The Institut Henri Poincaré produces an exclusive 32-minute documentary on the outstanding mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange, in co-production with CNRS Images and in partnership with the Lagrange Institute of Paris.
Historians retrace Lagrange's European course and show how he went from academics protected by the powerful to a teacher charged with educating new citizens at the time of the French Revolution. They pose the question of the involvement of scientists in the political life of the time.
Scientists explain how the work of Lagrange, especially in analysis and in celestial mechanics, is innovative in the way of conceiving the problems at the time, and make it possible to understand how he positioned himself on the border between mathematics and physics , and was able to deeply mark the sciences and their teaching until today. Despite the omnipresence of Lagrange in mathematics and modern physics (Equations Lagrange, Points Lagrange, Interpolation Lagrange, Lagrangian, etc ...), the life of this scholar of the Enlightenment remains unknown ...
Acknowledgments: Bruno Belhoste - Anne-Sophie Bonnet-Bendhia - Jenny Boucard - Alberto Conte - Laurent Guin - Eberhard Knobloch - Jacques Laskar - Thomas Morel - Maria Munoz - Luigi Pepe - Jerome Perez - Silvia Roero.
Production: Cédric Villani, Jean-Philippe Uzan
Scientific director: Frédéric Brechenmacher
Director: Quentin Lazzarotto
In collaboration with CNRS Images and in partnership with the Lagrange Institute of Paris.
Acknowledgments: This film was supported by Pierre and Marie Curie University with funding from the Labex Carmin.