On the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Hermann Grassmann (1809-1877), an interdisciplinary conference was held in Potsdam, Germany, and in Grassmann's hometown Szczecin, Poland. The idea of the conference was to present a multi-faceted picture of Grassmann, and to uncover the complexity of the factors that were responsible for his creativity. The conference demonstrated not only the very influential reception of his work at the turn of the 20th century, but also the unexpected modernity of his ideas, and their continuing development in the 21st century.

This book contains 37 papers presented at the conference. They investigate the significance of Grassmann's work for philosophical as well as for scientific and methodological questions, for comparative philology in general and for Indology in particular, for psychology, physiology, religious studies, musicology, didactics, and, last but not least, mathematics. In addition, the book contains numerous illustrations and English translations of original sources, which are published here for the first time. These include life histories of Grassmann (written by his son Justus) and of his brother Robert (written by Robert himself), as well as the paper "On the concept and extent of pure theory of number'' by Justus Grassmann (the father).<

The mathematics of ancient Egypt was fundamentally different from our math today. Contrary to what people might think, it wasn't a primitive forerunner of modern mathematics. In fact, it can't be understood using our current computational methods. "Count Like an Egyptian" provides a fun, hands-on introduction to the intuitive and often-surprising art of ancient Egyptian math. David Reimer guides you step-by-step through addition, subtraction, multiplication, and more. He even shows you how fractions and decimals may have been calculated--they technically didn't exist in the land of the pharaohs. You'll be counting like an Egyptian in no time, and along the way you'll learn firsthand how mathematics is an expression of the culture that uses it, and why there's more to math than rote memorization and bewildering abstraction.

Reimer takes you on a lively and entertaining tour of the ancient Egyptian world, providing rich historical details and amusing anecdotes as he presents a host of mathematical problems drawn from different eras of the Egyptian past. Each of these problems is like a tantalizing puzzle, often with a beautiful and elegant solution. As you solve them, you'll be immersed in many facets of Egyptian life, from hieroglyphs and pyramid building to agriculture, religion, and even bread baking and beer brewing.

Fully illustrated in color throughout, "Count Like an Egyptian" also teaches you some Babylonian computation--the precursor to our modern system--and compares ancient Egyptian mathematics to today's math, letting you decide for yourself which is better.

Volume 2.3, containing the Greek translations of books II-IV, completes the edition of the Conica of Apollonius of Perga. It is arranged according to the same principle as the previous volume on book I: the critical edition of the Greek text is accompanied by numerous notes and a lexicon of all mathematical terms. An introduction and a French translation provide further insights into the text. The edition of the Greek books of the Conica will be thematically complemented by volume 3 of the SGA series, containing the critical edition of Eutocius of Ascalon's commentary on the Conica and its French translation.

This seminal collection gathers together many general writings of one of the world's leading historians of mathematics. Organized thematically, these essays ponder the intellectual underpinnings of the field, examine the major topics in the history of mathematics, and recount the bizarre history of pseudomath.

Ivor Grattan-Guinness explores how people understand mathematics--the routes of learning they take as they make important discoveries and study mathematical concepts and theories. The essays in the first part of the book discuss the history of mathematics as a field and its central philosophical issues. Those in the next part address the history of mathematics education and its importance to current modes of teaching. In the last section Grattan-Guinness investigates various understudied aspects of math, including numerology, Masonic symbols in classical music, and the links between mathematics and Christianity.

This collection includes several essays that are difficult to find anywhere else. All historians of mathematics and students of the field will want a copy of this remarkable resource on their bookshelves.

Band 5 umfasst die Themenbereiche Astronomie, Optik und Wahrscheinlichkeitstheorie. Er enthalt Hausdorffs Dissertation uber die Refraktion des Lichtes in der Atmosphare, zwei Folgearbeiten zum gleichen Thema sowie die Habilitationsschrift uber die Extinktion des Lichtes in der Atmosphare. Es folgt eine Arbeit uber geometrische Optik, die unmittelbar an die beruhmte Publikation von H. Bruns uber das Eikonal anschliesst und in der Hausdorff die damals ganz neuen Lieschen Theorien fur die Optik nutzbar zu machen suchte.

