10. Blaise Pascal taught himself math as a young boy and then went on to invent the world’s earliest calculator at the age of just 15
When Blaise Pascal was a young boy, his tax collector father banned him from studying mathematics. A keen mathematician himself, Etienne Pascal believed that, if his son started learning about numbers, he would love them so much that he wouldn’t be able to focus on learning Latin and Greek. Of course, this only made young Pascal even more curious. He would study math on his own and in private. He even started to work out geometry, giving his own names to terms and concepts. When his father found out about his secret studies, he couldn’t stay mad for long. After all, his young son was quite obviously a genius.
At the age of 12, then, Pascal Junior would accompany his father to lectures and seminars at the local mathematical institute. As well as learning from his elders, the precocious boy also worked on theories of his own. At the age of 16, he published a significant treatise on the subject of projective geometry. The paper had a huge impact within the academic community, both in France and throughout Europe. That its author was largely self-taught and still a teenager made it all the more remarkable.
Alongside his interest in geometry, Pascal also worked on developing a calculating machine. He hoped that such a device would help his father in his work. During his teenage years, it’s believed he built as many as 50 prototypes, some of which came to be known as ‘Pascal’s Calculators’. Though simple, they were nevertheless effective and the Frenchman is credited with being one of the first inventors of the mechanical calculator.
After his 18th birthday, Pascal’s creativity and genius started to wane. He struggled with ill health and then devoted much of his 20s and 30s to studying theology and philosophy. Pascal died in August 1622 at the age of just 39. However, the pioneering work he carried out while still a teenager ensure that he will always be remembered as one of the most important mathematicians that ever lived.
