Download or read book Redefining Geometrical Exactness written by H. J. M. Bos and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2001 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Until the 17th century, rigor and exactness in mathematics meant geometry and Euclid. Other means of confirming results, such as computation, were considered inferior to the traditional constructions using ruler and compass. In 1637 Descartes introduced what is now called analytical geometry, which made algebraic methods equal to geometry in the methods of mathematics. In this detailed study, Bos explores the origins of what is meant by "rigor" in mathematics, and how that definition evolved to include the use of new geometric and algebraic methods.
Download or read book Redefining Geometrical Exactness written by Henk J M Bos and published by . This book was released on 2000-12-15 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Redefining Geometrical Exactness written by Henk J.M. Bos and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his "Géométrie" of 1637 Descartes achieved a monumental innovation of mathematical techniques by introducing what is now called analytic geometry. Yet the key question of the book was foundational rather than technical: When are geometrical objects known with such clarity and distinctness as befits the exact science of geometry? Classically, the answer was sought in procedures of geometrical construction, in particular by ruler and compass, but the introduction of new algebraic techniques made these procedures insufficient. In this detailed study, spanning essentially the period from the first printed edition of Pappus' "Collection" (1588, in Latin translation) and Descartes' death in 1650, Bos explores the current ideas about construction and geometrical exactness, noting that by the time Descartes entered the field the incursion of algebraic techniques, combined with an increasing uncertainty about the proper means of geometrical problem solving, had produced a certain impasse. He then analyses how Descartes transformed geometry by a redefinition of exactness and by a demarcation of geometry's proper subject and procedures in such a way as to incorporate the use of algebraic methods without destroying the true nature of geometry. Although mathematicians later essentially discarded Descartes' methodological convictions, his influence was profound and pervasive. Bos' insistence on the foundational aspects of the "Géométrie" provides new insights both in the genesis of Descartes' masterpiece and in its significance for the development of the conceptions of mathematical exactness.
Download or read book Leibniz and the Structure of Sciences written by Vincenzo De Risi and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-01-01 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book offers a collection of essays on various aspects of Leibniz’s scientific thought, written by historians of science and world-leading experts on Leibniz. The essays deal with a vast array of topics on the exact sciences: Leibniz’s logic, mereology, the notion of infinity and cardinality, the foundations of geometry, the theory of curves and differential geometry, and finally dynamics and general epistemology. Several chapters attempt a reading of Leibniz’s scientific works through modern mathematical tools, and compare Leibniz’s results in these fields with 19th- and 20th-Century conceptions of them. All of them have special care in framing Leibniz’s work in historical context, and sometimes offer wider historical perspectives that go much beyond Leibniz’s researches. A special emphasis is given to effective mathematical practice rather than purely epistemological thought. The book is addressed to all scholars of the exact sciences who have an interest in historical research and Leibniz in particular, and may be useful to historians of mathematics, physics, and epistemology, mathematicians with historical interests, and philosophers of science at large.
Download or read book A Companion to Hobbes written by Marcus P. Adams and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2021-09-28 with total page 548 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offers comprehensive treatment of Thomas Hobbes’s thought, providing readers with different ways of understanding Hobbes as a systematic philosopher As one of the founders of modern political philosophy, Thomas Hobbes is best known for his ideas regarding the nature of legitimate government and the necessity of society submitting to the absolute authority of sovereign power. Yet Hobbes produced a wide range of writings, from translations of texts by Homer and Thucydides, to interpretations of Biblical books, to works devoted to geometry, optics, morality, and religion. Hobbes viewed himself as presenting a unified method for theoretical and practical science—an interconnected system of philosophy that provides many entry points into his thought. A Companion to Hobbes is an expertly curated collection of essays offering close textual engagement with the thought of Thomas Hobbes in his major works while probing his ideas regarding natural philosophy, mathematics, human nature, civil philosophy, religion, and more. The Companion discusses the ways in which scholars have tried to understand the unity and diversity of Hobbes’s philosophical system and examines the reception of the different parts of Hobbes’s philosophy by thinkers such as René Descartes, Margaret Cavendish, David Hume, and Immanuel Kant. Presenting a diversity of fresh perspectives by both emerging and established scholars, this volume: Provides a comprehensive treatment of Hobbes’s thought in his works, including Elements of Law, Elements of Philosophy, and Leviathan Explores the connecting points between Hobbes’ metaphysics, epistemology, mathematics, natural philosophy, morality, and civil philosophy Offers readers strategies for understanding how the parts of Hobbes’s philosophical system fit together Examines Hobbes’s philosophy of mathematics and his attempts to understand geometrical objects and definitions Considers Hobbes’s philosophy in contexts such as the natural state of humans, gender relations, and materialist worldviews Challenges conceptions of Hobbes’s moral theory and his views about the rights of sovereigns Part of the acclaimed Blackwell Companions to Philosophy series, A Companion to Hobbes is an invaluable resource for scholars and advanced students of Early modern thought, particularly those from disciplines such as History of Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Intellectual History, History of Politics, Political Theory, and English.
