A (very) Brief History of James Clerk Maxwell

please note that in the youtube description we have links to discord patreon and the sources that i referenced to be able to make this video james clerk maxwell was a 19th century scottish mathematician and scientist he made fundamental contributions to mathematical physics most notably in the kinetic theory of gases which accurately explained the origin of temperature and helped to develop the maxwell boltzmann distribution color photography presenting the first ever color photograph in an 1861 presentation saturn's rings which he mathematically proved over 100 years before the voyager journey verified his theory and electricity and magnetism creating maxwell's equations which scientists called the second great unification of physics unifying electricity magnetism and optics maxwell is regarded as the founder of modern electrical engineering and his contribution to lay the foundations for special relativity and quantum mechanics many physicists believe that he had the most influence on 20th century physics and einstein actually described maxwell's work as the most profound and the most fruitful that physics has experienced since the time of newton maxwell was born on july 13th 1831 in edinburgh scotland shortly after his birth him and his family moved to a countryside home in glenlair cacood brashear his parents were john clerk maxwell and francis k little seems to be known about francis but john was a lawyer that came from a wealthy family from pennycook and added maxwell to his name after inheriting an estate the couple met in their 30s francis giving birth to maxwell when she was almost 40 and he was their second attempt at having a child their first child elizabeth died in infancy maxwell was raised a christian attending both calvinist presbyterian and episcopalian services due to his parents respective denominations and he converted to evangelical faith later in his life maxwell's early education began at home primarily being taught by his mother he was noted as being markedly curious relatively young with a letter from april 1834 describing him as tinkering with bell wires deeply observing the flow of pond water into his home and asking his mother to show him how everything worked like doors and locks it was expected that maxwell would be taught at home until the age of 13 but after suffering from abdominal cancer maxwell's mother died in december of 1839 when maxwell was just 8 years old this led to him being taught by a 16-year-old tudor who treated maxwell rather harshly john ended up dismissing the tudor in november of 1841 and it was decided that maxwell would attend edinboro academy during the academic year the family stayed at maxwell's aunt isabella's home and stayed in glenlair during the summers having been raised near isolation in glenlair maxwell had trouble adjusting to the academy his mannerisms and homemade wardrobe apparently made quite a negative impression on his peers earning him the name dafty though his peers weren't very nice to him maxwell eventually made lifetime friendships with lewis campbell a 19th century scottish classical scholar notable for his works on sophocles and plato and helping write the biography life of james clerk maxwell and peter guthrie tate a 19th century scottish mathematical physicist most notable for his work treat us on natural philosophy as well as his research and not theory which contributed to the formation of topology as a mathematical discipline tate described max well initially as timid and boring and the activities in which maxwell took part were considered unintelligible by his peers according to another classmate of his one day maxwell stood up to his peers with such energy that he was never bullied by them again gradually gaining everyone's respect in the coming years going on to win prize after prize in school contests including a mathematical medal and first place for both english and poetry in early 1846 the age of 14 maxwell wrote his first mathematical paper entitled on the description of oval curves and those having a plurality of foci in which he generalized the definition of an ellipse and defined curves where there are more than two foci the ideas had already been worked out by the likes of descartes but maxwell simplified the construction being a tremendous work from a 14 year old the work was read to the royal society of edinburgh on april 6 1846 [Music] in 1847 maxwell began attending the university of edinburgh according to joseph john thompson who wrote on maxwell maxwell interacted frequently with the most steamed intellectuals at the university of edinburgh they found him shy strange quite socially awkward which would be a trend for his entire life but nonetheless recognized how remarkable his abilities were people also found it difficult to follow maxwell's line of thinking when interacting as his immense creativity would cause them to jump from one subject to another before an idea could be properly digested by his recipient in november of 1847 maxwell was enrolled in three courses that would greatly influence him a mathematics course lectured by philip kelland a 19th century english mathematician notable for his work on heat light and water waves a physics course taught by james david forbes a 19th century scottish physicist notable for his work on the conduction of heat and inventing the colored spinning top and a logic course taught by william sterling hamilton a 19th century scottish logician notable for being among the first scottish logicians to create the algebra of logic introducing the quantification of the predicate forbes was especially impactful seeming to have really