What did Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky invent. Brief biography of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

Disputes about the role of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in the development of world science do not subside. Someone considers him insane, a dropout and a plagiarist, someone considers him a brilliant scientist, a Russian da Vinci.

Tsiolkovsky was self-taught. Ever since his school days, he had serious hearing problems, which is why little Kostya experienced alienation from his peers and more and more went into books that were his best friends. In fact, cut off from the scientific environment, Tsiolkovsky made most of his discoveries on an intuitive level. In 1893, Tsiolkovsky's story "On the Moon" was published in the magazine "Around the World". In it, the scientist anticipated those physical phenomena that people will be able to prove almost a century later. Tsiolkovsky, with the help of thought, seemed to have visited the satellite of the Earth. The story is short, highly recommended reading.

Tsiolkovsky was not religious. His wife's parents agreed to have an atheist son-in-law only because their daughter was a dowry. Tsiolkovsky's attitude to Orthodoxy was special. His daughter recalled: “He considered churches to be decorations of cities and monuments of antiquity. Father listened to the ringing of bells like music and liked to walk around the city during the vigil. He treated Christ as a great humanist and a person of genius, who intuitively foresaw the truths, which scientists later approached through science.

Such, for example, is Christ's dictum: "There are many mansions in my father's house." Tsiolkovsky saw in this saying of Christ the idea of numerous inhabited worlds. Tsiolkovsky placed Christ unattainably high in regard to ethics. His death for an idea, his grief for humanity, his ability to understand everything, to forgive everything, drove him into ecstasy. But with the same enthusiasm he treated selfless scientists who saved humanity from death, disease, inventors who facilitated human labor. He believed in higher perfect beings living on planets older than our earth, but he thought of them as beings consisting of the same matter as the entire cosmos, which, according to his concept, was governed by laws common to the entire universe. .

Tsiolkovsky's careless statements about Christ once almost cost him his teacher's place. Tsiolkovsky had to spend a lot of money to go to Kaluga and explain himself to his superiors.

Airship

Firstly, the volume of the shell was variable, which made it possible to maintain a constant lifting force at different flight altitudes and temperatures of the atmospheric air surrounding the airship. This possibility was achieved due to corrugated sidewalls and a special tightening system. Secondly, Tsiolkovsky left the use of explosive hydrogen, his airship was filled with hot air. The height of the airship could be adjusted using a separately developed heating system. The air was heated by passing the exhaust gases of the motors through the coils.

Thirdly, the thin metal shell was also corrugated, which made it possible to increase its strength and stability. Tsiolkovsky repeatedly applied for financial assistance to build an airship, but he was constantly refused. He independently, at his own expense, made several models of airships, working and controlled.

Eugenics

Tsiolkovsky is reproached for extremely sharp views on humanity and is even called the ideologist of Russian fascism. Indeed, the views of the scientist on human progress sin undeniably subjective.

Here, for example, is one of Tsiolkovsky's statements: “Everyone must strive to ensure that there are no imperfect beings, for example, rapists, cripples, sick, feeble-minded, unconscious, etc. They should be exceptionally cared for, but they should not produce offspring. So painlessly they fade away. There should not be unconscious animals in the world, but they should not be killed either, but by isolating the sexes or in other ways to stop their reproduction. Now the inhabitants of the northern countries cannot do without domestic animals, but in time, when everyone will receive the right to 4 acres of land in a warm climate, not only wild, but also domestic animals will be superfluous.

Tsiolkovsky dreamed of an ideal human society and expressed radical views. So, he proposed to destroy criminals, splitting them into atoms, and also adhered to the idea of a caste structure of society. In the future, the scientist believed, society will turn into ray energy. Some interpreters of Tsiolkovsky's writings consider this idea to be an intuition about the era of the Internet.

Discoveries

Despite the fact that most of the discoveries were made by Tsiolkovsky intuitively, their number is amazing. They proposed: gas rudders (made of graphite) to control the flight of the rocket and change the trajectory of its center of mass; the use of propellant components for cooling the outer shell of the spacecraft (during entry into the Earth's atmosphere), the walls of the combustion chamber and the nozzle; pumping system for supplying fuel components.

In the field of rocket propellants, Tsiolkovsky investigated a large number of different oxidizers and fuels; recommended fuel vapors: liquid oxygen with hydrogen, oxygen with hydrocarbons. Tsiolkovsky worked hard and fruitfully on the creation of a theory of the flight of jet aircraft, invented his own scheme of a gas turbine engine. The merits of Tsiolkovsky were highly appreciated not only by domestic scientists, but also by the creator of the first rockets, Wernher von Braun.

