Taurinus

Franz Adolph Taurinus

Born: 15 Nov 1794 in Bad König, Germany
Died: 13 Feb 1874 in Cologne, Germany

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Taurinus studied law at Heidelberg, Giessen and Göttingen. From 1822 he lived in Cologne as a man of independent means able to devote himself entirely to research without students to teach.

He corresponded with Gauss and worked on geometry. At first he tried to prove that Euclidean geometry was the only geometry but, in 1826, he accepted the lack of contradiction in other geometries. From that time he worked on non-euclidean trigonometry.

Taurinus presented the idea that elliptic geometry could be realised on the surface of a sphere, an idea taken up by Riemann.

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. F Engel and P Stäckel, Die Theorie der Parallellinien von Euklid bis Gauss (Leipzig,1895). 
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JOC/EFR February 1996