Mathematics

How to Read Historical Mathematics

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I
f you’ve ever read a historical mathematical text and then
thought,
what
on
earth
was
that?
this book is for you.
Let me explain.
Reading historical mathematics is fascinating, challenging,
enriching,
and endlessly rewarding. A huge wealth of mathe
-
matics and mathematical experience are contained in the past;
the enthralling task of finding out about them can transform
your study and enjoyment of modern mathematics, and it can
turn into the study of a lifetime in its own right.
Nations and societies commemorate people and events from
their past, and by doing so they create and strengthen their own
sense of identity. Mathematicians do the same thing when they
commemorate the past in the names they use: the Isaac New-
ton Institute, Lebesgue integrals, Noether’s theorem. . . . We
all know who Isaac Newton was, but most of us are a bit more
shaky about Henri Lebesgue or Emmy Noether. That’s where
the history of mathematics comes in. Who were the people
who made our mathematics the way it is? What did they
do? Why do we remember them? (There are more awkward
viii
questions, too: What about the people we don’t remember?
Why do some mathematicians and their writings become part
of the mathematical “hall of fame” and others not? Why, in the
end, is our mathematics the way it is

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Publisher

United Kingdom : Springer Publishing Company, LLC., 2010

Collation

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Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

978-0-691-14014-8

Classification

NONE

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