William Kingdon Clifford, (born May 4, 1845, Exeter, Devon, England—died March 3, 1879, Madeira Islands, Portugal), British philosopher and mathematician who, influenced by the non-Euclidean geometries of Bernhard Riemann and Nikolay Lobachevsky, wrote “On the Space-Theory of Matter” (1876). He presented the idea that matter and energy are simply different types of curvature of space, thus foreshadowing Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity.
Clifford was educated at King’s College, London, and at Trinity College, Cambridge, and was elected a fellow of the latter in 1868. In 1871 he was named professor of mathematics at University College, London. Three years later he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society.
Image source:
Not Stated. (1879). William Kingdon Clifford. Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Portrait_of_William_Kingdon_Clifford.jpg
Biography source:
William Kingdon Clifford. (2018, May 2). Retrieved October 31, 2018, from https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Kingdon-Clifford
