Nikolai Lobachevsky - Wikipedia

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Several transliterations of the mathematician's surname redirect here. For things named after
him, see Lobachevsky (disambiguation).
Nikolai Lobachevsky

Portrait by Lev Kryukov (c. 1843)

December 1, 1792[1][2]
Born
Makaryev, Makaryevsky uezd, Nizhny Novgorod Governorate,[3][4]Russian Empire
(now Makaryevo, Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia)
February 24, 1856 (aged 63)
Died
Kazan, Kazan Governorate, Russian Empire
(now Tatarstan, Russia)
Nationality Russian
Education Kazan University (MSc, 1811)
Known for Lobachevskian geometry
Scientific career
Fields Geometry
Academic advisors J. C. M. Bartels[5][6]
Notable students Nikolai Brashman[5]
Signature

Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky (Russian: Никола́й Ива́нович Лобаче́вский, IPA: [nʲikɐ

ˈlaj ɪˈvanəvʲɪtɕ ləbɐˈtɕɛfskʲɪj] ( listen); 1 December [O.S. 20 November] 1792 – 24
February [O.S. 12 February] 1856) was a Russian mathematician and geometer, known
primarily for his work on hyperbolic geometry, otherwise known as Lobachevskian
geometryand also his fundamental study on Dirichlet integrals known as Lobachevsky
integral formula.

William Kingdon Clifford called Lobachevsky the "Copernicus of Geometry" due to the
revolutionary character of his work.[7][8]

Life[edit]
Nikolai Lobachevsky was born either in or near the city of Nizhny Novgorod in the Russian
Empire (now in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia) in 1792 to parents of Russian
and Polishorigin – Ivan Maksimovich Lobachevsky and Praskovia Alexandrovna
Lobachevskaya.[9][10][11] He was one of three children. When he was seven, his father, a clerk
in a land surveyingoffice, died, and Nikolai moved with his mother to Kazan. Lobachevsky
attended Kazan Gymnasium from 1802, graduating in 1807 and then received a scholarship
to Kazan University,[9][10] which was founded just three years earlier in 1804.

At Kazan University, Lobachevsky was influenced by professor Johann Christian Martin

Bartels, a former teacher and friend of German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss.
[9]Lobachevsky received a Master of Science in physics and mathematics in 1811. In 1814, he
became a lecturer at Kazan University, in 1816 he was promoted to associate professor. In
1822, at the age of 30, he became a full professor,[9][10] teaching mathematics, physics, and
astronomy.[10] He served in many administrative positions and became the rector of Kazan
University[9] in 1827. In 1832, he married Varvara Alexeyevna Moiseyeva. They had a large
number of children (eighteen according to his son's memoirs, while only seven apparently
survived into adulthood). He was dismissed from the university in 1846, ostensibly due to his
deteriorating health: by the early 1850s, he was nearly blind and unable to walk. He died in
poverty in 1856 and was buried in Arskoe Cemetery, Kazan.

On his religious views, he was said to be an atheist.[12][13].

Career[edit]
Lobachevsky's main achievement is the development (independently from János Bolyai) of
a non-Euclidean geometry,[10] also referred to as Lobachevskian geometry. Before him,
mathematicians were trying to deduce Euclid's fifth postulate from other axioms. Euclid's
fifth is a rule in Euclidean geometry which states (in John Playfair's reformulation) that for
any given line and point not on the line, there is only one line through the point not
intersecting the given line. Lobachevsky would instead develop a geometry in which the fifth
postulate was not true. This idea was first reported on February 23 (Feb. 11, O.S.), 1826 to the
session of the department of physics and mathematics, and this research was printed as On
the Origin of Geometry (О началах геометрии) in 1829–1830 (Kazan University Course
Notes). In 1829 Lobachevsky wrote a paper about his ideas called "A Concise Outline of the
Foundations of Geometry" that was published by the Kazan Messenger but was rejected
when it was submitted to the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences for publication.

The non-Euclidean geometry that Lobachevsky developed is referred to as hyperbolic

geometry. Lobachevsky replaced Playfair's axiom with the statement that for any given point
there exists more than one line that can be extended through that point and run parallel to
another line of which that point is not part. He developed the angle of parallelism which
depends on the distance the point is off the given line. In hyperbolic geometry the sum of
angles in a hyperbolic triangle must be less than 180 degrees. Non-Euclidean
geometrystimulated the development of differential geometry which has many applications.
Hyperbolic geometry is frequently referred to as "Lobachevskian geometry" or "Bolyai–
Lobachevskian geometry".