motivated maxwell's potent interest in the nature and perception of color [Music] despite all the work these classes provided maxwell didn't find the coursework that demanding thus giving him plenty of time to throw himself into experimental work especially in glenlair through his experiments which forbes highly encouraged by giving maxwell free use of any physics instruments forbes had procured maxwell discovered photo elasticity independent of its first discovery by david brewster and he produced two papers that were published in the philosophical transactions of the royal society of edinburgh the theory of rolling curves read in february of 1849 and the equilibrium of elastic solids read in february of 1850 in october of 1850 maxwell began attending peterhouse cambridge but moved to trinity college after his first term as he believed it would be easier to receive a fellowship in the future in november of 1851 maxwell studied under william hopkins a 19th century english mathematician who become notable for his influence on great mathematicians being coined the senior wrangler maker a wrangler being a student who gains first class honor in their final year of cambridge's undergraduate mathematics program maxwell ended up getting the place of second wrangler in 1854 just behind 19th century english mathematician edward ruth notable for systematizing the mathematical theory of mechanics and planting important seeds for modern control systems theory shortly after receiving his degree maxwell read his paper on the transformation of surfaces by bending to the cambridge philosophical society one of the few purely mathematical papers he'd written emphasizing his growth as a mathematician after spending years at trinity college maxwell wished to stay and apply to a fellowship he figured would take years he continued to research and provided tutoring to supplement his income while he waited on the fellowship verdict [Music] in march of 1855 maxwell read a paper of his to the royal society of edinburgh titled experiments on color which laid out the principles of color combination in the work he was able to demonstrate that white light would result from a mixture of red green and blue light in october 1855 maxwell was made a fellow at trinity college far sooner than he'd expected in early 1856 maxwell's father grew ill and he wished to spend more time with his father forbes urged maxwell to apply for the chair of natural philosophy at marshall college of aberdeen during easter vacation maxwell spent time with his father in glenlair who ended up dying on april 3rd 1856. maxwell mourned and returned to cambridge as he intended but shortly after returning he was informed that he'd gotten the post at marshall college and moved to aberdeen in november of 1856. for the academic year maxwell stayed with his cousin aberdeen his cousin was william dice k a scottish engineer notable for being the main contributor to work done on aberdeen harbor in the late 19th century outside of the academic year maxwell spent his time in glenlair at the home he inherited from his late father since maxwell was the chair of natural philosophy he had to take on other responsibilities outside of his research like constructing syllabi as well as preparing and giving lectures of which he committed 15 hours a week to including a free lecture to a local college when maxwell was able to focus on research he devoted his attention toward the motion of saturn's rings this was the subject of the adams prize announced in 1857 by st john's college of cambridge and maxwell was immediately drawn in him and tate had previously studied the problem in the late 1840s so maxwell had a head start he submitted his essay on the subject two years later entitled on the stability of the motion of saturn's rings being the only one to have enough headway on the topic to actually be able to submit in the essay he showed mathematically that stability could only be achieved if the rings consisted of numerous solid particles which wasn't confirmed officially until the voyager spacecraft's journey in the early 1980s he was awarded 130 quid for the essay and the quality of the essay was hailed by george biddle arie a 19th century english mathematician and astronomer notable for his research on planetary orbits which included measuring the mean density of the earth in 1857 maxwell became friends with the principle of marshall the reverend daniel dewer soon after meeting dewer maxwell met duer's daughter catherine mary who was seven years older than maxwell loves struck and the pair were engaged in february of 1858 marrying in june of that same year catherine often helped in maxwell's lab and did experiments herself on viscosity in 1859 forbes moved from the university of edinburgh to the university of saint andrews leaving the chair of natural philosophy vacant both maxwell and tate hopped on the opportunity and applied to the position ultimately tate was chosen as he was claimed to be better suited to teach students who had more academic struggles john ambrose fleming a 19th and 20th century electrical engineer and physicist notable for inventing the first vacuum tube and establishing the right-hand rule expressed that maxwell's teaching could be kind of hard to follow that it was often obscure and he had a paradoxical and elusive way of speaking however george gabriel stokes a 19th century irish english physicist and mathematician notable for his contributions to fluid mechanics including the navier stokes equations expressed that maxwell gave surprisingly clear explanations after attending one of his geometry lectures in 1860 martial college merged with king's college of