Meet Michael Kearney: The youngest person in the world to graduate from a university
This week you met, here at Olhar Digital, the little belgian genius Laurent Simons, who, at just 11 years old, completed a degree in physics at the University of Antwerp in 12 months – a course that lasts three years. But Simons is not the youngest in history to graduate from a college.He trails American Michael Kearney, a BA in anthropology from the University of South Alabama, who graduated at age ten in 1994. Kearney, who is in the Guinness Book, is also the youngest to complete high school, a feat he has accomplished at 8 years old. ...
Was Tycho Brahe as Influential as he Thought?
Through the years there have been subtle changes in the evaluations of the work of Tycho Brahe. As one examines the tracts dealing with novae and comets in which reference is made to the nova of 1572 or the comet of 1577, it becomes quite evident that in different parts of Europe and in the Near East and at different periods of time and among men of different religious convictions different values were placed on his work. The extent of his influence should be distinguished from the measure of his achievements. Moreover, his importance cannot be completely separated from that of ...
The Life and Travels of Franz Joseph Haydn
May 31st marked the 208th anniversary of the death of Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn also known as the “Father of the Symphony.” Throughout his career, Haydn composed 106 symphonies and played a major role in the development of chamber music, one of the foundational genres of classical music.Haydn grew up in the town of Roharu, Austria. When his parents noticed his musical talents, he was enrolled at a young age to sing at St. Stephen's cathedral in Vienna, where he would also learn how to play keyboard and violin. At the age of 16, Haydn was forced out of St. Stephen's choir b...
Thomas Paine’s Attitudes Toward Religion Impacted His Legacy, Author Says
WASHINGTON, October 18, 2019 — Thomas Paine's open call for American independence from Great Britain in Common Sense inspired revolutionaries across the 13 colonies to revolt against the crown. The ripple of insurrection across the Atlantic earned Paine notoriety—and infamy—through the prolific distribution of his pamphlet and his support of the French Revolution. But Paine’s many other accomplishments in writing, poetry, science, and engineering have failed to appeal to the American public as treasured relics of history because of Paine’s scathing criticism of organized religion, according...
Sir Walter Raleigh and Evolution
I HAVE recently come across a passage in Sir Walter Raleigh's “History of the World” which seems to me sufficiently remarkable for the author to deserve a notable place among those early naturalists who anticipated in some measure the modern views on evolution. In the historical sketch at the beginning of the “Origin of Species” Darwin quotes Buffon, who was born a century and a half later than Raleigh, as “the first author who in modern times has treated the subject in a scientific spirit”; but although, scientifically, Raleigh cannot be compared with Buffon, the fact of his having penned ...
