Grant Alien was a Canadian writer on scientific subjects and novelist. He was born in 1848 at Kingston, Canada and died in 1899. His earlier education he received in America, he studied also in France, and he graduated at Oxford with honours in 1870. From 1873 to 1879 he was connected with Queen's College, Jamaica, but latterly resided chiefly in England, and became well known as an exponent of evolutionary science, and as a novelist. His first important work, Physiological AEsthetics, appeared in 1877; his other scientific or semi-scientific works include The Colour Sense; The Evolutionist at Large; Colin Clout's Calendar (the record of a summer); Vignettes from Nature; The Colours of Flowers; Flowers and their Pedigrees; and Force and Energy, a Theory of Dynamics. Other works by him are: Anglo-Saxon Britain; Charles Darwin; and The Evolution of the Idea of God. His novels were of little account. Research Grant Alien
Jean Le Rond d'Alembert was a French mathematician and philosopher. He was born in 1717 and died in 1783. He was the illegitimate son of Madame de Tencin, and was exposed at the Church of St. Jean le Rond (hence his name) soon after birth. He was brought up by the wife of a poor glazier, and with her he lived for more than forty years. His parents never publicly acknowledged him, but his father settled upon him an income of 1200 livres. He showed much quickness in learning, entered the College Mazarin at the age of twelve, and studied mathematics with enthusiasm and success, but received little encouragement from his teachers.
Having left college he studied law and became an advocate, but did not practise, and long continued to occupy himself with mathematics, in which he made immense advances by his own efforts, often arriving at results that other mathematicians had previously arrived at unknown to him. A pamphlet on the motion of solid bodies in a fluid, and another on the integral calculus, which he laid before the Academy of Sciences in 1739 and 1740, showed him in so favourable a light that the Academy received him in 1741 into the number of its members. He soon after published his famous work on dynamics, Traite de Dynamique in 1743; and another work dealing with fluids, Traite des Fluides. A treatise or essay on the cause of winds was also a work that added to D'Alembert's reputation.
He also took a part in the investigations which completed the discoveries of Newton respecting the motion of the heavenly bodies, and published at intervals various important astronomical dissertations - on the perturbations of the planets, for instance, and on the precession of the equinoxes - as well as on other subjects. He also took part, with Diderot and others, in the celebrated Encyclopedic, for which he wrote the Discours Preliminaire, as well as many philosophical and almost all the mathematical articles. Literature, history, and philosophy also received attention from him, and his Elements de Philosophic published in 1759, was a work of much value.
He received an invitation from the Russian empressCatherine II to go to St Petersburg as tutor to her son, a very large sum being offered; and Frederick the Great invited him to settle in Berlin, but in vain. From Frederick, however, he accepted a pension, and he also paid a visit to Berlin. There was an intimate friendship between him and Voltaire. He never married, but he was on terms of the closest friendship with Madame L'Espinasse, and they occupied the same house for a number of years. He was held in high esteem by David Hume, who left him a legacy of 200 pounds. Research Jean d'Alembert
Vivian Caulfield was an English artist and writer. He was born in 1874 and died in 1958. He wrote the book How to Ski which analysed skiingdynamics for the first time, and criticised the method of turning with a single stick which led to the modern style of skiing with a stick in each hand. Research Vivian Caulfield
Sir William Rowan Hamilton was an Irish mathematician and astronomer. He was born in 1805 at Dublin and died in 1865. Before he was fourteen years old he had made himself acquainted with thirteen languages, among which were Arabic, Persian, Hindustani, Sanskrit, and Syriac. At the age of seventeen he was pronounced by a competent authority the first mathematician of his age. At Trinity College, Dublin, he gained the highest honours, and he was appointed in 1827 professor of astronomy in Trinity College, as well as astronomer-royal. He was knighted in 1835, and in 1837 elected president of the Royal Irish Academy. He contributed numerous papers to the transactions of learned bodies, and made some valuable discoveries; but his fame is chiefly founded on his invention of the calculus of quaternions, a new method in the higher mathematics. Amongst his published works' are General Method in Dynamics, Algebra as the Science of Pure Time, Memoirs on Discontinuous Functions. Research William Hamilton 3