Auf dem Gebiet der Stochastik veroffentlichte Hausdorff zwei langere Arbeiten, die in verschiedenen Bereichen der Versicherungsmathematik und der Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung ihre Spuren hinterlassen haben. Von besonderem historischen Interesse sind die im Band publizierten Stucke aus Hausdorffs Nachlass, etwa seine Vorlesung "Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung" vom Sommersemester 1923 oder seine Briefe an Richard von Mises aus dem Jahre 1919. "

Historical records show that there was no real concept of probability in Europe before the mid-seventeenth century, although the use of dice and other randomizing objects was commonplace. Ian Hacking presents a philosophical critique of early ideas about probability, induction, and statistical inference and the growth of this new family of ideas in the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. Hacking invokes a wide intellectual framework involving the growth of science, economics, and the theology of the period. He argues that the transformations that made it possible for probability concepts to emerge have constrained all subsequent development of probability theory and determine the space within which philosophical debate on the subject is still conducted. First published in 1975, this edition includes an introduction that contextualizes his book in light of developing philosophical trends. Ian Hacking is the winner of the Holberg International Memorial Prize 2009.

This book celebrates the work of Don Pigozzi on the occasion of his 80th birthday. In addition to articles written by leading specialists and his disciples, it presents Pigozzi's scientific output and discusses his impact on the development of science. The book both catalogues his works and offers an extensive profile of Pigozzi as a person, sketching the most important events, not only related to his scientific activity, but also from his personal life. It reflects Pigozzi's contribution to the rise and development of areas such as abstract algebraic logic (AAL), universal algebra and computer science, and introduces new scientific results. Some of the papers also present chronologically ordered facts relating to the development of the disciplines he contributed to, especially abstract algebraic logic. The book offers valuable source material for historians of science, especially those interested in history of mathematics and logic.

In 1988 The Mathematical Intelligencer, a quarterly mathematics journal, carried out a poll to find the most beautiful theorem in mathematics. Twenty-four theorems were listed and readers were invited to award each a 'score for beauty'. While there were many worthy competitors, the winner was 'Euler's equation'. In 2004 Physics World carried out a similar poll of 'greatest equations', and found that among physicists Euler's mathematical result came second only to Maxwell's equations. The Stanford mathematician Keith Devlin reflected the feelings of many in describing it as "like a Shakespearian sonnet that captures the very essence of love, or a painting which brings out the beauty of the human form that is far more than just skin deep, Euler's equation reaches down into the very depths of existence". What is it that makes Euler's identity, ei + 1 = 0, so special? In Euler's Pioneering Equation Robin Wilson shows how this simple, elegant, and profound formula links together perhaps the five most important numbers in mathematics, each associated with a story in themselves: the number 1, the basis of our counting system; the concept of zero, which was a major development in mathematics, and opened up the idea of negative numbers; an irrational number, the basis for the measurement of circles; the exponential e, associated with exponential growth and logarithms; and the imaginary number i, the square root of -1, the basis of complex numbers. Following a chapter on each of the elements, Robin Wilson discusses how the startling relationship between them was established, including the several near misses to the discovery of the formula.

Felix Hausdorff gehort zu den herausragenden Mathematikern der ersten Halfte des 20. Jahrhunderts. Er hinterliess einen ungewohnlich reichhaltigen Korpus wissenschaftlicher Manuskripe. Sein Gesamtwerk soll nun in 9 Banden, jeweils mit detaillierten Kommentaren, herausgegeben werden. Der vorliegende Band II enthalt Hausdorffs wohl wichtigstes Werk, die "Grundzuge der Mengenlehre" Dieses Buch gehort zu den Klassikern der mathematischen Literatur und hat auf die Entwicklung der Mathematik im 20. Jahrhundert einen bedeutenden Einfluss ausgeubt. Daher erschien es geboten, ausfuhrliche Kommentare beizufugen. In diesen Kommentaren werden vor allem die bedeutenden originellen Beitrage, die Hausdorff in den "Grundzugen" zur Topologie, allgemeinen und deskriptiven Mengenlehre geleistet hat, eingehend behandelt. Insbesondere wird versucht, Hausdorffs Leistungen in die historische Entwicklung einzuordnen und ihre jeweilige Wirkungsgeschichte zu skizzieren."

