Abstract
Author of the monumental Histoire Naturelle, Buffon also introduced several original ideas in probability and statistics, notably the premier example in “geometric probability” and a body of experimental and theoretical work in demography.
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Bibliography
Badey, L. (1929). Buffon, précurseur de la science démographique. Annales de geographies May, 206–220.
Buffon, G.L. (1749–1804). Histoire naturelle, générale etparticuliére. 44 volumes, Imprimerie Royale [later Plassan], Paris. [This is the original complete edition. The most authoritative subsequent edition is that published in 1884–1885 (14 volumes in-8), annotated and preceded by an introduction by J.L. Lanessan, followed by the general correspondence of Buffon, collected and annotated by Nadault de Buffon, Librairie A. Le Vasseur, Paris,].
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Piveteau, J. (1954). Oeuvres philosophiques de Buffon. edited by J. Piveteau, Corpus général des philosophes francais, Volume XLI, Paris, PUR. [Contains in particular the paper “De la manière d’étudier et de traiter l’histoire naturelle” and “Essai d’arithmétique morale. ” Apart from an introduction to the philosophical work of Buffon by J. Piveteau and a study of his mathematical philosophy by M. Fréchet, this work contains a very detailed bibliography of works on Buffon and his opus up to 1954].
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Ducel, Y., Martin, T. (2001). Georges-Louis Leclerc, comte de buffon. In: Heyde, C.C., Seneta, E., Crépel, P., Fienberg, S.E., Gani, J. (eds) Statisticians of the Centuries. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0179-0_15
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0179-0_15
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