Gotfried Leibniz and Peter the Great in discussions of geomagnetiс problems

Abstract

The great scientist Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Peter the Great met multiple times in 1711, 1712, and 1716 in Torgau on the Elbe, Karlsbad and Hannover. Their conversations touched on many problems, including the creation of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the study of the nature of the border between Eurasia and North America, but one of the main subjects was the organization of systematic geomagnetic studies in the Russian Empire aimed at improving of navigation capabilities. Shortly before his death, Peter the Great sent the Vitus Bering’s expedition to the east of the country, which, among other things, first carried out observations of magnetic declination there. These observations, in particular, were the first in Kamchatka, and they are still actively used in the analysis of secular magnetic variations.

Keywords

• gottfried leibniz
• peter the great
• geomagnetic researches