Probably the most celebrated controversy in all of the history of science was that between Newton and Leibniz over the invention of the calculus. The argument ranged far beyond a mere priority dispute and took on the character of a war between two different philosophies of nature. Newton was the first to devise the methods of the calculus, but Leibniz (who independently discovered virtually identical methods) was the first to publish, in 1684. Mutual toleration passed into suspicion and, at last, denunciation of each by the other as a fraud and a plagiarist. The affair became a scandal, as British mathematicians asserted Newton’s claims before the public while their Continental colleagues hotly defended Leibniz’s priority. Professor Hall analyzes the situation out of which the dispute arose, the circumstances that caused it to become embittered, the dispositions of the chief actors, and the shifts in their opinions of each other.

These three volumes constitute the first complete English translation of Felix Klein's seminal series "Elementarmathematik vom hoheren Standpunkte aus". "Complete" has a twofold meaning here: First, there now exists a translation of volume III into English, while until today the only translation had been into Chinese. Second, the English versions of volume I and II had omitted several, even extended parts of the original, while we now present a complete revised translation into modern English. The volumes, first published between 1902 and 1908, are lecture notes of courses that Klein offered to future mathematics teachers, realizing a new form of teacher training that remained valid and effective until today: Klein leads the students to gain a more comprehensive and methodological point of view on school mathematics. The volumes enable us to understand Klein's far-reaching conception of elementarisation, of the "elementary from a higher standpoint", in its implementation for school mathematics. In Volume III, Klein explores the relationship between precision and approximation mathematics. He crosses the various fields of mathematics - from functions in one and two variables to practical geometry to space curves and surfaces - underlining the relation between the exactness of the idealised concepts and the approximations to be considered in applications. Logical procedures are confronted with the way in which concepts arise starting from observations. It is a comparison between properties pertaining only to the theoretical field of abstract mathematics and properties that can be grasped by intuition. The final part, which concerns gestalt relations of curves and surfaces, shows Klein to be the master of the art of description of geometric forms.

This is a popular book that chronicles the historical attempts to prove the fifth postulate of Euclid on parallel lines that led eventually to the creation of non-Euclidean geometry. To absorb the mathematical content of the book, the reader should be familiar with the foundations of Euclidean geometry at the high school level. But besides the mathematics, the book is also devoted to stories about the people, brilliant mathematicians starting from Pythagoras and Euclid and terminating with Gauss, Lobachevsky and Klein. For two thousand years, mathematicians tried to prove the fifth postulate (whose formulation seemed to them too complicated to be a real postulate and not a theorem, hence the title In the Search for Beauty). But in the 19th century, they realized that such proof was impossible, and this led to a revolution in mathematics and then in physics. The two final chapters are devoted to Einstein and his general relativity which revealed to us that the geometry of the world we live in is not Euclidean.Also included is an historical essay on Omar Khayyam, who was not only a poet, but also a brilliant astronomer and mathematician.

This eminently readable book focuses on the people of mathematics and draws the reader into their fascinating world. In a monumental address, given to the International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris in 1900, David Hilbert, perhaps the most respected mathematician of his time, developed a blueprint for mathematical research in the new century. Jokingly called a natural introduction to thesis writing with examples, this collection of problems has indeed become a guiding inspiration to many mathematicians, and those who succeeded in solving or advancing their solutions form an Honors Class among research mathematicians of this century. In a remarkable labor of love and with the support of many of the major players in the field, Ben Yandell has written a fascinating account of the achievements of this Honors Class, covering mathematical substance and biographical aspects.

