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Charles Howard Hinton (1853, UK – 30 April 1907, Washington D.C., USA) was a British mathematician and writer of science fiction works titled ''Scientific Romances''. He was interested in higher dimensions, particularly the fourth dimension. He is known for coining the word "tesseract" and for his work on methods of visualising the geometry of higher dimensions. ==Life== Hinton taught at Cheltenham College while he studied at Balliol College, Oxford, where he obtained his B.A. in 1877. From 1880 to 1886, he taught at Uppingham School in Rutland, where Howard Candler, a friend of Edwin Abbott Abbott's, also taught.〔British Society for the History of Mathematics (Gazeteer ).〕 Hinton also received his M.A. from Oxford in 1886. In 1880 Hinton married Mary Ellen, daughter of Mary Everest Boole and George Boole, the founder of mathematical logic. In 1883 he went through a marriage ceremony with Maud Florence, by whom he had had twin children, under the assumed identity of John Weldon. He was subsequently convicted of bigamy and spent three days in prison, losing his job at Uppingham. His father James Hinton was a radical advocate of polygamous relationships,〔[http://higherspace.wordpress.com/2009/06/12/rucker-on-boole-stott-hintons-bigamy/#_ftn8 A cultural history of higher space, 1853-1907 [work in progress] Mark Blacklock〕 and according to Charles' mother James had once remarked to her: "Christ was the saviour of Men but I am the saviour of Women and I don't envy him a bit."〔Havelock Ellis papers, British Library.〕 In 1887 Charles moved with Mary Ellen to Japan to work in a mission before accepting a job as headmaster of the Victoria Public School. In 1893 he sailed to the United States on the SS ''Tacoma'' to take up a post at Princeton University as an instructor in mathematics.〔 In 1897, he designed a gunpowder-powered baseball pitching machine for the Princeton baseball team's batting practice.〔〔Hinton, Charles, "A Mechanical Pitcher", ''Harper's Weekly'', 20 March 1897, p. 301–302.〕 The machine was versatile, capable of variable speeds with an adjustable breech size, and firing curve balls by the use of two rubber-coated steel fingers at the muzzle of the pitcher.〔Hinton, Charles, "The Motion of a Baseball", ''The Yearbook of the Minneapolis Society of Engineers'', May, 1908, p. 18–28.〕 He successfully introduced the machine to the University of Minnesota, where Hinton worked as an assistant professor until 1900, when he resigned to move to the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C.〔 At the end of his life, Hinton worked as an examiner of chemical patents for the United States Patent Office. At age 54, he died unexpectedly of a cerebral hemorrhage on 30 April 1907.〔"Scientist Drops Dead", ''Washington Post'', 1 May 1907.〕〔Several of these references are cited in the introduction to the book ''Speculations on the Fourth Dimension'', edited by Rudolf Rucker.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Charles Howard Hinton」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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