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Léon Foucault

File:Foucault_portre_crop.jpg · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons

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Léon Foucault

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Also known as John Bernard Foucault

French physicist (1819–1868)

OverviewAI-generated

Léon Foucault was a person whose work period spanned from 1839 to 1868. He was born on September 18, 1819, and died on February 11, 1868. His recorded works include *Mesure de la vitesse de la lumière*, *Étude optique des surfaces*, *Sur divers signes sensibles du mouvement diurne de la terre*, and *Recueil des travaux scientifiques*.

Foucault is recognized in the Royal Society collection. He is the subject of quotes regarding scientific accuracy and the rotation of the Earth, including an invitation to observe the Earth turn at the Meridian Hall of the Paris Observatory.

Synthesized by Vinony from 17 facts across 7 sources: Wikidata, Crossref, MusicBrainz, Open Library, Wikiquote, Vinony collections, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.

Person · Open Library

Born
1819
Died
1868
Works
5

Top works

  • Cours de microscopie, complémentaire des études médicales anatomie microscopique et physiologie des fluides de l'economie
  • Mesure de la vitesse de la lumière. Étude optique des surfaces
  • Sur divers signes sensibles du mouvement diurne de la terre
  • Recueil des travaux scientifiques
  • Recueil des travaux scientifiques de Léon Foucault

via Open Library + Wikidata

Music · MusicBrainz

Type
Person
Country
US
Active from
1976-01-26

via MusicBrainz · CC0

Recent publications · Crossref

5 total works indexed

  1. The Subject and Power

    · 1982 · cited 4,659x

  2. Of Other Spaces

    · 1986 · cited 3,584x

  3. Large-Scale Machine Learning with Stochastic Gradient Descent

    · 2010 · cited 3,418x

  4. Discipline and Punish

    · 2007 · cited 2,888x

  5. Correlations in Space and Time and Born Approximation Scattering in Systems of Interacting Particles

    · 1954 · cited 2,536x

via Crossref · CC0

Quotes

  • “Above all, we must be accurate, and it is an obligation which we intend to fulfill scrupulously.”
  • “You are invited to come to see the Earth turn, tomorrow, from three to five, at Meridian Hall of the Paris Observatory.”
  • “The phenomenon develops calmly, but it is invisible, unstoppable. One feels, one sees it born and grow steadily; and it is not in one's power to either hasten it or slow it down. Any person, brought into the presence of this fact, stops for a few moments and remains pensive and silent; and then generally leaves, carrying with him forever a sharper, keener sense of our incessant motion through space.”
  • “To contribute usefully to the advance of science, one must sometimes not disdain from undertaking simple verifications.”
  • “May those men who are animated by the true scientific spirit cease to believe that they are obliged to consider only subjects of public utility; ...because, one must not hide it, the field of applications, so rich and fertile today, would not take long to be blighted by sterility if it ceased to be fertilized and revivified by the beneficial light which theoretical research radiates and pours incessantly upon it.”

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA

Wikidata facts

Instance of
human
Given name
Jean
Gender
male
Citizenship
France
Place of birth
Paris
Place of death
Paris
Occupation
astronomer
Educated at
Collège Stanislas de Paris
Employer
Paris Observatory, PSL University
Languages spoken
French
Award
Officer of the Legion of Honour
Notable work
Glan–Foucault prism
Student of
Alfred François Donné
Field of work
optics
Image
Foucault portre crop.jpg
Residence
France
Show 17 more facts
Commons category
Léon Foucault
place of burial
Montmartre Cemetery
member of
Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences
date of death
1868-02-11
date of birth
1819-09-18
Commons gallery
Jean Bernard Léon Foucault
cause of death
multiple sclerosis
manner of death
mercury poisoning
birth name
Jean Bernard Léon Foucault
name in native language
Jean Bernard Léon Foucault
writing language
French
ethnic group
French
start of work period
1839-01-01
end of work period
1868-01-01
on focus list of Wikimedia project
Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/4
maintained by WikiProject
WikiProject Mathematics
has works in the collection
J. Paul Getty Museum
Sources (6)

via Wikidata · CC0

~7 min read

Encyclopedic overview

Jean Bernard Léon Foucault ( UK: /ʒɒ̃ ˈbɛərnɑːr ˌleɪɒ̃ ˈfuːkoʊ/, US: /ˌʒɒ̃ bɛərˈnɑːr leɪˌɒ̃ fuːˈkoʊ/; French: [ʒɑ̃ bɛʁnaʁ leɔ̃ fuko]; 18 September 1819 – 11 February 1868) was a French physicist who invented the Foucault pendulum, a device demonstrating the effect of Earth's rotation. He also made an early measurement of the speed of light, discovered eddy currents, and is credited with naming the gyroscope.

Early years

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Léon Foucault” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

Gallery (3)

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via Wikidata sitelinks · CC0