Thābit ibn Qurra

Thābit ibn Qurra lived in Baghdad in the second half of the ninth century, a time when the Abbasid Caliphate gathered minds and manuscripts from across the known world. He made his mark in algebra and geometry, then turned to astronomy and became one of the first to reform the Ptolemaic system that had stood for centuries. In mechanics, he founded the field of statics. He wrote extensively on medicine and produced philosophical treatises, moving between disciplines with the fluency his era allowed. He died on February 19, 901, having spent a career translating, discovering, and arguing with th…