Such a hectic activity. developed by Tsiolkovsky could not do without mistakes. So, due to isolation from the scientific world, he rediscovered the kinetic theory of gases, sending it to Mendeleev, to which he replied in bewilderment: the kinetic theory of gases was discovered 25 years ago.

in 1893, Tsiolkovsky published the work "Gravity as a source of world energy", where, using the erroneous theory of compression developed by Helmholtz (1853) and Kelvin ("Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism"), he tried to calculate the age of the Sun, determining the age of the star at 12 million years and predicting that in 7.5 million years the Sun will go out, since its density will reach the density of the planet (Earth). Modern science puts the age of the Sun at 4.59 billion years, saying it will shine and support life on Earth for at least another 1 billion years.

Tsiolkovsky did not accept Einstein's theory of relativity, saying that pointing to the limitedness of the Universe and the limited speed in the Universe by the speed of light is the same as limiting the creation of the world to six days. Tsiolkovsky also rejected the idea of time relativity: “The slowdown of time in ships flying at subluminal speed compared to terrestrial time is either a fantasy or one of the regular mistakes of a non-philosophical mind. … Time slowdown! Understand what wild nonsense lies in these words!

High contempt

Tsiolkovsky was one of those people who devoted himself entirely to science. He even married not for love, but only with the expectation that his wife would not interfere with his work. His relations with those around him did not develop in the best way, he had almost no friends, but there were students. Tsiolkovsky devoted 42 years of his life to teaching practice. According to the memoirs, the scientist was not a passionate speaker, but he managed to interest the audience, the students loved him, which cannot be said about the neighbors. Many took Tsiolkovsky for a madman, which, however, did not particularly worry him. Still, the theory of eugenics he developed provided answers to many questions and claims.

Here is one of the opinions about Tsiolkovsky: “This Kaluga native,” some said, “is a man out of his mind, a semi-literate ignoramus, a teacher of arithmetic for dioceses, that is, for priestly daughters (what a shameful position!), Understanding nothing in science, takes on the solution of unsolvable problems over which the minds of famous professors struggled. This, so to speak, teacher of the preparatory class sticks his nose in areas to which he has absolutely nothing to do - in higher mathematics and astronomy! Why, this is for chickens to laugh at! ”

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky was born on September 17, 1857. Disputes about its role in the development of world science do not subside. Someone considers him a dropout, a fascist and a plagiarist, someone considers him a brilliant scientist, a Russian da Vinci. 7 ingenious follies of Tsiolkovsky.

"ON THE MOON"

RELIGION

Tsiolkovsky was not religious. His wife's parents agreed to have an atheist son-in-law only because their daughter was a dowry. Tsiolkovsky's attitude to Orthodoxy was special. His daughter recalled: “He considered churches to be decorations of cities and monuments of antiquity. Father listened to the ringing of bells like music and liked to walk around the city during the vigil. He treated Christ as a great humanist and a person of genius who foresaw intuitively the truths, which scientists later approached through science. Such, for example, is Christ's dictum: "There are many mansions in my father's house." Tsiolkovsky saw in this saying of Christ the idea of numerous inhabited worlds.

Tsiolkovsky placed Christ unattainably high in regard to ethics. His death for an idea, his grief for humanity, his ability to understand everything, to forgive everything, drove him into ecstasy. But with the same enthusiasm he treated the selfless workers of science, who saved mankind from death, disease, inventors, who facilitated human labor. He believed in higher perfect beings living on planets older than our earth, but he thought of them as beings consisting of the same matter as the entire cosmos, which, according to his concept, was governed by laws common to the entire universe. .

Tsiolkovsky's careless statements about Christ once almost cost him his teacher's place. Tsiolkovsky had to spend a lot of money to go to Kaluga and explain himself to his superiors.

AIRSHIP

One of the main deeds of Tsiolkovsky's life was the all-metal airship he designed. Balloons of that time were not only unreliable, but also unsafe. Tsiolkovsky's airship favorably differed from them in several characteristics at once. Firstly, the volume of the shell was variable, which made it possible to maintain a constant lifting force at different flight altitudes and temperatures of the atmospheric air surrounding the airship. This possibility was achieved due to corrugated sidewalls and a special tightening system.

Secondly, Tsiolkovsky left the use of explosive hydrogen, his airship was filled with hot air. The height of the airship could be adjusted using a separately developed heating system. The air was heated by passing the exhaust gases of the motors through the coils.

