Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff

Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff ( born December 5, 1774 in Stuttgart, † June 26, 1835 in Erlangen, Germany ) was a German mathematician, physicist and astronomer. First Professor in Estonia and founder of the observatory of Dorpat, he later went to the universities of Würzburg and Erlangen. The member of three academies can be regarded as one of the last universal scholar, but were strongly criticized his work on astrology.

In the literature it is partially quoted under Johann Wilhelm and Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff Pfaff, falsely by astrologers as Julius Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff.

Life

William Pfaff was the youngest of twelve children of the Stuttgart Regional Finance Council Burkhard Friedrich Pfaff and his wife Maria Magdalena, née fire. His older brother Johann Friedrich Pfaff was also professor of mathematics.

After high school, he already graduated at age 16, he studied from 1791 to 1796 philosophy and theology at the Evangelical pin Tübingen ( Mag.phil. 1793 Exam 1796) and in 1800 for Stiftsrepetenten (Lecturer ) appointed. To address its varied scientific interests, he undertook then longer trips. In August 1803 he received - probably on the recommendation of his brother - a call to the newly established University of Dorpat ( now Tartu ), Professor of Applied Mathematics and Astronomy. Astronomical observation site was originally a private home because the observatory was built until 1809. Research topics included, inter alia, Astrometry, precession and perturbations of planets. In 1804 he married the Baltic nobility of Pauline Patkul. Of four children, but three died early.

As it drew Pfaff again to southern Germany, he moved in 1809 to the real educational establishment Nuremberg natural philosophers God Help Heinrich Schubert ( 1780-1860 ). Under its influence he turned diverse and speculative studies, including in linguistics, Sanskrit, Egyptology, and stood against the hieroglyphic interpretation of Jean -François Champollion. In the spirit of the romantic philosophy of nature he tried to peer under a rehabilitation of astrology, but encountered so with Carl Friedrich Gauss and Johann Elert Bode and the astronomer Wilhelm Olbers fierce criticism.

Beginning of 1817 was William Pfaff Professor specially facultatem of Mathematics at the University of Würzburg, but changed in the autumn of 1818 at the University of Erlangen as professor of mathematics, which he held until his death. As head of the Physics Cabinet he also held lectures in astronomy, was concerned with the newfound spectroscopy and promoted in Josef Fraunhofer he proposed later for an honorary doctorate. Pfaff himself was a member of the Academy at St. Petersburg, of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, and Physico- Medical Society to Moscow.

After a year of widowhood he married in 1817 in Erlangen his second wife Louise Plank. With her he had also three sons and one daughter, including Alexius Burkhard Friedrich Pfaff Emmanuel, who was a well-known mineralogist and geologist, and Hans Ulrich Vitalis Pfaff, professor of mathematics also in Erlangen.

After several strokes William Pfaff died 1835.

Honors

Pfaff and astrology

A private area of ​​interest was the Pfaff astrology, so it is sometimes called incorrectly "last Astrology professor at a German university." The New German Biography mentioned in this regard criticism of colleagues and sums up: With his advocacy of astrology was Fr an exception among the astronomers of his time.

He wrote popular essays on astrology and translated parts of the Tetrabiblos of Ptolemy, which were launched in 1938 by Hubert Korsch again. The complete transfer by M.E. Angle made ​​Pfaff Summary but dispensable. During 1820 astrology in the UK was slowly more popular again, like did not take place in the German language area.

Publications (selection )

  • Astronomical observations and news, and formulas for the disruption of Ceres by Saturn. In: JE Bode: Berlin Astronomical Yearbook for the year 1809 Berlin 1806.
  • Above the improvements of the lunch telescope, observed occultations, etc. In: Bode:. Astronomical Yearbook for the year 1812, Berlin 1809, pp. 120-124
  • Series of calculating the elements of a planetary orbit. In: Bode: Astronomical Yearbook for the year 1813, Berlin 1810, pp. 169-177.
  • Of the variation of the planet elements. In: Zach: Correspond. astron. Volume 25, 1812, pp. 393-408
  • Ideas for the perturbation calculation according to Keppler online at Google Books. In: Bode: Berlin Astronomical Yearbook for 1817, Berlin 1814, pp. 160-166.
  • Textbook of physics, physical geography and astronomy. For use with high schools and civic schools. Carl Heyder Verlag, Erlangen 1823
  • Hieroglyphics, its nature, and its sources. Besides hieroglyphtische inscription of three Scarabäen. Nuremberg, Friedrich Campe 1824
  • W. Herschel's discoveries in astronomy and its related sciences. . Cotta'sche bookstore, Stuttgart and Tübingen 1828, online at Google Books; PDF
  • Reflections on the spiral. In: memorandum Münchn.Acad. Volume 1, 1932, pp. 1-14
  • Astrology. Campe Verlag Nuremberg 1816
  • The light and the world regions, together with a treatise on Planetenconjunctionen and the star of the Magi. Kunz'schen bookstore Bamberg 1821 online at Google Books; PDF
  • Astrological Handbook for the year 1822 and 1823. Palm Publisher Erlangen 1822 and 1823, in Claudius Ptolemy's astrological system
  • Man and the stars - fragments of the history of the world soul. Campe Verlag, Nuremberg 1834.
  • Complete index of publications Pfaff, PDF of the Tartu University Library (incl topics to mathematics, languages, hieroglyphics, history of religion, history of science )
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