Download or read book Isaac Newton on Mathematical Certainty and Method written by Niccolo Guicciardini and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2011-08-19 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An analysis of Newton's mathematical work, from early discoveries to mature reflections, and a discussion of Newton's views on the role and nature of mathematics. Historians of mathematics have devoted considerable attention to Isaac Newton's work on algebra, series, fluxions, quadratures, and geometry. In Isaac Newton on Mathematical Certainty and Method, Niccolò Guicciardini examines a critical aspect of Newton's work that has not been tightly connected to Newton's actual practice: his philosophy of mathematics. Newton aimed to inject certainty into natural philosophy by deploying mathematical reasoning (titling his main work The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy most probably to highlight a stark contrast to Descartes's Principles of Philosophy). To that end he paid concerted attention to method, particularly in relation to the issue of certainty, participating in contemporary debates on the subject and elaborating his own answers. Guicciardini shows how Newton carefully positioned himself against two giants in the “common” and “new” analysis, Descartes and Leibniz. Although his work was in many ways disconnected from the traditions of Greek geometry, Newton portrayed himself as antiquity's legitimate heir, thereby distancing himself from the moderns. Guicciardini reconstructs Newton's own method by extracting it from his concrete practice and not solely by examining his broader statements about such matters. He examines the full range of Newton's works, from his early treatises on series and fluxions to the late writings, which were produced in direct opposition to Leibniz. The complex interactions between Newton's understanding of method and his mathematical work then reveal themselves through Guicciardini's careful analysis of selected examples. Isaac Newton on Mathematical Certainty and Method uncovers what mathematics was for Newton, and what being a mathematician meant to him.
Download or read book Between Tradition and Innovation written by Ad J. Meskens and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2021-03-29 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers an analysis of the ground breaking mathematical work of Gregorio a San Vicente and his student and shows that the Flemish Jesuit Mathematics School had profound influence on mathematics in the seventeenth century.
Download or read book Geometry from a Differentiable Viewpoint written by John McCleary and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 375 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thoroughly revised second edition of a textbook for a first course in differential/modern geometry that introduces methods within a historical context.
Download or read book From Logic to Practice written by Gabriele Lolli and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-11-28 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book brings together young researchers from a variety of fields within mathematics, philosophy and logic. It discusses questions that arise in their work, as well as themes and reactions that appear to be similar in different contexts. The book shows that a fairly intensive activity in the philosophy of mathematics is underway, due on the one hand to the disillusionment with respect to traditional answers, on the other to exciting new features of present day mathematics. The book explains how the problem of applicability once again plays a central role in the development of mathematics. It examines how new languages different from the logical ones (mostly figural), are recognized as valid and experimented with and how unifying concepts (structure, category, set) are in competition for those who look at this form of unification. It further shows that traditional philosophies, such as constructivism, while still lively, are no longer only philosophies, but guidelines for research. Finally, the book demonstrates that the search for and validation of new axioms is analyzed with a blend of mathematical historical, philosophical, psychological considerations.
Download or read book The Geometry of an Art written by Kirsti Andersen and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2008-11-23 with total page 837 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This review of literature on perspective constructions from the Renaissance through the 18th century covers 175 authors, emphasizing Peiro della Francesca, Guidobaldo del Monte, Simon Stevin, Brook Taylor, and Johann Heinrich. It treats such topics as the various methods of constructing perspective, the development of theories underlying the constructions, and the communication between mathematicians and artisans in these developments.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Descartes and Cartesianism written by Steven Nadler and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2019-04-25 with total page 843 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of Descartes and Cartesianism comprises fifty specially written chapters on Rene Descartes (1596-1650) and Cartesianism, the dominant paradigm for philosophy and science in the seventeenth century, written by an international group of leading scholars of early modern philosophy. The first part focuses on the various aspects of Descartes's biography (including his background, intellectual contexts, writings, and correspondence) and philosophy, with chapters on his epistemology, method, metaphysics, physics, mathematics, moral philosophy, political thought, medical thought, and aesthetics. The chapters of the second part are devoted to the defense, development and modification of Descartes's ideas by later generations of Cartesian philosophers in France, the Netherlands, Italy, and elsewhere. The third and final part considers the opposition to Cartesian philosophy by other philosophers, as well as by civil, ecclesiastic, and academic authorities. This handbook provides an extensive overview of Cartesianism - its doctrines, its legacies and its fortunes - in the period based on the latest research.