EUGENICS

Tsiolkovsky is reproached for extremely sharp views on humanity and is even called the ideologist of Russian fascism. Indeed, the views of the scientist on human progress sin undeniably subjective. Here, for example, is one of Tsiolkovsky's statements: “Everyone must strive to ensure that there are no imperfect beings, for example, rapists, cripples, sick, feeble-minded, unconscious, etc. They should be exceptionally cared for, but they should not produce offspring. So painlessly they fade away. There should not be unconscious animals in the world, but they should not be killed either, but by isolating the sexes or in other ways to stop their reproduction.

Now the inhabitants of the northern countries cannot do without domestic animals, but in time, when everyone will receive the right to 4 acres of land in a warm climate, not only wild, but also domestic animals will be superfluous. Tsiolkovsky dreamed of an ideal human society and expressed radical views. So, he proposed to destroy criminals, splitting them into atoms, and also adhered to the idea of a caste structure of society. In the future, the scientist believed, society will turn into ray energy. Some interpreters of Tsiolkovsky's writings consider this idea to be an intuition about the era of the Internet.

DISCOVERIES

ERRORS

HIGH CONSPIRECT

Tsiolkovsky devoted 42 years of his life to teaching practice. According to the memoirs, the scientist was not a passionate speaker, but he managed to interest the audience, the students loved him, which cannot be said about the neighbors. Many took Tsiolkovsky for a madman, which, however, did not particularly worry him.

Still, the theory of eugenics he developed provided answers to many questions and claims. Here is one of the opinions about Tsiolkovsky: “This Kaluga native,” some said, “is a man out of his mind, a semi-literate ignoramus, a teacher of arithmetic for dioceses, that is, for priestly daughters (what a shameful position!), Understanding nothing in science, takes on the solution of unsolvable problems over which the minds of famous professors struggled. This, so to speak, teacher of the preparatory class sticks his nose in areas to which he has absolutely nothing to do - in higher mathematics and astronomy! Why, this is for chickens to laugh at! ”

Tsiolkovsky cosmonautics scientist

The name of the great Russian scientist, founder of the theory of jet propulsion and astronautics K.E. Tsiolkovsky is known all over the world. All his activities are a real feat for the glory of his people, for the benefit of all mankind. It is no coincidence that the world's first cosmonaut Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin spoke so warmly about Konstantin Eduardovich: "He loved the people for whom he lived and worked, he bequeathed all his labors to the Soviet people," which is why the name of Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky will never be erased through the ages, " great pioneer of the universe."

Konstantin Eduardovich was born on September 5/17, 1857 in the village of Izhevsk, Ryazan province, in the family of forester Eduard Ignatievich Tsiolkovsky.

This surname has been known since 1697. Among the sons of Ignatius Tsiolkovsky, a seedy landowner from the Rivne district of the Volyn province, Edward, the father of the future scientist, is mentioned. After graduating from the St. Petersburg Forestry and Land Survey Institute, Eduard Ignatievich served as an assistant forester, and then as a forester in the Olonetsk, St. Petersburg, Vyatka provinces, in the Spassky district of the Ryazan province. Here in the village of Izhevsk, he met the daughter of a small estate nobleman I. I. Yumashev, Maria Ivanovna, and proposed to her. Konstantin Eduardovich wrote: "I think that I received a combination of the strong will of the father with the talent of the mother." In 1862, the family moved from Izhevsk to Ryazan, where Eduard Ignatievich got a job as a teacher of natural history and taxation of land surveying and taxation classes at the Ryazan gymnasium.

In Ryazan, a misfortune happened to Konstantin Eduardovich, which abruptly turned his whole life. After a fun winter sledding, he caught a cold. The cold greatly weakened the body, the infection caused scarlet fever. “I got sick, delirious. They thought I would die, but I recovered, only I became very deaf, and the deafness did not go away. She tortured me a lot." If before that Kostya was a cheerful and lively boy, a naughty boy, a participant in various children's amusements, then after the illness another, bitter and painful period of life began. “With peers and in society, I often got into trouble ... This removed me from people and made me bored to read, concentrate, dream. It deepened me into myself, made me look for great things in order to earn the approval of people and not be so contemptible.

