Johann Bernoulli - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

Johann was born in Basel, the son of Nikolaus Bernoulli, an apothecary, and his wife, Margaretha Schonauer and began studying medicine at Basel University. His father desired that he study business so that he might take over the family spice trade, but Johann Bernoulli disliked business and convinced his father to allow him to study medicine instead. However, Johann Bernoulli did not enjoy medicine either and began studying mathematics on the side with his older brother Jacob. Throughout Johann Bernoulli’s education at Basel University the Bernoulli brothers worked together spending much of their time studying the newly discovered infinitesimal calculus. They were among the first mathematicians to not only study and understand calculus but to apply it to various problems.

Read more about this topic:  Johann Bernoulli

Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or education:

    The science, the art, the jurisprudence, the chief political and social theories, of the modern world have grown out of Greece and Rome—not by favor of, but in the teeth of, the fundamental teachings of early Christianity, to which science, art, and any serious occupation with the things of this world were alike despicable.
    Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)

    There is a period near the beginning of every man’s life when he has little to cling to except his unmanageable dream, little to support him except good health, and nowhere to go but all over the place.
    —E.B. (Elwyn Brooks)

    One of the benefits of a college education is, to show the boy its little avail.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)