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Pastimes : Don't Ask Rambi -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ilaine who wrote (30762)	7/2/1999 8:59:00 PM
From: jpmac	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71178

That sounds like a very well-rounded day of entertainment. I looked up the Walters. It looks neat. Here's a link to their site with some info on the book: thewalters.org And here's a blurb from Encyclopedia.com (he sounds like an interesting feller) : Archimedes c.287 B.C.-212 B.C., Greek mathematician, physicist, and inventor. His reputation in antiquity was based on several mechanical contrivances, e.g., ARCHIMEDES' SCREW; which he is alleged to have invented. One legend states that during the Second PUNIC WAR he protected his native Syracuse from the besieging armies of Marcus Claudius MARCELLUS for three years by inventing machines of war, e.g., various ballistic instruments and mirrors that set Roman ships on fire by focusing the sun's rays on them. In modern times, however, he is best known for his work in mathematics, mechanics, and hydrostatics. In mathematics, he calculated that the value of PI is between 3 10/71 and 3 1/7; devised a mathematical exponential system to express extremely large numbers; proved that the volume of a sphere is two thirds the volume of a circumscribed cylinder; and, in calculating the areas and volumes of various geometrical figures, carried the method of exhaustion invented by EUDOXUS OF CNIDUS far enough in some cases to anticipate the invention (17th cent.) of the CALCULUS. One of the first to apply geometry to mechanics and hydrostatics, he proved the law of the lever entirely by geometry and established ARCHIMEDES' PRINCIPLE. In another legendary story, the ruler Hiero II requested him to find a method for determining whether a crown was pure gold or alloyed with silver. Archimedes realized, as he stepped into a bath, that a given weight of gold would displace less water than an equal weight of silver (which is less dense than gold); and he is said, in his excitement at his discovery, to have run home naked, shouting Eureka! Eureka! (I have found it! I have found it!). He was killed by a Roman soldier, supposedly while absorbed in mathematics.