It was time to study, and Kostya, along with his younger brother, entered the Vyatka Men's Gymnasium (the family moved to Vyatka in 1868). But studying was hard: “I couldn’t go to school: I didn’t hear the teachers at all or heard only obscure sounds,” he later noted. Leaving the gymnasium after the third grade, the future scientist began to study independently from the books of his father and older brothers. Books helped him find his "I". He became interested in the exact sciences, modeling and, in his own words, even as a child he dreamed of flying, of overcoming gravity, “... there were few books, I had no teachers at all, so I had to create and create more than perceive and assimilate ... In a word, the creative element, the element of self-development, originality prevailed, ”Konstantin Eduardovich later wrote about this period of his life. And further: "From the age of 14-15 I became interested in physics, chemistry, mechanics, astronomy, mathematics, etc." This independence of development will help the future scientist to develop his own special style of creativity, in which freedom of thinking, breadth of outlook, depth of scientific analysis, perseverance in bringing each scientific question to a logical solution, faith in the necessity and importance of one's work, an organic combination of theory and experiment will always prevail. . Until a very old age, the scientist retained the ability to be surprised at everything new, to quickly grasp this new and to go boldly much further forward, sometimes contrary to existing provisions, to maintain an incredible power of imagination throughout his life.

Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky

Outstanding self-taught scientist.

Born on September 17, 1857 in the village of Izhevsky, Spassky district, Ryazan province, in the family of a forester. At the age of nine, he was ill with scarlet fever, which is why he practically lost his hearing, which means the ability to actively communicate with people. What has deafness done to me? he recalled. “She made me suffer every minute of my life spent with people. I always felt isolated, offended, outcast with them. This deepened me into myself, made me look for great things in order to earn the approval of people and not be so contemptible "...

Involuntary deepness forced Tsiolkovsky, beyond his age, to carefully peer into the world. “Father suddenly imagined that I had technical abilities and I was sent to Moscow.” For three years Tsiolkovsky lived in the capital, studying physical and mathematical sciences at the courses of secondary and higher schools. “I remember that apart from water and black bread I had nothing then. Every three days I went to the bakery and bought 9 kopecks worth of bread there. Thus, I lived 90 kopecks a month. Nevertheless, I was happy with my ideas and black bread did not upset me at all. At the same time, various questions occupied me terribly, and I tried to solve them right away with the help of the acquired knowledge. This question especially tormented me - is it possible to use centrifugal force in order to rise beyond the atmosphere, into the heavenly spaces?

Once it seemed to Tsiolkovsky that he was close to solving the problem.

“... I was so excited, even shocked, that I did not sleep all night, wandered around Moscow, and kept thinking about the great consequences of my discovery. But by morning I was convinced of the falsity of my invention. The disappointment was as strong as the charm. This night left a mark on my whole life: thirty years later, I still sometimes dream that I am climbing to the stars in my car, and I feel the same delight as on that immemorial night.

In the fall of 1879, Tsiolkovsky passed the exams as an external student and was appointed to the post of teacher of arithmetic, geometry and physics in the city of Borovsk, Kaluga province. “I put on my headphones, short fur coat, coat, felt boots and hit the road.” As a teacher, he wrote, “... I served without interruption for about 40 years. Approximately 500 students and 1500 high school students have passed through my hands. I gave at least 40,000 lectures (because of my deafness, I didn't like to ask questions and therefore adhered to the lecture method). The students loved me very much for my fairness and indefatigability in explanations. Well, I did not skimp on entertaining experiments; part of my salary went to these experiments.

The first scientific researches of Tsiolkovsky belong to the time of his life in Borovsk. Quite independently, without knowing anything about the discoveries already made, he developed the foundations of the kinetic theory of gases. The work "Mechanics of the animal organism" deserved a favorable review of the famous physiologist Sechenov. However, most of the works sent by Tsiolkovsky to various addresses returned to him with negative reviews, but he firmly believed that he was right. In his free time from teaching and from scientific studies, Tsiolkovsky cut the neighbor's children on the porch, and in winter he skated on the ice of the river.

The main works done in those years by Tsiolkovsky concerned the scientific substantiation of an all-metal balloon (airship), a well-streamlined airplane, and a rocket for interplanetary travel. But since 1896, he was already mainly engaged in the theory of the movement of jet vehicles. He even proposed a number of designs for long-range rockets and rockets for interplanetary travel. Apparently, the era itself was like that. Yes, from the province and the stars are more visible.

The scientific and technical justification for the design of an all-metal airship was given by Tsiolkovsky in 1887 in his work Theory and Experience of the Balloon. Detailed drawings were attached to the work. The airship developed by Tsiolkovsky favorably differed from all previous designs. Firstly, it was an airship of variable volume, which made it possible to maintain a constant lifting force at different ambient temperatures and at different flight altitudes, and secondly, the gas filling the airship could be heated by the heat of already exhaust gases passed through special coils , and thirdly, the shell of the airship was made of thin corrugated metal. The geometric shape of the airship and the calculation of the strength of the shell were made by Tsiolkovsky himself.

