# People who made significant contributions to math/science yet received no education in those fields. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 30, 2016, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113 "2016-10-30T14:24:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/1 "2016-10-30T14:24:03Z")
(Mods, please feel free to move this thread to a more appropriate forum. I wasn’t sure where to put it.) I am intrigued by people who have contributed great things to math and science yet received little or no formal education in those fields. A few that come to mind: [Michael Faraday](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Faraday). One of the greatest experimenters ever. Yet his knowledge in math didn’t extend above basic algebra. [Marjorie Rice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marjorie_Rice). A housewife who came up with new discoveries in geometrical tiling. [Milton Humason](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_L._Humason). I love this story… when the Mount Wilson Observatory was being built 100 years ago, Milton was a mule driver and was hired to haul materials and equipment up the mountain. He hung around the observatory after it was completed and eventually became an astronomer. What are some others? Seems this was somewhat more common in the past. Is it essentially unheard of today? ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/2 "2016-10-30T14:37:06Z")
Vivien Thomas, a black man who lost his life savings in the 1929 crash and therefore could not attend college, who nonetheless was a pioneer in the development of open heart surgery. > **[Vivien Thomas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivien_Thomas)** > > Vivien Theodore Thomas (August 29, 1910 – November 26, 1985) was an American laboratory supervisor who developed a procedure used to treat blue baby syndrome (now known as cyanotic heart disease) in the 1940s. He was the assistant to surgeon Alfred Blalock in Blalock's experimental animal laboratory at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, and later at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. Thomas was unique in that he did not have any professional education or exp A PBS ... ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/3 "2016-10-30T14:55:32Z")
**[Hedy Lamarr](https://www.nwhm.org/education-resources/biography/biographies/hedy-lamarr/)** is known for her inventions (used to this day in cell phone technology), yet seems to have had minimal formal education in the sciences, having gone to acting school. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/4 "2016-10-30T14:59:13Z")
> [@Crafter\_Man](#): > > (Mods, please feel free to move this thread to a more appropriate forum. I wasn’t sure where to put it.) > > I am intrigued by people who have contributed great things to math and science yet received little or no formal education in those fields. > > A few that come to mind: > > [Michael Faraday](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Faraday). One of the greatest experimenters ever. Yet his knowledge in math didn’t extend above basic algebra. > > [Marjorie Rice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marjorie_Rice). A housewife who came up with new discoveries in geometrical tiling. > > [Milton Humason](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_L._Humason). I love this story… when the Mount Wilson Observatory was being built 100 years ago, Milton was a mule driver and was hired to haul materials and equipment up the mountain. He hung around the observatory after it was completed and eventually became an astronomer. > > What are some others? > > Seems this was somewhat more common in the past. Is it essentially unheard of today? I suspect the great increase in knowledge and specialization in the time since Faraday make it difficult to make a contribution without training. You still can in things like tiling, which you could do without a detailed background in mathematics, but I can’t see someone making a development in electromagnetism today without studying it. For what it’s worth, I was surprised to learn that my uncle, who worked for Merck and got a couple of patents while working there, had no formal degree in chemistry. He got those a few decades ago, so it certainly was possible even that recently to make a contribution in chemistry. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/5 "2016-10-30T15:05:18Z")
Nicholas Christofilos [Nicholas Christofilos - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Christofilos) - a Greek businessman (he owned an elevator company) who studied physics on his own, and eventually was hired at Lawrence Livermore as a physicist. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/6 "2016-10-30T15:06:07Z")
[Hermann Grassman’s initial studies were in theology and literature](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Grassmann), yet he went on to make important contributions to physical sciences and mathematics. [Oliver Heaviside was too poor to attend college](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Heaviside) so became a telegraph operator. From this lowly start he went on to become one of the most important electrical engineers ever and made important contributions to mathematical physics. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/7 "2016-10-30T16:11:30Z")
What a coincidence! Just this morning I read a review (in American Scientist) of a biography of Nathaniel Bowditch (1773-1838) by Tamara Plakins Thornton. At age 12 with only three years of formal schooling, he apprenticed at a ship chandlery owned by a relative and that was the end of his formal education. He reorganized the accounting at his company, taught himself algebra (and eventually calculus), revised the standard nautical charts and produced his own, then got interested in actuarial math and worked for an insurance company. Somehow he got placed on the board of governors at Harvard, where he engineered the removal of an incompetent president. Later on he got interested in celestial mechanics and eventually translated four of the five volumes of Laplace’s famous tome (his translation of the fourth was posthumous). Along the way he was elected to the Royal Societies of England, Scotland, and Ireland. One other instance I have written about before. A friend in graduate school who was a HS dropout, never went to college, taught himself undergrad math, somehow got into grad school and got master’s and PhD. He didn’t ever do that much math, but the story is remarkable. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/8 "2016-10-30T16:19:15Z")
