63 lines
2.7 KiB
Markdown
63 lines
2.7 KiB
Markdown
**Antonie Pannekoek** (1873 - 1960) was an
|
|
[astronomer](Science "wikilink"), astrophysicist and [council
|
|
communist](Council_Communism "wikilink").
|
|
|
|
## Life
|
|
|
|
### Early Life and Scientific Career
|
|
|
|
Anton was born in Vaassen, [Netherlands](Netherlands "wikilink") in
|
|
1873, he had an interest in astronomy (the study of objects in space
|
|
such as comets, planets, stars and galaxies) from an early age, making
|
|
observations of the star
|
|
[Polaris](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaris) from a young age. He
|
|
studied mathematics and physics at the University of Leiden in 1891 and
|
|
published his first article "On the Necessity of Further Researches on
|
|
the Milky Way". After graduating, he was appointed as an observer at the
|
|
Leiden Observatory, he gained a PhD in 1902, a dissertation titled:
|
|
"Studies on the light change
|
|
[Algols](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algol)". He had a child in 1905
|
|
(who became a world-renowned geologist) with his wife Aaltje
|
|
Noordewier-Reddingius.\[1\]
|
|
|
|
### Political Shift
|
|
|
|
Anton had been a [liberal](Liberalism "wikilink") for most of his life,
|
|
but became a socialist after reading books by [Edward
|
|
Bellamy](Edward_Bellamy "wikilink") and began to study [Karl
|
|
Marx](Karl_Marx "wikilink"). He left the observatory in Leiden after
|
|
becoming dissatisfied with his work and moved to Belin. He became a
|
|
teacher at a school owned by the [Social
|
|
Democrats](Social_Democrats_\(Germany\) "wikilink") and published
|
|
political articles for magazines.\[2\]
|
|
|
|
### Return to the Netherlands
|
|
|
|
At the start of [World War I](World_War_I "wikilink"), he was on holiday
|
|
in the Netherlands and did not want to return to Germany, instead
|
|
becoming a teacher in physics, chemistry and maths. After the war, he
|
|
became fiercly criticial of [Lenin's](Vladimir_Lenin "wikilink") actions
|
|
in the [October Revolution](October_Revolution "wikilink") and
|
|
[authoritarian socialism](Authoritarian_Socialism "wikilink") in
|
|
general. In 1925, he became a lecturer at the [University of
|
|
Amsterdam](University "wikilink") and was elected to the Royal
|
|
Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (actions that angered the
|
|
government, as he was a libertarian communist).
|
|
|
|
He traveled extensively through [Indonesia](Indonesia "wikilink") to
|
|
observe solar eclipses and mapped the sky in the southern hemisphere.
|
|
His application of quantum mechanics and physics to astronomy lead him
|
|
to being the founder of astrophysics in the Netherlands. He recieved an
|
|
honory doctorate from Harvard University in 1936 and in 1951 the Gold
|
|
Medal from the Royal Astronomical Society. The astronomical institute of
|
|
the University of Amsterdam, the Anton Pannekoek Institute, which he
|
|
founded was named after him.\[3\]
|
|
|
|
## References
|
|
|
|
<references />
|
|
|
|
1. [Wikipedia](Wikipedia "wikilink") (Dutch) -
|
|
<https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Pannekoek>
|
|
2.
|
|
3. |