Unfortunately, the all-metal airship project was not supported by scientific institutions. Tsiolkovsky's appeal to the General Staff of the Russian Army was also unsuccessful. In essence, everything was limited to the publication of the work “Metal Controlled Balloon”.

In 1892 Tsiolkovsky moved to Kaluga.

There he began teaching physics and mathematics at the gymnasium and the diocesan school, and in his scientific activity he turned to the new, then little studied field of aircraft heavier than air.

In the 1894 article "Airplane or bird-like (aircraft) flying machine" Tsiolkovsky gave a description and drawings of a monoplane, which in appearance and aerodynamic layout anticipated the designs of aircraft that appeared only fifteen to twenty years later. In Tsiolkovsky's airplane, the wings had a thick profile with a rounded leading edge, and the fuselage had a streamlined shape.

In 1897, Tsiolkovsky built a wind tunnel on his own, as he called it - a blower, and developed a special experimental technique. But he nevertheless obtained the most significant results in the field of the theory of rocket motion.

Tsiolkovsky spoke about the use of the principle of jet propulsion as early as 1883. However, only in 1903, in the famous article “Investigation of world spaces with rocket instruments”, published in the journal “Scientific Review”, he gave a theory of rocket flight, taking into account the change in its mass during movement, and also substantiated the possibility of using jet vehicles for interplanetary communications. Both the rigorous mathematical proof of the possibility of using a rocket to solve scientific problems, and the very idea of using rocket engines to create the movement of grandiose interplanetary ships - everything belonged entirely to Tsiolkovsky. In the same article, he developed the fundamentals of the theory of a liquid-propellant jet engine, as well as elements of its design.

Deepening his research, in 1929 Tsiolkovsky proposed an original theory of rocket trains.

In the first version of his theory, a large rocket was to be used, made up of several other rockets connected in series one after the other. When such a “train” took off, the last (lower) rocket was the pusher. Having used the fuel, it separated from the "train" and fell to the ground. Then the engine of the next lower rocket was turned on and started to work. Having developed fuel, it also separated from the "train". The head rocket came to the final goal, reaching a speed that it could never have achieved as a single one. In the second version, the "train" consisted of a parallel connection of missiles, called the Tsiolkovsky squadron. All missiles of such a squadron had to work simultaneously - until half of their fuel was used up. After that, the fuel supply from the extreme missiles was merged into the half-empty tanks of the inner ones, and the missiles themselves were separated from the squadron. This process was to be repeated until only one missile remained. She reached her goal.

Tsiolkovsky not only solved the problem of rocket motion in a uniform gravitational field and calculated the necessary fuel reserves to overcome the Earth's gravity, he also, albeit approximately, considered the influence of the atmosphere on rocket flight and calculated the fuel reserve to overcome the resistance forces of the Earth's air shell. Tsiolkovsky's research for the first time scientifically demonstrated the possibility of carrying out flights at cosmic speeds. He was the first to study the issue of an artificial satellite of the Earth, and also expressed the idea of creating extraterrestrial stations as intermediate bases for interplanetary communications. He put forward the idea of gas rudders to control the flight of a rocket in an airless space and proposed gyroscopic stabilization of a rocket in free flight in a space where gravity and resistance forces do not act. So that the rocket would not burn out like a meteorite when returning from space to Earth, Tsiolkovsky calculated special trajectories to cancel the speed when approaching the Earth, and also proposed special methods for cooling the walls of the rocket with a liquid oxidizer. Having studied a large number of possible oxidizers and combustibles, Tsiolkovsky recommended the following fuel pairs for liquid-propellant jet engines: alcohol and liquid oxygen, hydrocarbons and liquid oxygen or ozone.

“... First you can fly a rocket around the Earth,” Tsiolkovsky dreamed, “then you can describe one way or another relative to the Sun, reach the desired planet, approach or move away from the Sun, fall on it or leave completely, becoming a comet wandering for many thousands of years in darkness, among the stars, until approaching one of them, which will become for travelers or their descendants a new Sun.

Mankind, he wrote, forms a series of interplanetary bases around the Sun, using asteroids wandering in space (small moons) as material for them. Reactive devices will conquer boundless spaces for people and give solar energy two billion times greater than that which mankind has on Earth. In addition, it is possible to reach other suns, which jet trains will reach within several tens of thousands of years. The best part of humanity will in all probability never perish, but will migrate from sun to sun as they fade. There is no end to life, no end to reason and human perfection. His progress is eternal.

