James Dodson

James Dodson FRS (c.1705–1757) was a British mathematician, actuary and innovator in the insurance industry.

Dodson became head of the Royal Mathematical School, and Stone's School, institutions within Christ's Hospital. Dodson built on the statistical mortality tables developed by Edmund Halley in 1693. Equitable Life charged premiums aimed at correcting offsetting the risks of long term life assurance policies. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Dodson died in 1757. The Equitable Life Assurance Society was founded in 1762 to put actuarial principles that Dodson had developed over the previous decade into practice by a group of mathematicians and others including Edward Rowe Mores.

Bibliography

* James Dodson, The Mathematical Repository, Vol. III (1755)
* James Dodson, [http://kabele.org/papers/dodsonms.pdf First Lectures on Insurance (1756)]
* G. J. Gray, ‘Dodson, James (c.1705–1757)’, rev. Anita McConnell, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004

External links

* [http://www.actuaries.org.uk/Display_Page.cgi?url=/library/profession_history.html History of the actuarial profession]
* [http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqCmd=Show.tcl&dsqSearch=RefNo='EC/1754/17'&dsqDb=Catalog Royal Society: certificate of election]