. State at Mankato: Page on Goethe |
| Thomas Cooper | Political activist and eventually, a Pennsylvania judge. His opposition |
| (1759 -1839) | to the Sedition Act earned a jail sentence. Became professor of |
| chemistry at a number of universities, and was president of South | |
| Carolina College. | |
| Thomas Cooper Society Home Page |
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Amedeo Avogadro |
Successful lawyer who became Italy's first chair of mathematical |
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(1776 -1856) |
physics at Turin. His work on the determination of masses remains |
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essential theory within physics. |
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Amos Eaton |
Entered adult life as a practicing lawyer in New York. Eventually |
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(1776 -1842) |
undertook career as surveyor & botanist. A founder of the |
| Rensselaer School, where he pioneered educational principles grounded | |
| in empirical, laboratory-based methods. A proponent of women's | |
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education within arts and sciences in higher education. |
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Francis Horner |
A Scottish lawyer and English barrister, Horner, at the age of twenty, |
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(1778 -1817) |
published a translation of Euler's algebra work and wrote a biography |
| of the mathematician. He also worked in chemistry and anatomy. | |
| With Henry Brougham and others, founded the Edinburgh Review. | |
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He was elected to Parliament as a Whig. |
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Henry Brougham |
Also a Scottish lawyer and English barrister, Brougham was the |
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(1778 -1868) |
youngest person to read a paper on mathematics to the Royal |
| Society. He founded the Edinburgh Society of Physics. He remained | |
| an active trial lawyer and was a Whig member of Parliament, an | |
| opponent of slavery, a womens' rights activist and eventually was | |
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made lord chancellor. |
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Benjamin Silliman |
Although educated as a lawyer, Silliman was offered Yale's first |
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(1779 -1864) |
professorship of chemistry and natural history. He undertook self- |
| education in these areas as well as medicine. Noted as a pioneer | |
| of American scientific education, his specimens and collections | |
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comprised one of the best in the nation. |
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James Hamilton |
American lawyer and scientist. First to establish bequest to the |
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(1793 -1873) |
Smithsonian Institution for advances in science. |
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Sir John Wrottesley |
While practicing law in England, he constructed an observatory. His |
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(1798 -1867) |
work was judged to merit election to the Royal Society and he later |
| served as its president. His recommendations for improved | |
| navigational techniques were adopted by the government. | |
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Abraham Lincoln |
Member of the Illinois bar and only United States President to be |
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(1809 -1865) |
awarded a patent. His 1848 submission described a device which |
| could move boats over sand bars through the use of bouyancy | |
| chambers. | |
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| Sir William R. Grove | Member of Lincoln's Inn. Knighted and made a Queen's Counsel and |
| (1811 -1896) | finally, a judge. In the process, he participated in early cases relating to |
| photographic processes and forensic evidence of poisoning. Credited | |
| with the invention of the fuel cell in 1839 which was based on the | |
| work of Sir Humphrey Davy. | |
| University of Illinois Plasma Material Group on Grove | |
| Hebrew University of Jerusalem Page of Grove | |
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| Arthur Cayley | Practicing attorney who published mathematical work while still an |
| (1821 -1895) | undergraduate. Published over 250 mathematics papers during his |
| tenure as a lawyer. Gave up the law to become professor of | |
| mathematics at Cambridge. | |
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Alford Bray Kempe |
London barrister. At Cambridge, he was a student of Arthur Cayley. At |
| (1849 -1922) | law, he served as an Anglican Canon lawyer. His ongoing work in the |
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field of mathematics earned him election to the Royal Society. He is |
| perhaps best known as a contributor to the investigation of the | |
| Four Color Problem and did seminal work in the area of the psychology | |
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of mathematical investigation. |
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Ashutosh Mookerjee |
Lawyer and mathematician. Ended a distinguished legal career as a |
| (1864 -1924) | Kolkata High Court judge. He was knighted in 1911. Hailed as one of the |
| major figures in Indian education, he was Vice Chancellor of Calcutta | |
| University, where he instituted inititatives in math and science | |
| education. | |
| Biographical Site |
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Jacques Ellul |
Earned doctor of law degree at Paris. Prolific writer and one of |
| (1912 -1994) | of the earliest modern thinkers to confront the problems of new |
| technologies and their relationship to society. | |
| The Jacques Ellul Web Site |