Nicole Oresme or Nicolas d'Oresme (c. 1323 - July 11, 1382) was a brilliant economist, mathematician, physicist, astronomer, philosopher, psychologist, and musicologist, a passionate theologian and Bishop of Lisieux, a competent translator, counselor of King Charles V of France, one of the principal founders^* and popularizers of modern sciences, and probably one of the most original thinkers of the 14th century.

Oresme's life

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Nicole Oresme: Therefore, I indeed know nothing except that I know that I know nothing.^*

Oresme was born c. 1320-1325 in the village of Allemagne (^* today's Fleury-sur-Orne) in the vicinity of Caen, Normandy, in the Diocese of Bayeux. Practically nothing is known concerning his family. The fact that Oresme attended the royally sponsored and subsidized College of Navarre, an institution for students too poor to pay their expenses while studying at the University of Paris, makes it probable that he came from a peasant family.

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