Download or read book Handbook of the History and Philosophy of Mathematical Practice written by Bharath Sriraman and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on with total page 3221 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Transcendental Curves in the Leibnizian Calculus written by Viktor Blasjo and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2017-04-22 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Transcendental Curves in the Leibnizian Calculus analyzes a mathematical and philosophical conflict between classical and early modern mathematics. In the late 17th century, mathematics was at the brink of an identity crisis. For millennia, mathematical meaning and ontology had been anchored in geometrical constructions, as epitomized by Euclid's ruler and compass. As late as 1637, Descartes had placed himself squarely in this tradition when he justified his new technique of identifying curves with equations by means of certain curve-tracing instruments, thereby bringing together the ancient constructive tradition and modern algebraic methods in a satisfying marriage. But rapid advances in the new fields of infinitesimal calculus and mathematical mechanics soon ruined his grand synthesis. Descartes's scheme left out transcendental curves, i.e. curves with no polynomial equation, but in the course of these subsequent developments such curves emerged as indispensable. It was becoming harder and harder to juggle cutting-edge mathematics and ancient conceptions of its foundations at the same time, yet leading mathematicians, such as Leibniz felt compelled to do precisely this. The new mathematics fit more naturally an analytical conception of curves than a construction-based one, yet no one wanted to betray the latter, as this was seen as virtually tantamount to stop doing mathematics altogether. The credibility and authority of mathematics depended on it. Brings to light this underlying and often implicit complex of concerns that permeate early calculus Evaluates the technical conception and mathematical construction of the geometrical method Reveals a previously unrecognized Liebnizian programmatic cohesion in early calculus Provides a beautifully written work of outstanding original scholarship
Download or read book Reading Mathematics in Early Modern Europe written by Philip Beeley and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-10-20 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Libraries and archives contain many thousands of early modern mathematical books, of which almost equally many bear readers’ marks, ranging from deliberate annotations and accidental blots to corrections and underlinings. Such evidence provides us with the material and intellectual tools for exploring the nature of mathematical reading and the ways in which mathematics was disseminated and assimilated across different social milieus in the early centuries of print culture. Other evidence is important, too, as the case studies collected in the volume document. Scholarly correspondence can help us understand the motives and difficulties in producing new printed texts, library catalogues can illuminate collection practices, while manuscripts can teach us more about textual traditions. By defining and illuminating the distinctive world of early modern mathematical reading, the volume seeks to close the gap between the history of mathematics as a history of texts and history of mathematics as part of the broader history of human culture.
Download or read book The History of Continua written by Stewart Shapiro and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2021 with total page 593 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mathematical and philosophical thought about continuity has changed considerably over the ages, from Aristotle's insistence that a continuum is a unified whole, to the dominant account today, that a continuum is composed of infinitely many points. This book explores the key ideas and debates concerning continuity over more than 2500 years.
Download or read book Research in History and Philosophy of Mathematics written by Maria Zack and published by Birkhäuser. This book was released on 2015-11-10 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains thirteen papers that were presented at the 2014 Annual Meeting of the Canadian Society for History and Philosophy of Mathematics/La Société Canadienne d’Histoire et de Philosophie des Mathématiques, held on the campus of Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. It contains rigorously reviewed modern scholarship on general topics in the history and philosophy of mathematics, as well as on the meeting’s special topic, Early Scientific Computation. These papers cover subjects such as •Physical tools used by mathematicians in the seventeenth century •The first historical appearance of the game-theoretical concept of mixed-strategy equilibrium •George Washington’s mathematical cyphering books •The development of the Venn diagram •The role of Euler and other mathematicians in the development of algebraic analysis •Arthur Cayley and Alfred Kempe’s influence on Charles Peirce's diagrammatic logic •The influence publishers had on the development of mathematical pedagogy in the nineteenth century •A description of the 1924 International Mathematical Congress held in Toronto, told in the form of a “narrated slide show” Written by leading scholars in the field, these papers will be accessible to not only mathematicians and students of the history and philosophy of mathematics, but also anyone with a general interest in mathematics.
Download or read book A History of Mathematical Impossibility written by Jesper Lützen and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-01-26 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many of the most famous results in mathematics are impossibility theorems stating that something cannot be done. Good examples include the quadrature of the circle by ruler and compass, the solution of the quintic equation by radicals, Fermat's last theorem, and the impossibility of proving the parallel postulate from the other axioms of Euclidean geometry. This book tells the history of these and many other impossibility theorems starting with the ancient Greek proof of the incommensurability of the side and the diagonal in a square. Lützen argues that the role of impossibility results have changed over time. At first, they were considered rather unimportant meta-statements concerning mathematics but gradually they obtained the role of important proper mathematical results that can and should be proved. While mathematical impossibility proofs are more rigorous than impossibility arguments in other areas of life, mathematicians have employed great ingenuity to circumvent impossibilities by changing the rules of the game. For example, complex numbers were invented in order to make impossible equations solvable. In this way, impossibilities have been a strong creative force in the development of mathematics, mathematical physics, and social science.
