John Wallis Research Paper

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Over time, many mathematicians have worked hard to find solutions to problems within mathematics. These scholars work off of each others' discoveries, to establish some of their own. English mathematician, John Wallis, made major contributions to the origins of calculus. He devoted much of his life to the study of mathematics, particularly calculus. John Wallis was born on November 26, 1616, in Ashford, England. He attended school in Ashford, until his mother decided it would be best for their family to move, due to an outbreak of the plague. Wallis then attended James Movat's grade school in Tenterden, Kent ( Robertson, E F, and J J O'Connor). It was here when he first expressed his potential as a great scholar. His first interest in mathematics started, at the age of 15, when he saw his brother with an arithmetic book. In 1632, Wallis …show more content…
Wallis was able to discover this, while he was trying to figure out the integral of (1-x2)1/2 from 0-1, used to find the area of a circle of unit radius. Using Cavalieri's ideas on indivisibles, Wallis resolved the issue of integrating (1-x2)n for integer powers of n. However, incapable of dealing with fractional powers, he used interpolation, which was a word Wallis introduced to the world of mathematics within this work. His method of interpolation developed from a combination of Kepler's idea of continuity, as well as his discovered techniques on evaluating integrals (McElroy). Shortly after, in 1659, Wallis published another tract that included the answer to the problems of the cycloid, which had originally been brought forth by Pascal. In this tract, he also, by chance, explained how his principles from his Arithmetica Infinitorum could be used for reflecting algebraic curves. He also came up with a solution to the issue of adjusting "the semi-cubical parabola x³ = ay²" (Ball), which had earlier been discovered by William Neil, in
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