Some mathematicians and historians have wrongly claimed that Lobachevsky in his studies in
non-Euclidean geometry was influenced by Gauss, which is untrue. Gauss himself
appreciated Lobachevsky's published works very highly, but they never had personal
correspondence between them prior to the publication. Although three people—Gauss,
Lobachevsky and Bolyai—can be credited with discovery of hyperbolic geometry, Gauss never
published his ideas, and Lobachevsky was the first to present his views to the world
mathematical community.[14]
Lobachevsky's magnum opus Geometriya was completed in 1823, but was not published in
its exact original form until 1909, long after he had died. Lobachevsky was also the author
of New Foundations of Geometry (1835–1838). He also wrote Geometrical Investigations on
the Theory of Parallels (1840)[15] and Pangeometry (1855).[16][17]

Another of Lobachevsky's achievements was developing a method for the approximation of

the roots of algebraic equations. This method is now known as the Dandelin–Gräffe method,
named after two other mathematicians who discovered it independently. In Russia, it is called
the Lobachevsky method. Lobachevsky gave the definition of a function as a correspondence
between two sets of real numbers (Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet gave the same definition
independently soon after Lobachevsky).

Impact[edit]
E. T. Bell wrote about Lobachevsky's influence on the following development of mathematics
in his 1937 book Men of Mathematics:[18]

The boldness of his challenge and its successful outcome have inspired
mathematicians and scientists in general to challenge other "axioms" or accepted
"truths", for example the "law" of causality which, for centuries, have seemed as
necessary to straight thinking as Euclid's postulate appeared until Lobachevsky
discarded it. The full impact of the Lobachevskian method of challenging axioms has
probably yet to be felt. It is no exaggeration to call Lobachevsky the Copernicus of
Geometry, for geometry is only a part of the vaster domain which he renovated; it
might even be just to designate him as a Copernicus of all thought.

Honors[edit]
1858 Lobachevsky, an asteroid discovered in 1972, was named in his honour.
The lunar crater Lobachevsky was named in his honor.
Lobachevsky Prize, a mathematics award by the Kazan State University.
The Lobachevsky University was named in his honor.

In popular culture[edit]

Annual celebration of Lobachevsky's birthday by participants of Volga's student

Mathematical Olympiad

Lobachevsky is the subject of songwriter/mathematician Tom Lehrer's humorous song

"Lobachevsky" from his 1953 Songs by Tom Lehrer album. In the song, Lehrer portrays a
Russian mathematician who sings about how Lobachevsky influenced him: "And who
made me a big success / and brought me wealth and fame? / Nikolai Ivanovich
Lobachevsky is his name." Lobachevsky's secret to mathematical success is given
as "Plagiarize!", as long as one is always careful to "call it, please, research". According to
Lehrer, the song is "not intended as a slur on [Lobachevsky's] character" and the name
was chosen "solely for prosodic reasons".[19]
 In Poul Anderson's 1969 fantasy novella "Operation Changeling" – which was later
expanded into the fix-up novel Operation Chaos (1971) – a group of sorcerers navigate
a non-Euclidean universe with the assistance of the ghosts of Lobachevsky and Bolyai.
The story also contains the line, "Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky is his name," possibly a
nod to the Tom Lehrer song.
Roger Zelazny's science fiction novel Doorways in the Sand contains a poem dedicated to
Lobachevsky.
Morris Panych's Governor General's Award-winning play, Girl in the Goldfish Bowl,
references Lobachevsky repeatedly as the focus of Owen's geometry obsession.
Vladimir Nabokov mentions Lobachevski in his Lectures on Russian Literature.

Works[edit]
Kagan V. F. (ed.): N. I. Lobachevsky – Complete Collected Works, Vol. I–IV (Russian),
Moscow–Leningrad (GITTL), (1946–51).
Vol. I: Geometrical Researches on the Theory of Parallels (1840); On the Origin of
Geometry (1829–30).
Vol. II: New Principles of Geometry with Complete Theory of Parallels (1835–38).
Vol. III: Imaginary Geometry (1835); Application of imaginary geometry to certain
integrals (1836); Pangeometry (1856).
Vol. IV: Works on Other Subjects.

English translations

Geometrical Researches on the Theory of Parallels. G. B. Halsted (tr.). 1891. Reprinted in

Roberto Bonola: Non-Euclidean Geometry: A Critical and Historical Study of its
Development. 1912. Dover reprint 1955.

Also in: Seth Braver Lobachevski illuminated, MAA 2011.

Pangeometry. translated by Henry P. Manning: in D. E. Smith A Source Book in

Mathematics. McGraw Hill 1929. Dover reprint, pp. 360–374.
New Principles of Geometry with Complete Theory of Parallels. G. B. Halsted (tr.). 1897.
Nikolai I. Lobachevsky, Pangeometry, translator and editor: A. Papadopoulos, Heritage
of European Mathematics Series, Vol. 4, European Mathematical Society. 2010.