1m Zusammenhang mit Vorarbeiten zu einer Biographie uber Heinz Hopf sind wir vor einigen Jahren im Archiv des Schweizerischen Schulrates auf bisher unbekannte Dokumente aus dem Jahre 1930 gestossen, wel- che die N achfolgeregelung von Hermann Weyl an der ETH betreffen und die in mehrfacher Hinsicht Interesse verdienen. Dies hat uns veran- lasst, an der ETH systematisch nach weiteren Dokumenten zu Hermann Weyl und zur Mathematik an der ETH aus der Zeit seiner Tiitigkeit in Zurich zu suchen. Versehen mit einem Rahmentext veroffentlichen wir hier eine Zusammenstellung dieser Dokumente, die bis anhin nur schwer oder uberhaupt nicht zugiinglich waren. Hermann Weyl bezeichnet im Ruckblick die 17 Jahre seiner Tatigkeit in Zurich als die "wohl wichtigsten und produktivsten" seines Lebens. In der Tat sind von ihm zwischen 1913 und 1930 acht Bucher und rund siebzig Arbeiten erschienen. In Zurich erreichten ihn auch zahlreiche Berufun- gen aus Deutschland und den USA. 1m Ruckblick spricht er von ihnen als von der "schlimmste[n] Plage" wiihrend dieser Zeit. Es schien uns eine reizvolle Aufgabe zu sein, die iiusseren Lebensumstiinde Hermann Weyls in Zurich zu verfolgen, die ihm eine so erfolgreiche Tiitigkeit ermoglicht haben. Die aufgefundenen Dokumente fugen sich dariiber hinaus auch zu einer Darstellung der personellen Entwicklung der Mathematik (und der theoretischen Physik) an der ETH in den Jahren 1913 bis 1930.

The first three books of the Conica deals with the basic elements of the theory of conical sections, before Apollonius turns to particular problems in the following books. Until recently these three books were only known from Eutociusa (TM) text. However, they were known to be part of an Arabic translation of a Greek version independent of Eutociusa (TM) text. A close study of the Arabic texts of books 2 and 3 leads to the same conclusion as that which, as a result of the new edition, was reached for the first book: that the Greek version provides a better and sounder text. This volume provides a first critical edition of the Arabic text, the first translation of it into a modern language and a detailed historical and mathematical commentary.

In the Corpus Aristotelicum there are 18 passages where it can be shown that Aristotle quotes statements that are formally opposite to the fundamental Euclidean theorem of the sum of the angles in a triangle. These statements are the result of the attempt by the geometricians of the Academy to prove the fundamental approach of Euclidean geometry indirectly. However, the attempt did not result in contradiction and Aristotle felt that there was no way of deciding between the alternatives Euclidean - non-Euclidean . In his Ethics this is the only example he uses to illustrate the freedom of choice of the active subject."

The first book surveying the history and ideas behind reverse mathematics Reverse mathematics is a new field that seeks to find the axioms needed to prove given theorems. In Reverse Mathematics, John Stillwell offers a historical and representative view, emphasizing basic analysis and giving a novel approach to logic. By using a minimum of mathematical logic in a well-motivated way, Reverse Mathematics will engage advanced undergraduates and all mathematicians interested in the foundations of mathematics.

Between inventing the concept of a universal computer in 1936 and breaking the German Enigma code during World War II, Alan Turing (1912-1954), the British founder of computer science and artificial intelligence, came to Princeton University to study mathematical logic. Some of the greatest logicians in the world--including Alonzo Church, Kurt Godel, John von Neumann, and Stephen Kleene--were at Princeton in the 1930s, and they were working on ideas that would lay the groundwork for what would become known as computer science. This book presents a facsimile of the original typescript of Turing's fascinating and influential 1938 Princeton PhD thesis, one of the key documents in the history of mathematics and computer science. The book also features essays by Andrew Appel and Solomon Feferman that explain the still-unfolding significance of the ideas Turing developed at Princeton.

A work of philosophy as well as mathematics, Turing's thesis envisions a practical goal--a logical system to formalize mathematical proofs so they can be checked mechanically. If every step of a theorem could be verified mechanically, the burden on intuition would be limited to the axioms. Turing's point, as Appel writes, is that "mathematical reasoning can be done, and should be done, in mechanizable formal logic." Turing's vision of "constructive systems of logic for practical use" has become reality: in the twenty-first century, automated "formal methods" are now routine.

Presented here in its original form, this fascinating thesis is one of the key documents in the history of mathematics and computer science."