A critical edition of Ibn al-Haytham's \textit{On the shape of the eclipse}. The first experimental study of the camera obscura

DOI10.1007/978-3-319-47991-0MaRDI QIDQ332232zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Dominique Raynaud

Publication date 27 October 2016

Published in Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47991-0

zbMATH Keywords

al-Haythameclipse of the sungeometric optics

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Research exposition (monographs, survey articles) pertaining to history and biography (01-02) History of mathematics in the Golden Age of Islam (01A30) Collected or selected works; reprintings or translations of classics (01A75) History of geometry (51-03)

Review text

This book is much more than what is promised by the title. While the author refrains from a definite answer it is clear that he subscribes to the opinion that the mathematician/physicist al-Hasan Ibn al-Hasan Ibn al-Haytham is not identical with the philosopher Muhammad Ibn al-Hasan Ibn al Haytham. The book deals with the optics of an observation of a partial eclipse of the sun (identified as probably an eclipse in 990 observed in Basra) with a geometric-optics proof of the properties of the observed features (the variable image of the crescent-shaped sun). The critical edition of the Arabic text and its very legible English translation takes up about 50 pages of the 260 pages of the book. The extensive commentary first shows by a careful linguistic analysis that Ibn al-Haytham most probably was independent from precedessors and contemporaries in his mathematical treatment of geometric optics and also was misunderstood by modern commentators. The bulk of the commentary is a very detailed geometric exposition of the mathematics and physics referring to visibility and sharpness of the image observed in a camera obscura, including a study of he optimal size of the hole for sharpness. An appendix determines which manuscript illustrations seem to be authentic reproductions of the author's and which eclipse was observed. The author's idiosyncratic use of Arabic words to express scientific terms are collected in a useful glossary.

Recommendations

• L'optique d'ibn al-haytham et la tradition ptoléméenne
• Le commentaire par al-Kindī de l'Optique d'euclide: un traité jusqu'ici inconnu
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 4202206
• A Re-analysis of the Eclipse Observations in Ptolemy's Almagest
• Ptolemy, Alhazen, and Kepler and the Problem of Optical Images
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 7733738
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 2222949
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 5168470
• Ibn al-Haytham's Homocentric Epicycles in Latin Astronomical Texts of the XIVth and XVth Centuries
• Ptolemy, Alhacen, and Ibn Mu'adh and the Problem of Atmospheric Refraction

Cited in

(6)

• Egidius of Baisiu's theory of pinhole images
• Accounting for overspecification and indifference to visual accuracy in manuscript diagrams: a tentative explanation based on transmission
• The remarkable Ibn al-Haytham
• L'optique d'ibn al-haytham et la tradition ptoléméenne
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1435795 (Why is no real title available?)
• Tables for the radii of the Sun, the Moon, and the shadow from John of Gmunden to Longomontanus

This page was built for publication: A critical edition of Ibn al-Haytham's \textit{On the shape of the eclipse}. The first experimental study of the camera obscura

Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q332232)