And if this is so, then it is impossible to doubt the attainment of immortality.”

Only under Soviet rule did Tsiolkovsky get the opportunity to work without thinking about the material side of the matter.

“... The Socialist (later called the Communist) Academy was established in Moscow. I told her about myself and sent my printed autobiography. Was elected a member. But I was already a wreck,” wrote Tsiolkovsky bitterly, “and could not fulfill the desire of the Academy to move to Moscow.”

In 1919, Tsiolkovsky was elected a member of the Russian Society of Lovers of the World in Petrograd, in 1927 a member of the Southern Astronomical Society, in 1928 a member of the Commission for Scientific Aeronautics, in 1932 a member of the Osoaviakhim Union, and in 1934 an honorary professor of the Air Force Academy. Many in Kaluga knew well the man in a long black coat, in a black hat, with a black scarf over his shoulder, who spoke only with the help of an auditory tube, which he himself called a "hearer".

Tsiolkovsky's studies left a bright mark in aerodynamics, philosophy, linguistics, in the works on the social structure of people's lives on artificial islands floating around the Sun between the orbits of the Earth and Mars ("ethereal islands"). Some of these studies are controversial, some repeat what was created before him, however, the work done in the provincial Kaluga by a man who is largely cut off from world culture cannot but delight.

“I am the purest materialist,” Tsiolkovsky noted more than once. “I admit nothing but matter. In physics, chemistry and biology I see one mechanics. The entire cosmos is only an infinite and complex mechanism. Its complexity is so great that it borders on arbitrariness, surprise and chance.

In fact, Tsiolkovsky's views were much more complex.

Remarkable evidence of this was left by the famous Soviet scientist A. L. Chizhevsky, who knew the great self-taught Kaluga well.

“... There are questions that we can answer,” Chizhevsky recalled Tsiolkovsky’s words, “if not accurate, but satisfactory for today. There are questions that we can talk about, that we can discuss, argue, disagree with, but there are questions that we cannot ask either another, or even ourselves, but we certainly ask ourselves in moments of the greatest understanding of the world. These questions are: why all this? If we asked ourselves this kind of question, it means that we are not just animals, but people with a brain in which there are not just Sechenov's reflexes and Pavlovian drool, but something else, something completely different from either reflexes or drool. Doesn't the matter concentrated in the human brain pave some special paths, regardless of Sechenov's and Pavlov's primitive mechanisms? In other words, are there not elements of thought and consciousness in the brain matter, developed over millions of years and free from reflex apparatus, even the most complex ones?...

Yes, Alexander Leonidovich, - said Tsiolkovsky, - as soon as you ask yourself a question of this kind, then you have escaped from the traditional vice and soared into endless heights: why all this - why do matter, plants, animals, man and his brain - also matter, requiring an answer to the question: why all this? Why does the world, the Universe, the Cosmos exist? What for?…

Many people think that I am busy with the rocket and worried about its fate because of the rocket itself. This would be the deepest mistake. Rockets for me are only a way, only a method of penetrating into the depths of space, but by no means an end in itself. People who have not grown up to such an understanding of things talk about what does not exist, which makes me some kind of one-sided technician, and not a thinker. Unfortunately, many who speak or write about a rocket ship think so. I do not argue that it is very important to have rocket ships, because they will help humanity to spread throughout the world space. And for the sake of this resettlement, I'm busy. There will be another way to travel in space - I will accept it. The whole point is in the resettlement from the Earth and in the settlement of the Cosmos. We must go towards, so to speak, cosmic philosophy! Unfortunately, our philosophers do not think about this at all. And someone else, if not philosophers, should deal with this issue. But they either do not want, or do not understand the great significance of the issue, or are simply afraid. And that is possible! Imagine a philosopher who is afraid!.. A Democritus who is a coward!.. Impossible!..

Airships, rockets, the second law of thermodynamics - this is the business of our day, but at night we live a different life, if we ask ourselves this damned question. It is said that asking such a question is just pointless, harmful and unscientific. They say it's even criminal. I agree with this interpretation. Well, what if he, this question, is still asked? What to do then? Retreat, burrow into pillows, intoxicate yourself, blind yourself? And it is set not only here, in Tsiolkovsky's small room, but some heads are full of it, saturated with it - and for more than one century, not one millennium. This question does not require laboratories, tribunes, or Athenian academies. Nobody solved it: neither science, nor religion, nor philosophy. He stands before humanity - huge, boundless, like the whole world, and cries out: why? What for? Others - understanding - are simply silent.

