Sophie The Mathematician
And other notable though lesser known mathematicians of the past
Math has never been my favorite subject. I would rather spend my time reading or writing then spend hours trying to solve proofs and complete complex trigonometry or calculus problems. Luckily, my future career does not require that much complicated math and thanks to the technologies that we have at our disposal today I have the capacity to simply plug numbers into a system in order to solve a problem. I think it is important to note that just because I don’t especially love math doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate it. Afterall, without mathematicians I wouldn’t be able to type up this article and publish it here on Medium. I am especially interested in and appreciative of women who were the trailblazers of their time and would eventually make it possible for future generations of young women to become inspired and pursue STEAM careers.
French mathematician, Sophie Germain, was one of those trailblazing women. Marie-Sophie Germain was born in Paris, France on April 1, 1776 and died on June 27, 1831. From a young age, Sophie was fascinated with math. Back then, it was thought to be very unladylike for any young woman to pursue a career in mathematics. However, she didn’t let this silly societal rule stop her from exploring and ended up teaching herself Latin and Greek so that she could understand the more complex books on math. By using the pseudonym M. LeBlanc, Sophie was able to obtain lecture notes for courses from the École Polytechnique in Paris; if she had used her own name, she would never have gained access on the basis of her sex despite the fact that was the same age and just qualified as her male counterparts. In 1808, the German physicist Ernst Florens Friedrich Chladni (1756–1827) conducted experiments on vibrating plates, exhibiting the so-called Chladni figures. It was these experiments that led the French Academy of Sciences to set up a prize competition with the following challenge: “… formulate a mathematical theory of elastic surfaces and indicate just how it agrees with empirical evidence” and it was this very challenge that would lead to Germain’s legacy (Barrow-Green, June).
At first, a two year deadline was set for all entries but it proved to be way more challenging than anyone had really anticipated. By the time two years passed, Sophie was the only one who had even submitted anything. Unfortunately, her theories were proven wrong and she would end up having to start all over again. The contest opened up again, and again Sophie submitted another memoir. This time, she was able to demonstrate that “Lagrange’s equation did yield Chladni’s patterns in several cases, but [she] could not give a satisfactory derivation of Lagrange’s equation from physical principles.” She ended up receiving an honourable mention, but because her theories and equations couldn’t support all of Chladni’s patterns, she wasn’t awarded the prize.
These two losses did not deter Sophie, however, and she ended up submitting a third memoir in 1815. At last, she was deemed worthy of the prize (a medal of 1kg of gold) even though there were still some kinks in the problems. She did not, however, appear at the award ceremony and it’s been speculated that the judges did not fully appreciate her work. J J O’Connor and E.F. Roberston note one biographer in their research on Sophie’s life that puts it perfectly:
Although it was Germain who first attempted to solve a difficult problem, when others of more training, ability and contact built upon her work, and elasticity became an important scientific topic, she was closed out. Women were simply not taken seriously.
I like to think that if Sophie was alive today, her work would have been publicly celebrated more. Taking the time to research and go down these rabbit holes is so important because there are so many more people out there who were considered to be in the minority (either because of their sex, sexual orientation, or color of their skin) that deserve to be written about and studied more. I’ll just briefly mention two: Alan Turing and Ada Lovelace. Turing was a mathematician of the 20th century and is another person who is only just recently beginning to be recognized for their work. As mentioned in this BBC special, Turing would not have been able to crack the Engima code during WWII without the help from Ada Lovelace’s notes on Analytical Engine that she took in the 19th century. Both Turing and Lovelace were ostracized in their fields of work. For Lovelace, no one took her seriously because just like Sophie Germain, she was a woman in a field full of men. Turing’s work was looked over and not properly credited because of his sexuality. Back in England during WWII, any gay man could be imprisoned and even killed just because of their sexual orientation. Turing ended up committing suicide in 1954 and was only publicly rewarded and recognized for his work fighting the Nazis after his death. But because he cited Lovelace’s work, more historians have been able to uncover the virtually unknown mathematician of the 19th century. Representation in all fields of work matter. I would encourage everyone to learn more about these amazing people by taking the time to research using the links mentioned above (and again linked below).
Resources:
Barrow-Green, June. “Sophie Germain”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 14 Jan. 2021, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sophie-Germain. Accessed 6 February 2021.
