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ARCHYTAS of Tarentum, the last and greatest of the scientific thinkers belonging to the Pythagorean school, was contemporary with Plato, and is said to have been one of his teachers when he visited Italy. In any case he was a firm friend of Plato, and saved his life when it was endangered by the younger Dionysus. The respect felt for him by his fellow-citizens appears from the fact that he was chosen seven times as their general, with powers over the confederation of the cities of Magna Græcia. Many stories are told of his kindness to children and humanity to slaves.
Aristotle wrote a treatise, which has not come down to us, on the philosophy of Archytas. Such fragments of his philosophy as survive are too slight, and their authenticity is too uncertain, to enable us to estimate their value. But researchers have brought into prominence the importance of Archytas as a mathematical discoverer. His solution of what was known as the Problem of Delos -- the insertion between two given quantities of two mean proportionals -- proves great original power and the possession of a large stock of geometrical knowledge. We see that he was familiar with the generation of cylinders and cones, and had also clear ideas on the interpenetration of surfaces; he had, moreover, a clear conception of geometrical loci, and of their application to the determination of a point by means of their intersection. It is to be added, that Archytas was the teacher of Eudoxus of Cnidus, the most important name in mathematics between Pythagoras and Archimedes.
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| This biography is
reprinted from The New Calendar of Great Men. Ed. Frederic
Harrison. London: Macmillan and Co., 1920. |
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