“... The cosmic existence of mankind,” Chizhevsky recalled the words of Tsiolkovsky, “like everything in space, can be divided into four main eras. The era of birth, which humanity will enter in a few decades and which will last several billion years. Then the era of formation. This era will be marked by the spread of mankind throughout the cosmos. The duration of this era is hundreds of billions of years. Then the era of the flourishing of mankind. Now it is difficult to predict its duration - also, obviously, hundreds of billions of years. And, finally, the terminal era will take tens of billions of years. During this era, humanity will fully answer the question: why? - and considers it good to include the second law of thermodynamics in the atom, that is, from a corpuscular substance it will turn into a ray one.

What is the ray era of the cosmos - we know nothing and cannot assume anything. I admit that after many billions of years the cosmic ray era will again turn into a corpuscular one, but of a higher level, in order to start everything anew: there will be suns, nebulae, constellations, planets. But according to a more perfect law. And again a new, more perfect person will come into space... to go through all the high eras and after many billions of years to go out again, turning into a ray state, but also of a higher level. Billions of years will pass, and again higher-class matter will arise from the rays and, finally, a supernova man will appear, who will be the mind as much higher than we are, as much as we are higher than a single-celled organism. He will no longer ask: why, why? He will be know, and, based on his knowledge, he will build his world according to the model that he considers the most perfect ...

Such will be the change of the great cosmic eras and the great growth of the mind!

And so it will last until this mind recognizes everything, that is, many billions of millions of years, many cosmic births and deaths. And that's when intelligence(or matter) learns everything, the very existence of individual individuals and the material or corpuscular world, he will consider unnecessary and will pass into a ray state of a higher order, which will know everything and desire nothing, that is, into that state of consciousness that the human mind considers the prerogative of the gods. The cosmos will turn into a great perfection.”

During his life, Tsiolkovsky published many books.

He published them in tiny editions at his own expense. These books contained precise calculations, complex drawings, philosophical reflections, but most importantly, they contained many unusual foresights. "My conclusions are more comforting than the promises of the most cheerful religions."

From the book The Most Famous Scientists of Russia author Prashkevich Gennady Martovich

Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky An outstanding self-taught scientist. He was born on September 17, 1857 in the village of Izhevsky, Spassky district, Ryazan province, in the family of a forester. At the age of nine, he had been ill with scarlet fever, which caused him to practically lose his hearing, which means that he was able to actively communicate with

From the book Great Soviet Encyclopedia (DE) of the author TSB

Den Vladimir Eduardovich Den Vladimir Eduardovich, Soviet economic geographer and statistician. Professor, head of the department of economic geography at the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute (1902-31) and in other universities. Main works

From the book Great Soviet Encyclopedia (KA) of the author TSB

From the book Great Soviet Encyclopedia (LI) of the author TSB

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From the author's book

TSIOLKOVSKY, Konstantin Eduardovich (1857–1935), scientist and inventor 50 Mankind will not remain forever on Earth, but, in the pursuit of light and space, it will first timidly penetrate beyond the atmosphere, and then conquer all the circumsolar space. Letter to B.P. Vorobyov

Introduction

I chose this topic because Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky is a scientist with a capital letter. His scientific works have been studied and will be studied for a long time to come. Tsiolkovsky made a great contribution to the development of the natural sciences, so such a person cannot be ignored. He is an author on aerodynamics, aeronautics and many others. Representative of Russian cosmism, member of the Russian Society of Lovers of the World. The author of science fiction works, a supporter and propagandist of the idea of space exploration using orbital stations, put forward the idea of a space elevator. He believed that the development of life on one of the planets of the Universe would reach such power and perfection that it would make it possible to overcome the forces of gravity and spread life throughout the Universe.

Childhood and self-education K.E. Tsiolkovsky

Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky was born on September 5, 1857, in the family of a Polish nobleman who served in the department of state property, in the village of Izhevskoye near Ryazan. He was baptized in St. Nicholas Church. The name Konstantin was completely new in the Tsiolkovsky family, it was given by the name of the priest who baptized the baby.

In Izhevsk, Konstantin had a chance to live for a very short time - the first three years of his life, and he had almost no memories of this period. Eduard Ignatievich (Konstantin's father) started having troubles in the service - the authorities were dissatisfied with his liberal attitude towards local peasants. In 1860, Konstantin's father received a transfer to Ryazan as a clerk of the Forest Department, and soon began to teach natural history in the land surveying and taxation classes of the Ryazan gymnasium and received the rank of titular adviser.