See also[edit]
References[edit]
1. ^ This is the date given by V. F. Kagan's 1957 book N. Lobachevsky and His Contribution
to Science (first published in Russian in 1943), p. 26, and A. A. Andronov's 1956 article
"Где и когда родился Н.И.Лобачевский" ("Where and when was Lobachevsky born?")
(the latter gives 1 December [O.S. 20 November] 1792).
2. ^ Older sources in Russian—e.g., A. F. Popov, "Воспоминания о службе и трудах проф.
Казанского университета Н. И. Лобачевского" ("Memoirs of the Service and Work of
N. I. Lobachevsky"), 1857—give 1793 rather than 1972, while the Dictionary of Scientific
Biography (1970) gives December 2, 1792. Further information on Lobachevsky's
birthdate can be found in: Athanase Papadopoulos (ed.), Nikolai I. Lobachevsky.
Pangeometry, European Mathematical Society. 2010, pp. 206–7.
3. ^ See "К 150-летию со дня смерти Н.И.Лобачевского" ("On the 150th anniversary of
the death of N. Lobachevsky") by G. M. Polotovsky, PDF page 3: "Н.И.Лобачевский
 родился в Макарьевском уезде Нижегородской губернии в 1793 году" (quoting A. F.
Popov (1857)); page 4: "[В.Ф.Каган (1943)] местом рождения называет Макарьев".
4. ^ Other sources in Russian—e.g., A. A. Andronov (1956)—give the city of Nizhny
Novgorodrather than the Governorate as his birthplace; see also Lobachevsky's biography
at the website of the Lobachevsky Nizhny Novgorod State University Museum and Andrey
Kalinin's article "Чье имя носит университет" ("After whose name the University has
been named").
5. ^ Jump up to: a b Nikolai Lobachevsky at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
6. ^ Athanase Papadopoulos (ed.), Nikolai I. Lobachevsky. Pangeometry, European
Mathematical Society. 2010, p. 208.
7. ^ Bell, E. T. (1986). Men of Mathematics. Touchstone Books. p. 294. ISBN 978-0-671-
62818-5. Author attributes this quote to another mathematician, William Kingdon
Clifford.
8. ^ This is a quote from G. B. Halsted's translator's preface to his 1914 translation of The
Theory of Parallels: "What Vesalius was to Galen, what Copernicus was to Ptolemy that
was Lobachevsky to Euclid." — W. K. Clifford
9. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Victor J. Katz. A history of mathematics: Introduction. Addison-
Wesley. 2009. p. 842.
10. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Stephen Hawking. God Created the Integers: The Mathematical
Breakthroughs that Changed History. Running Press. 2007. pp. 697–703.
11. ^ Ivan Maksimovich Lobachevsky (Jan Łobaczewski in Polish) came from a Polish noble
family of Jastrzębiec and Łada coats of arms, and was classified as a Pole in Russian
official documents; Jan Ciechanowicz. Mikołaj Łobaczewski - twórca pangeometrii.
Rocznik Wschodni. Issue 7–9. 2002. p. 163.
12. ^ Bardi, Jason (2008). The Fifth Postulate: How Unraveling a Two Thousand Year Old
Mystery Unraveled the Universe. John Wiley & Sons. p. 186. ISBN 978-0-470-46736-
7. “His stubbornness, reported atheism, and genius supported his rise as a champion of
the proletariat. To the Soviets, Lobachevsky represented not just the greatness of the
common man, emerging from a humble background as he did, he also was a
revolutionary of sorts.”
13. ^ "The History of Science". Soviet Science. Taylor & Francis. p. 329. “Though
Lobachevsky appears to have invented non-Euclidean geometry without the help of the
Almighty, he built a church on the instructions of the University council. It is said that he
was an atheist.”
14. ^ O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Nikolai Lobachevsky", MacTutor History
of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews.
15. ^ The 1914 English translation by George Bruce Halsted is available
at "Quod.lib.umich.edu". The University of Michigan Historical Mathematics Collection.
Retrieved 2012-12-17.
16. ^ The 1902 German translation by Heinrich Liebmann is available
at "Quod.lib.umich.edu". The University of Michigan Historical Mathematics Collection.
Retrieved 2012-12-17.
17. ^ Lobachevsky dictated two versions of that work, a first one in Russian, and a second one
in French (Papadopoulos 2010, p. v).
18. ^ Bell, E. T. (1986). Men of Mathematics. Touchstone Books. p. 336. ISBN 978-0-671-
62818-5.
19. ^ Liner notes, "The Tom Lehrer Collection", Shout! Factory, 2010

External links[edit]
O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Nikolai Lobachevsky", MacTutor History of
Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews.
Works by or about Nikolai Lobachevsky in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
Website dedicated to Lobachevsky (in Spanish)
Nikolaj Ivanovič Lobačevskij - Œuvres complètes, tome 2 – Gallica-Math
Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod