Who was the Reverend Thomas Bayes?

The following is quoted from the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Bayes, Thomas (b. 1702, London - d. 1761, Tunbridge Wells, Kent), mathematician who first used probability inductively and established a mathematical basis for probability inference (a means of calculating, from the number of times an event has not occured, the probability that it will occur in future trials).

He set down his findings on probability in "Essay Towards Solving a Problem in the Doctrine of Chances" (1763), published posthumously in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London.

The only works he is known to have published in his lifetime are Divine Benevolence, or an Attempt to Prove That the Principal End of the Divine Providence and Government is the Happiness of His Creatures (1731) and An Introduction to the Doctrine of Fluxions, and a Defence of the Mathematicians Against the Objections of the Author of the Analyst (1736) which countered attacks by Bishop Berkeley on the logical foundations of Newton's calculus.

Here is some more information about Bayes taken from the book The Official Guide to Bunhill Fields. Bunhill Fields is a park in London, England where Bayes is buried (see The Burial Place of Bayes below).

He was a Presbyterian minister in Tunbridge Wells from 1731, son of the Rev. Joshua Bayes, a Nonconformist minister. It is thought that his election to the Royal Society might have been based on a tract of 1736 in which Bayes defended the views and philosophy of Sir Isaac Newton. A notebook of his exists, and includes a method of finding the time and place of conjunction of two planets, notes on weights and measures, a method of differentiation, and logarithms.

Thomas Bayes' contributions are immortalized by naming a fundamental proposition in probability, called Bayes Rule, after him.

The Burial Place of Bayes

Bayes is buried in Bunhill Fields in the heart of the City of London. The cemetery was used for the burial of nonconformists in the 18th century, but is now a public park maintained by the Corporation of London. Also buried in Bunhill Fields is Bayes's friend Richard Price, a pioneer of insurance, who presented Bayes's famous paper on probability to the Royal Society in 1763, two years after Bayes's death. Across the City Road from Bunhill Fields is Wesley's Chapel, which has been restored in recent years.

The pictures below show Bayes's tomb with a variety of inscriptions. It was a family vault in which are laid several members of the Bayes, Cotton and West families. On the top of the tomb is an inscription saying how the tomb was restored in 1969, through public subscription from statisticians worldwide." These photos were taken by Professor Tony O'Hagan of Sheffield University who also also provided the information about the burial place.

• First Photo small, large
• Second Photo small, large
• Third Photo small, large
• Fourth Photo small, large

The tomb was repaired and conserved again in 2006, in a project organised by the City of London Surveyor's Department, and funded by BEST (Bayesian Efficient Strategic Trading) LLC of Hoboken, NJ, after an introduction by ISBA. This work is described in a report from the City Surveyor, with interesting background detail about the burial ground and its ongoing restoration. ISBA maintains a fund, replenished by member donations, to be put towards continuing the upkeep of the tomb into the future. We hope you will consider a small donation when you renew or initiate your ISBA membership.

Bunhill (probably a corruption of "bonehill") Fields operated as a burial ground for "Dissenters" from 1665 to 1853, during which time around 123,000 burials took place. There are many notable graves, including John Bunyan, William Blake, Daniel Defoe, many of the Cromwell family and Susanna Wesley (mother of John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, who is buried across the City Road where his chapel still stands).

How to Find Bayes's Tomb

Map 1 is of Bunhill Fields, copied by kind permission of the Corporation of London from "The Official Guide to Bunhill Fields" (published by the Corporation of London, 1991, ISBN 0-85203-033-9). It clearly shows the site lying between the City Road and Bunhill Row, with Bayes's tomb in a fairly central position. Note that both entrances to Bunhill Fields are locked at night. There are no fixed opening times, but do not expect to find it open outside daylight hours in winter or normal working hours in summer.

Map 2 shows the surrounding streets. The nearest Underground station is Old Street. The map shows one exit, but there are exits at all four corners of the junction of Old Street with City Road. The map shows Wesley's Chapel right opposite the City Road entrance. Also of interest is that the Royal Statistical Society's offices are at 12 Errol Street, just south west of Bunhill Fields. They are more or less under the "b" of "bldgs". There is a footpath connecting Errol Street to Dufferin Street, more or less directly under the grid line, so it is just two minutes' walk from Bunhill Fields to the RSS. See also the dynamic map.