Fun article by John Psmith featuring some ferociously competitive mathematicians and physicists. A quote:
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In the 1696 edition of Acta Eruditorum, Johann Bernoulli threw down the gauntlet:
"I, Johann Bernoulli, address the most brilliant mathematicians in the world. Nothing is more attractive to intelligent people than an honest, challenging problem, whose possible solution will bestow fame and remain as a lasting monument. Following the example set by Pascal, Fermat, etc., I hope to gain the gratitude of the whole scientific community by placing before the finest mathematicians of our time a problem which will test their methods and the strength of their intellect. If someone communicates to me the solution of the proposed problem, I shall publicly declare him worthy of praise.
Given two points A and B in a vertical plane,
what is the curve traced out by a point acted on only by gravity,
which starts at A and reaches B in the shortest time."
This became known as the brachistochrone problem, and it occupied the best minds of Europe for, well, for less time than Johann Bernoulli hoped. The legend goes that he issued that pompous challenge I quoted above, and shortly afterward discovered that his own solution to the problem was incorrect. Worse, in short order he received five copies of the actually correct solution to the problem, supposedly all on the same day. The responses came from Newton, Leibniz, l’Hôpital, Tschirnhaus, and worst of all, his own brother Jakob Bernoulli, who had upstaged him yet again.
(1/2) (The fun part about Newton comes in part 2.)