The Type 88 (K1) is a South Korean main battle tank designed by General Dynamics during the 1980s. The Type 88 is manned by a crew of four and is armed with a 105 mm smoothbore gun with computerised fire-control, thermal sleeve and fume extractor, one 7.62 mm coaxial machine-gun, one 12.7 mm anti-aircraft machine-gun and 2 x 6 smoke dischargers. A liquid-cooled turbo-charged diesel engine provides a top speed of 65 kmh and a range of 500 km. Research Type 88
In dynamics, a couple is two equal and parallel forces acting in different directions, and applied to the same body. The distance between their lines of action is called the arm of the couple, and the product of one of the two equal forces by this arm is called the moment of the couple. Research Couple
Dynamics is the science which deals with the laws of force in their relation to matter at rest or in motion, and as such it is differentiated from cinematics, which considers motion mathematically, and apart from the forces producing it. It is to Isaac Newton that we owe the clear statement of the three primary laws of force. These are: (1) that every body remains in a state of rest, or of uniform motion along- a straight line, unless it is compelled by force to change that state. (2) That change of motion is in proportion to the force employed, and occurs along the straight line in which the force acta. This change of motion includes both change of rate and of direction. (3) That, as the result of every action, there is also and always an equal reaction. These laws, which were formulated from experiment, involve the conception of force as a primary influence or action expressed in terms of space, time, and matter.
Dynamics is divided into two great branches: statics, which treats of solid bodies at rest under the action of forces; and kinetics, which treats of the action of forces in producing motion in solid bodies. Formerly the latter alone was called dynamics, and to this, in conjunction with statics, the general name mechanics was given. In the wide sense dynamics includes also hydrostatics. Research Dynamics
Gunnery is the science of conducting the fire of artillery. Gunnery may be divided into the theoretical and practical branches. The former consists chiefly in the application of mathematics to the solution of the problems in dynamics involved in the consideration of the motion of shot through the air, and is essential to the design of good systems of rifling and well-proportioned projectiles.
Practical gunnery, which deals with the actual firing, has reference rather to the use of individual guns than to the handling of artillery on a large scale. The line taken by a projectile in its passage through the air to the first point of impact is called its trajectory. This is always a curve, since though the force of the powder tends to propel the projectile in a straight line, the force of the earth's gravity begins to drag it down on leaving the gun; the trajectory is also subject to modifications caused by the resistance of the air, the form of the shot, etc. Among things to be considered in gunnery are the velocity of the projectile, initial and subsequent, the angle of elevation of the piece, the range or distance to which the projectile is carried, etc.
The trajectory is more curved with a low-velocity gun than with a high-velocity one; hence to obtain the same range the former must have a greater angle of elevation above the horizontal plane. To allow for the fall of the projectile it is necessary to point the axis of the bore of the gun as much above the mark aimed at as the projectile would have fallen below if the gun had been pointed Straight. Hence the use of sights both for small arms and heavy guns. The latter have usually what is called a 'tangent scale' at the breech and a foresight at the muzzle to enable the piece to be aimed suitably. In order to know how to aim a gun so as to hit an object, its range or distance must be found. This may be done by trial, that is by firing several experimental shots; but special instruments known as range-finders have been in use since the start of the 20th century, the principle on which they are constructed being that of measuring the angle subtended at the object by a known base - the base being at the instrument itself.
In determining the velocity of projectiles various instruments were formerly used. Among these were Wheatstone's electro-magnetic chronoscope, the Bashforth chronograph, the Noble chronoscope, etc.
Horizontal fire against the front of a column or line of works is termed direct fire ; that which sweeps along a line of men or earth-works, enfilade fire, high angle and vertical fire is when the piece is fired at a high angle of elevation. Research Gunnery
Statics is the branch of dynamics dealing with states of balance in which no motion occurs because the forces tending to produce it are so arranged that their effects neutralise each other. Research Statics
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
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Abbreviations
Research Grant Alien