aberdeen to become the university of aberdeen this led to maxwell being laid off but fortunately he was able to take up the chair of natural philosophy at king's college of london and so later that year maxwell and catherine moved to london after recovering from a near-fatal bout of smallpox the post at king's college was more demanding than that of aberdeen being required to lecture nine months out of the year including evening lectures to artisans despite this maxwell did some of his most important work at king's college in 1861 maxwell published a four-part paper titled on physical lines of force influenced by a paper he'd written and read to the cambridge philosophical society in 1855 called on faraday's lines of force this 1861 work was revolutionary in classical electrodynamics and helped tremendously with developing vector calculus it is considered to be one of the most historically significant publications in physics regarded as up there with newton's principia mathematica within the work maxwell derived his famous equations of electromagnetism coined now as maxwell's equations which are a set of 20 partial differential equations that describe how electric and magnetic fields propagate interact and are influenced by objects oliver heavyside a 19th and 20th century english mathematician and physicist notable for bringing complex numbers into circuit analysis and independently developing vector calculus rewrote 12 of the 20 equations into the four equations that are best known today it must be noted that it's easier to modify from the original 20 equations to be compatible with quantum mechanics besides maxwell's equations the work also calculated that the speed of propagation of an electromagnetic field is approximately that of the speed of light proposing that the phenomena of light is therefore an electromagnetic phenomenon which maxwell further expanded upon in his 1864 paper a dynamical theory of the electromagnetic field at another point in 1861 maxwell gave a lecture on color theory to the royal institution of london providing the world's first demonstration of color photography thomas sutton the inventor of the single lens reflex camera took the photo photographing a tartan ribbon three times through red green and blue filters there was a fourth photo taken through a yellow filter but this was not used in the demonstration the experiment was far from perfect as sutton's photo plates were insensitive to red and barely sensitive to green but was nonetheless a remarkable push in the right direction in 1865 maxwell left king's college to live on his estate in glenlair with catherine where he continued to produce high quality work he occasionally traveled to cambridge but mostly wished to stay back in glenlair in 1866 maxwell continued to work on the kinetic theory of gases that he begun while in aberdeen he treated gasses statistically which in turn developed statistical mechanics showing that temperatures in heat involved only molecular movement that molecules at a high temperature have a high probability of moving toward those at low temperatures but is not guaranteed the theory today is coined the maxwell boltzmann kinetic theory of gases in 1871 maxwell wrote a textbook leveraging much of the 1866 work and then some titled theory of heat as well as showing the first explicit use of dimensional analysis a system he'd propose while at king's college later in 1871 maxwell reluctantly accepted an offer from cambridge to be the first cavendish professor of physics designing the cavendish lab named after henry cavendish who was a primarily 18th century scientist notable for discovering hydrogen maxwell also helped set up the lab and it was formally opened in june of 1874. from 1874 to 1879 maxwell edited cavendish's papers which consisted of rummaging through and repeating experiments from cavenish's two published papers and 20 packages of manuscripts consisting of mathematical and experimental electricity research what resulted from these efforts was the work the electrical researches of the honorable henry cavendish published by maxwell in 1879 in april of 1879 maxwell began to have difficulty swallowing the first symptom of his abdominal cancer in may of 1879 maxwell was well enough to give one final lecture fleming commenting how surprisingly lucid maxwell was for someone who was dying him and catherine returned to glendale that summer both ill maxwell's health continued to plummet but despite the pain he suffered he still appeared cheerful through it all in october of 1879 maxwell and catherine returned to cambridge maxwell now barely able to walk he died about a month later on november 5th 1879 his doctor commenting that he'd never seen someone die more consciously and more calmly maxwell was buried at parton kirk near castle douglas well there you have it another brief history of a remarkable mathematician we'll end on a quote from carl sagan a 20th century american planetary physicist notable for his research on extraterrestrial life the equations were to represent nature and nature is maxwell believed beautiful and elegant this essentially aesthetic judgment by a nerdish physicist entirely unknown except to a few other academic scientists has done more to shape our civilization than any 10 recent presidents and prime ministers if you enjoyed the video please click that like button and subscribe and if you generally just enjoy the content of this channel please consider supporting on patreon as always thank you for watching and i'll catch you next time you

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Length: 17min 44sec (1064 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 02 2022