The mother was involved in the primary education of Tsiolkovsky and his brothers. It was she who taught Konstantin to read (moreover, his mother taught him only the alphabet, and how to add words from letters Tsiolkovsky guessed himself), write, introduced him to the basics of arithmetic.

At the age of 9, Tsiolkovsky, sledding in the winter, caught a cold and fell ill with scarlet fever. As a result of a complication after an illness, he lost his hearing. Then came what later Konstantin Eduardovich called "the saddest, darkest time of my life." At this time, Tsiolkovsky for the first time begins to show interest in craftsmanship.

In 1868 the Tsiolkovsky family moved to Vyatka. In 1869, together with his younger brother Ignatius, he entered the first class of the male Vyatka gymnasium. The study was given with great difficulty, there were many subjects, the teachers were strict. The deafness was very disturbing. In the same year, sad news came from St. Petersburg - the elder brother Dmitry, who studied at the Naval College, died. This death shocked the whole family, but especially Maria Ivanovna. In 1870, Kostya's mother, whom he dearly loved, died unexpectedly. Grief crushed the orphaned boy. Even without that he did not shine with success in his studies, oppressed by the misfortunes that fell on him, Kostya studied worse and worse. Much more acutely did he feel his deafness, which made him more and more isolated. For pranks, he was repeatedly punished, ended up in a punishment cell.

In the second grade, Tsiolkovsky remained for the second year, and expulsion followed from the third. After that, Konstantin Eduardovich never studied anywhere - he studied exclusively on his own. Books become the boy's only friends. Unlike gymnasium teachers, books generously endow him with knowledge and never make the slightest reproach.

At the same time, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky joined the technical and scientific creativity. He independently made a home lathe, self-propelled carriages and locomotives. He was fond of tricks, thought about the project of a car with wings.

For the father, the abilities of his son become obvious, and he decides to send the boy to Moscow to continue his education. Every day from 10 am to 3-4 pm, the young man studies science in the Chertkovo public library - the only free library in Moscow at that time.

Work in the library was subject to a clear schedule. In the morning, Konstantin was engaged in exact and natural sciences, which required concentration and clarity of mind. Then he switched to simpler material: fiction and journalism. He actively studied "thick" journals, where both review scientific articles and journalistic articles were published. He enthusiastically read Shakespeare, Leo Tolstoy, Turgenev, admired the articles of Dmitry Pisarev: “Pisarev made me tremble with joy and happiness. In him I saw then my second “I”. During the first year of his life in Moscow, Tsiolkovsky studied physics and the principles of mathematics. In 1874, the Chertkovo Library moved to the building of the Rumyantsev Museum. In the new reading room Konstantin studies differential and integral calculus, higher algebra, analytic and spherical geometry. Then astronomy, mechanics, chemistry. For three years, Konstantin fully mastered the gymnasium program, as well as a significant part of the university one. Unfortunately, his father was no longer able to pay for his accommodation in Moscow, and besides, he felt unwell and was going to retire. With the knowledge gained, Konstantin could well begin independent work in the provinces, as well as continue his education outside of Moscow. In the autumn of 1876, Eduard Ignatievich called his son back to Vyatka, and Konstantin returned home.

Konstantin returned to Vyatka weakened, emaciated and emaciated. Difficult living conditions in Moscow, hard work also led to a deterioration in vision. After returning home, Tsiolkovsky began to wear glasses. Having regained his strength, Konstantin began to give private lessons in physics and mathematics. I learned my first lesson through my father's connections in a liberal society. Having shown himself to be a talented teacher, in the future he had no shortage of students. When teaching lessons, Tsiolkovsky used his own original methods, the main of which was a visual demonstration - Konstantin made paper models of polyhedra for geometry lessons, together with his students conducted numerous experiments in physics lessons, which earned him the fame of a teacher who explains the material well and clearly in classes with who are always interested. He spent all his free time in it or in the library. I read a lot - special literature, fiction, journalism. According to his autobiography, at that time he read The Beginnings by Isaac Newton, whose scientific views Tsiolkovsky adhered to throughout his later life.

At the end of 1876, Konstantin's younger brother Ignatius died. The brothers were very close from childhood, Konstantin trusted Ignatius with his innermost thoughts, and the death of his brother was a heavy blow. By 1877, Eduard Ignatievich was already very weak and ill, the tragic death of his wife and children affected (except for the sons of Dmitry and Ignatius, during these years the Tsiolkovskys lost their youngest daughter, Ekaterina, she died in 1875, during the absence of Konstantin), head family retired. In 1878 the entire Tsiolkovsky family returned to Ryazan.

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