Tomàs Cerdà
Tomàs Amorós i Cerdà SJ (1715 – 1791) was a Spanish Roman Catholic priest, mathematician, astronomer and philosopher.
Biography
Tomàs Cerdà was born in Tarragona.[1] At the age of 17, he entered the Society of Jesus and was ordained a priest in 1749. Cerdà studied mathematics in Marseilles.[lower-alpha 1] He taught philosophy in Zaragoza and at the University of Cervera.[lower-alpha 2] He was professor of theology in Girona and professor of mathematics at the College of Cordelles in Barcelona.[3] This interest in making new scientific knowledge known is reflected in Cerdà's Jesuiticae Philosophiae Theses (1753), where questions of physics, mathematics, astronomy and natural philosophy are discussed in general.[lower-alpha 3]
Cerdà taught mathematics classes in Cordelles until 1765. After publishing the Artillery Lessons (1764), he was called to court, where he moved in 1765 to teach mathematics to the infantas. Later Cerdà was appointed professor at the Imperial College in Madrid and senior cosmographer of the Indies. When Tomàs Cerdà left for Madrid, at the public mathematics chair in Cordelles, he continued teaching courses with Father Roque Antonio Gila, who had been a mathematics teacher at the Calatayud Seminary for seven years; he had Alcoverro as his assistant the first year (1765–66) and the following, shared teaching with Campserver.
In 1767, when the Jesuits were expelled from Spain, Cerdà went into exile in the Papal States and died in Forlì in 1791.[lower-alpha 4]
Thought
Cerdà's mathematical, physical and astronomical thought was at the forefront of his time, but remained unfortunately unpublished. He was among the introducers of infinitesimal calculus (differential and integral calculus). Cerdà made it clear in his works that he was Copernican and that the other systems did not convince him. He conceived a global project for teaching pure and applied mathematics, following the encyclopedic tradition of the compendiums of pure and mixed mathematics, or physico-mathematics, and incorporated the novelties in the various parts of these disciplines. In 1758, with the financial aid of City Council of Barcelona, Cerdà published two volumes of Mathematics Lessons or General Elements of Arithmetic and Algebra and wrote to the English mathematician Thomas Simpson asking him for advice on to select authors to follow in other parts of mathematics (of which he specifies some: "Mechanics, Statics, Hydrostatics, Optics, Astronomy, Navigation, Architecture, etc.") because he believed that it was necessary to treat these subjects "in a convenient way".
Regarding pure mathematics, Cerdà's idea was to publish five volumes. In addition to the two indicated, I wanted to include a third on Geometry and Trigonometry, a fourth on Application of Algebra to Geometry and curves, and a fifth that would be the Direct and Inverse Fluxion Method, which others call Differential and Integral Calculus Cerdà's autograph manuscripts have been located on the subjects of the cited volumes, including drafts of differential calculus where problems of maxima and minima, radii of curvature and evolutes are treated. However, they did not reach the press and only Mathematical Lessons or General Elements of Geometry was published, in 1760.
As for applied mathematics, it seems that Cerdà's project was to edit five more volumes. On the occasion of the inauguration of the School of Artillery in Segovia, Cerdà published Artillery Lessons, possibly on behalf of Count Gazzola, Inspector General of Artillery, to whom he dedicates the work. In the prologue, Cerdà suggested the creation of a National Academy of Sciences. These artillery lessons would constitute the sixth volume of the entire physico-mathematical encyclopedia projected by Cerdà (and also the last published, as a result of Cerdà's move to Madrid and the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain in 1767). The seventh would correspond to mechanics, the eighth would be a treatise on hydrostatics and hydraulics, the ninth a treatise on optics and the tenth one on navigation.
Several manuscripts related to this project are also preserved, among which a treatise on rational Newtonian mechanics where he makes extensive use of the differential calculus, and a Treatise on Astronomy stand out. The latter is basically a translation of the Astronomy part of Benjamin Martin's Philosophia Britannica or a New System of the Newtonian Philosophy, Astronomy and Geography (1747), with additions and changes by Cerdá. At the beginning of this manuscript, Cerdà describes the three "systems" of the world: the Ptolemaic, the Tychonic and the Copernican, but he will not say anything about the truth of these systems, "he will only explain the phenomena that would result from the last one (the Copernican), and the examination of which one should be followed will be reserved for another time". However, in the rest of the text Cerdà leaves no doubt as to which system should be followed and always speaks of the "solar system". In a separate chapter, he discusses at length the "mathematical principles on which the Copernican system is based." On the other hand, for Cerdà the solar system is not unique, but one more among the many worlds that possibly exist and that we do not know about.
In Cordelles, in addition to the theoretical teaching of "pure" and "mixed" mathematics, experimental physics work was also carried out, prepared for solemn acts of public exhibition and school parties, where exercises of many different types were carried out, for highlight the teachings received before the authorities and the nobility. The program of the experimental Physics exercises consisted of 12 sections that corresponded to the explanation, description, invention or use of different machines or instruments, specifically, the pneumatic machine, the electric machine, the lever, the scale, the Roman balance, the triangular prism and how to distinguish colors, the simple and compound barometer and experiments to test the elasticity of air by means of the barometer, convex and concave glasses, refracting and reflecting telescopes, simple and compound microscopes, and the magic lantern. It also included 10 "physical paradoxes" that the seminarians had to prove to be true, such as that light has weight, that air has absolute gravity, that fish breathe or that "natural" water is more solid than liquid.
Works
- Jesuiticae Philosophiae Theses (1753)
- Liciones de Mathemática o Elementos Generales de Arithmetica y Algebra, para uso de la clase (1758–1760)
- Lecciones de Mathemática o Elementos generales de Geometría, para el uso de la clase (1760)
- Lecciones de Artillería, para uso de la clase (1764)
- Tratado de Astronomía (1799)
Notes
Footnotes
- ↑ In Marseilles, Cerdà completed his scientific training with the French Jesuit Esprit Pézenas, author of the French version (1749) of MacLaurin's Treatise on Fluxions.
- ↑ In Cervera, where the teaching staff was largely made up of members of the Society of Jesus, the most outstanding teachers of the time were Mateo Aimerich and Cerdà.[2]
- ↑ Among the numerous authors cited by Cerdà are Kepler, Descartes, Gassendi, Huygens, Cassini, Clairaut, Juan y Santacilia, Nollet and Newton.
- ↑ The canon of the Collegiate Church of Santa Anna, Francesc Bell, former disciple of Cerdà and professor of mathematics at the Experimental Physico-mathematical Conference, was in charge of teaching mathematics in Cordelles, in agreement with Francesc Subiràs, bringing together his students with seminarians and external students who wished to attend this public class that Bell taught until his death in 1803. Later Joan Gerard Fochs and Isidre Gallarda would share the teaching in a cycle of two courses.
Citations
- ↑ Torres i Amat, Fèlix (1836). Memorias para ayudar a formar un diccionario crítico de los escritores catalanes y dar alguna idea de la antigua y moderna literatura de Cataluña. Barcelona: Imprenta de J. Verdaguer, p. 177.
- ↑ Montaner i Martorell, Josep Maria (1990). La modernització de l'utillatge mental de l'arquitectura a Catalunya (1714-1859). Institut d'Estudis Catalans, p. 121.
- ↑ Brotóns, Víctor Navarro (2006). "Science and Enlightenment in Eighteenth-Century Spain: The Contribution of the Jesuits before and after the Expulsion." In: John W. O'Malley et al., eds., The Jesuits II: Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts, 1540-1773. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 390–404.
