Philip J. Davis | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1923-01-02)January 2, 1923 Lawrence, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Died | March 14, 2018(2018-03-14) (aged 95) |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Harvard University |
| Awards | Chauvenet Prize (1963) Lester R. Ford Award (1982)[1][2] |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Mathematics |
| Institutions | Brown University |
| Doctoral advisor | Ralph Philip Boas, Jr. |
| Doctoral students | Frank Deutsch Jeffery J. Leader |
Philip J. Davis (January 2, 1923[3] – March 14, 2018) was an American academicapplied mathematician.
Davis was born inLawrence, Massachusetts. He was known for his work innumerical analysis andapproximation theory, as well as his investigations in thehistory andphilosophy of mathematics. He earned his degrees in mathematics fromHarvard University (SB, 1943; PhD, 1950, advisorRalph P. Boas, Jr.), and his final position was Professor Emeritus at the Division of Applied Mathematics atBrown University.
He served briefly in an aerodynamics research position in theAir Force inWorld War II before joining theNational Bureau of Standards (now theNational Institute of Standards and Technology). He became Chief of Numerical Analysis there and worked on the well-knownAbramowitz and StegunHandbook of Mathematical Functions before joining Brown in 1963.
He was awarded theChauvenet Prize for mathematical writing in 1963 for an article on thegamma function,[4] and won numerous other prizes, including being chosen to deliver the 1991 Hendrick Lectures of theMAA (which became the basis for his bookSpirals: FromTheodorus to Chaos). He was a frequent invited lecturer and authored several books. Among the best known areThe Mathematical Experience (withReuben Hersh), a popular survey of modern mathematics and itshistory andphilosophy;Methods of Numerical Integration (withPhilip Rabinowitz),[5] long the standard work on the subject ofquadrature; andInterpolation and Approximation, still an important reference in this area.
ForThe Mathematical Experience (1981), Davis and Hersh won aNational Book Award in Science.[6][a]
Davis also wrote an autobiography,The Education of a Mathematician; some of his other books include autobiographical sections as well. In addition, he published works of fiction. His best-known book outside the field of mathematics isThe Thread: A Mathematical Yarn (1983, 2nd ed. 1989), which "has raised Digression into a literary form" (Gerard Piel); it takes off from the name of the Russian mathematicianTschebyscheff, and in the course of explaining why he insists on that "barbaric, Teutonic, non-standard orthography" (in the words of a reader ofInterpolation and Approximation who wrote him to complain), he digresses in many amusing directions.
Davis died on March 14, 2018, at the age of 95.[7]
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