Happy Ada Lovelace Day!

[kaitou]

Awhile back I got a link on Facebook about Ada Lovelace Day and I promised that I would write about a favorite woman in Science or Mathematics. Despite the fact that I'm an utter failure at it, I find science fascinating. (Math is utterly incomprehensible to me) Some of my favorite high school memories are of going to The Cranbrook Institute for their Women in Math and Science Days. They'd bus any interested girl out there to go meet and hear lectures from all these women scientists and mathematicians. Ichthyologists, Engineers, Art Restorers... very cool stuff. And now, here I am, a pseudo-engineer. How my old Science teachers would laugh.

Anyway! I want to tell you about Gabrielle Émilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, marquise du Châtelet. Her life was so awesome you won't believe she's not a Mary Sue.

1. Her father had her trained in fencing, Latin, Greek, Mathematics, Literature and Science.


2. When she was hard up for books, she used her Math skillz at gambling.


3. She married a Marquis (marriage into nobility is VITAL for Mary Sue-ish-ness).


4. She had an affair with the Duc de Richelieu, who inspired Valmont in Dangerous Liaisons


5. She had an affair with Voltaire. Voltaire.


6. She wrote Institutions de physique as a textbook for her 13 year old son.


7. Coffeehouses were the hotbed of scientific/political/philosophical thought at the time, and women were not allowed. So Émilie simply attended in men's clothing.


8. She co-wrote Eléments de la philosophie de Newton with Voltaire, which explained Newton in a way that even a general reader could understand.


9. Her translation of Newton's Principia Mathematica into French is STILL the gold standard.


10. She has her own crater on Venus.

Comments

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

Voltaire knew everyone cool. I'd write fanfic about awesomely improbable team-ups between kick-ass 18th century Europeans except they wouldn't be awesomely improbable because Voltaire was friends with all of them.

If ever I had to defend the world from alien invasion while armed only with a time machine I'd totally be going through his Rolodex.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

Does it translate like the TARDIS? Otherwise this might get pretty tricky.

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

I am actually not totally terrible at reading archaic French! Since that was the language of intellectual conversation at the time, this could totally work out!

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

Wow. She seems like one of those people around whom so much cool stuff revolved, it seems like it HAS to be fiction.

Do you know if she was actually in disguise in the coffeehouses? I'm not sure which would be more awesome, her going totally incognito or just wearing pants to humor the insecure male philosophers.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

It wasn't the philosophers, it was the coffeehouse owner. Women were pretty much universally banned from European coffeehouses in the 18th century. I'm a little unclear as to whether it was a legal thing or not. She basically just wore men's clothing (fabulous mens' clothing from all accounts) to show that the rule was silly. She was already friends with many of the patrons, and they welcomed her. It sounds more like as long as she wore pants the coffeehouse owner didn't 'officially' know she was a woman. Plausible deniability.

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

Now THAT is badass. I like her even more now.

Emilie du Chatelet

[(Anonymous)]

I also posted about Emilie du Chatelet for Ada Lovelace day! Haha, glad to have company.
http://tempietto2.blogspot.com/2009/03/emilie-marquise-du-chatelet.html