My favorite is George McJunkin. Born a slave, be became a cowboy after the Civil War, and his observance and curiosity led to the discovery of the important difference between the dating of Folsom and Clovis point arrow-heads. > **[George McJunkin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_McJunkin)** > > George McJunkin (1856–1922) was an African American cowboy, amateur archaeologist and historian. McJunkin discovered the Folsom site in New Mexico in 1908. > Born to slaves in Midway, Texas, McJunkin was approximately 9 years old when the Civil War ended. He worked as a cowboy for freighters. He reportedly learned how to read from fellow cow punchers. McJunkin taught himself to read, write, speak Spanish, play the fiddle and guitar, eventually becoming an amateur archaeologist and historian. In 18... ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/9 "2016-10-30T16:37:59Z")
[Ramanujan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan) is the most famous one I know. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/10 "2016-10-30T17:39:26Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > [Oliver Heaviside was too poor to attend college](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Heaviside) so became a telegraph operator. From this lowly start he went on to become one of the most important electrical engineers ever and made important contributions to mathematical physics. Wow that’s quite a bio. ---
**Author:** ![coffeecat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coffeecat/32/3405_2.png) [@coffeecat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coffeecat)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/11 "2016-10-30T19:06:54Z")
I think Maria Mitchell taught herself celestial mechanics by reading texts in the original French and Latin. She went on to be an astronomer at the U.S. Naval Observatory and then a professor of astronomy at Vassar. Sent from my SM-G900T using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/12 "2016-10-30T19:12:05Z")
Note that Ramanujan spent a while studying math at various universities. He didn’t even try much at his other subjects, and he was kicked out of each of those institutions. Everyone knew how good he was at math and (when he bothered to try) other academic subjects from at least the age of 10 on. He was allowed to study math by himself. By the time he was 23, there were other Indian mathematicians trying to find him a position doing mathematical research. They also began trying to get British mathematicians to allow him to come to work with them. When he was 26 he went to Cambridge University to work with G. H. Hardy. When he was 31, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (and then he died a year later). It was not true, as some stories of his life imply, that his abilities were unrecognized before he wrote to Hardy. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/13 "2016-10-30T19:43:48Z")
Williamina Fleming discovered the Horsehead Nebula; she started off as Edward Charles Pickering’s maid; > **[Williamina Fleming](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williamina_Fleming)** > > Williamina Paton Stevens Fleming (15 May 1857 – 21 May 1911) was a Scottish-American astronomer. She was a single mother, hired by the director of the Harvard College Observatory to help in the photographic classification of stellar spectra. She helped develop a common designation system for stars and cataloged more than ten thousand stars, 59 gaseous nebulae, over 310 variable stars, and 10 novae and other astronomical phenomena. Among several career achievements that advanced astronomy, Flem... ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/14 "2016-10-30T19:44:07Z")
One story I’m fond of is that of [Britney Gallivan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Britney_Gallivan), who, while still in high school, completely settled the problem of how many times a piece of paper can be folded. She first of all recognized that the oft-quoted figure of a maximum of seven folds had no basis, then recognized what the actual limiting factors were, then derived a model for such folding and a formula based on it, and then applied the formula she had derived to actually do the experiment and folded a single piece of paper in half twelve times. I have no idea what she went on to do after high school, and the problem she solved was not a fundamental one with widespread implications, but still, it’s impressive to see any single person so thoroughly own every aspect of a problem. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/15 "2016-10-31T13:55:20Z")
That’s Hedley. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/16 "2016-10-31T16:09:18Z")
How about Benjamin Franklin? One of the most remarkable self-taught polymaths in history… ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/17 "2016-10-31T16:17:43Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > For what it’s worth, I was surprised to learn that my uncle, who worked for Merck and got a couple of patents while working there, had no formal degree in chemistry. He got those a few decades ago, so it certainly was possible even that recently to make a contribution in chemistry. Trades-HS degrees in Chemistry or Quality Control are pretty recent in much of Europe; most of the lab techs I’ve met had a high school degree (college-track or trades) but at most that meant three years of completely-theoretical chemistry beyond the middle school introductory courses. When half the managers in a certain Swedish factory got fired, the new Quality manager was a guy who hadn’t even finished HS but had been the senior lab tech for over a decade; he wouldn’t have been able to explain acidity models or resonance but if you needed someone to take a look at a recipe for a water-based latex and tell you what was wrong with it, he was your man. ---
**Author:** ![somepumpkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7feea3/32.png) [@somepumpkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/somepumpkin)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/18 "2016-10-31T16:18:57Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > That’s Hedley. I heard that in my head, too. ---
**Author:** ![Jeff\_Lichtman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeff_lichtman/32/1531_2.png) [@Jeff\_Lichtman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jeff_Lichtman)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/19 "2016-10-31T17:29:51Z")
Jane Goodall had no formal education as a scientist. She couldn’t afford a university education, so at the age of 18 she got a job as a secretary at Oxford. In 1957 she took a trip to Africa, where she met Louis Leakey. He hired her as an assistant, and in a few years she was off by herself studying chimpanzees. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113/20 "2016-10-31T17:36:41Z")
Since I’ve been watching the [TV show](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Sex), how about the sex researcher Virginia Johnson? She had some college but never received a degree, but she did fundamental and important research. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-made-significant-contributions-to-math-science-yet-received-no-education-in-those-fields/770113.md?page=2)