Who Invented the Calculus? - and Other 17Th Century Topics Transcript
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Edmond Halley and His Recurring Comet
EDMOND HALLEY AND HIS RECURRING COMET “They [the astronomers of the flying island of Laputa] have observed ninety-three different comets and settled their periods with great exactness. If this be true (and they affirm it with great confidence), it is much to be wished that their observations were made public, whereby the theory of comets, which at present is very lame and defective, might be brought into perfection with other parts of astronomy.” — Jonathan Swift, GULLIVER’S TRAVELS, 1726 HDT WHAT? INDEX HALLEY’S COMET EDMOND HALLEY 1656 November 8, Saturday (Old Style): Edmond Halley was born. NEVER READ AHEAD! TO APPRECIATE NOVEMBER 8TH, 1656 AT ALL ONE MUST APPRECIATE IT AS A TODAY (THE FOLLOWING DAY, TOMORROW, IS BUT A PORTION OF THE UNREALIZED FUTURE AND IFFY AT BEST). Edmond Halley “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX HALLEY’S COMET EDMOND HALLEY 1671 February 2, Friday (1671, Old Style): Harvard College was given a “3 foote and a halfe with a concave ey-glasse” reflecting telescope. This would be the instrument with which the Reverends Increase and Cotton Mather would observe a bright comet of the year 1682. ASTRONOMY HALLEY’S COMET HARVARD OBSERVATORY ESSENCE IS BLUR. SPECIFICITY, THE OPPOSITE OF ESSENCE, IS OF THE NATURE OF TRUTH. Edmond Halley “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX HALLEY’S COMET EDMOND HALLEY 1676 Edmond Halley was for six weeks the guest of the British East India Company at their St. Helena colony in the South Atlantic for purposes of observation of the exceedingly rare transit of the planet Venus across the face of the sun. -
J. Wallis the Arithmetic of Infinitesimals Series: Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences
J. Wallis The Arithmetic of Infinitesimals Series: Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences John Wallis was appointed Savilian Professor of Geometry at Oxford University in 1649. He was then a relative newcomer to mathematics, and largely self-taught, but in his first few years at Oxford he produced his two most significant works: De sectionibus conicis and Arithmetica infinitorum. In both books, Wallis drew on ideas originally developed in France, Italy, and the Netherlands: analytic geometry and the method of indivisibles. He handled them in his own way, and the resulting method of quadrature, based on the summation of indivisible or infinitesimal quantities, was a crucial step towards the development of a fully fledged integral calculus some ten years later. To the modern reader, the Arithmetica Infinitorum reveals much that is of historical and mathematical interest, not least the mid seventeenth-century tension between classical geometry on the one hand, and arithmetic and algebra on the other. Newton was to take up Wallis’s work and transform it into mathematics that has become part of the mainstream, but in Wallis’s text we see what we think of as modern mathematics still 2004, XXXIV, 192 p. struggling to emerge. It is this sense of watching new and significant ideas force their way slowly and sometimes painfully into existence that makes the Arithmetica Infinitorum such a relevant text even now for students and historians of mathematics alike. Printed book Dr J.A. Stedall is a Junior Research Fellow at Queen's University. She has written a number Hardcover of papers exploring the history of algebra, particularly the algebra of the sixteenth and 159,99 € | £139.99 | $199.99 ▶ seventeenth centuries. -
A Probabilistic Proof of Wallis's Formula for Π
A PROBABILISTIC PROOF OF WALLIS’S FORMULA FOR ¼ STEVEN J. MILLER There are many beautiful formulas for ¼ (see for example [4]). The purpose of this note is to introduce an alternate derivation of Wallis’s product formula, equation (1), which could be covered in a first course on probability, statistics, or number theory. We quickly review other famous formulas for ¼, recall some needed facts from probability, and then derive Wallis’s formula. We conclude by combining some of the other famous formulas with Wallis’s formula to derive an interesting expression for log(¼=2) (equation (5)). Often in a first-year calculus course students encounter the Gregory-Leibniz for- mula, ¼ 1 1 1 X1 (¡1)n = 1 ¡ + ¡ + ¢ ¢ ¢ = : 4 3 5 7 2n + 1 n=0 The proof uses the fact that the derivative of arctan x is 1=(1 + x2), so ¼=4 = R 1 2 0 dx=(1 + x ). To complete the proof, expand the integrand with the geometric series formula and then justify interchanging the order of integration and summa- tion. Another interesting formula involves Bernoulli numbers and the Riemann zeta function. The Bernoulli numbers Bk are the coefficients in the Taylor series t t X1 B tk = 1 ¡ + k ; et ¡ 1 2 k! k=2 P1 ¡s each Bk is rational. The Riemann zeta function is ³(s) = n=1 n , which converges for real part of s greater than 1. Using complex analysis one finds (see for instance [10, p. 365] or [18, pp. 179–180]) that (¡4)kB ³(2k) = ¡ 2k ¢ ¼2k; 2 ¢ 2k! 1 2 P ¡2 yielding formulas for ¼ to any even power. -
Halley, Edmond He Was Assistant of the Secretaries of the Royal Soci- Ety, and from 1685 to 1693 He Edited the Philosoph- Born: November 8, 1656, in Haggerton, UK
Principia Mathematica, in 1686. From 1685 to 1696 Halley, Edmond he was assistant of the secretaries of the Royal Soci- ety, and from 1685 to 1693 he edited the Philosoph- Born: November 8, 1656, in Haggerton, UK. ical Transactions of the Royal Society. In 1698 he Died: January 14, 1742, in Greenwich, UK. was the frequent guest of Peter the Great, who was studying British shipbuilding in England. He was the Edmond Halley was a major English astronomer, technical adviser to Queen Anne in the War of Span- mathematician, and physicist, who was also ish Succession, and in 1702 and 1703 she sent him interested in demography, insurance mathematics on diplomatic missions to Europe to advise on the (see Actuarial Methods), geology, oceanography, fortification of seaports. geography, and navigation. Moreover, he was Between 1687 and 1720 Halley published papers considered an engineer and a social statistician whose on mathematics, ranging from geometry to the com- life was filled with the thrill of discovery. In 1705, putation of logarithms and trigonometric functions. he reasoned that the periodic comet – now known He also published papers on the computation of as Halley’s comet – that appeared in 1456, 1531, the focal length of thick lenses and on the calcu- 1607, and 1682, was the same comet that appears lation of trajectories in gunnery. In 1684 he studied every 76 years, and accurately predicted that it would tidal phenomena, and in 1686 he wrote an important appear again in December 1758. His most notable paper in geophysics about the trade winds and mon- achievements were his discoveries of the motion of soons. -
Wallis's Product, Brouncker's Continued Fraction, and Leibniz's Series Author(S): Jacques Dutka Source: Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol
Wallis's Product, Brouncker's Continued Fraction, and Leibniz's Series Author(s): Jacques Dutka Source: Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 26, No. 2 (1982), pp. 115-126 Published by: Springer Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41133644 Accessed: 23-10-2017 15:57 UTC REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41133644?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms Springer is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Archive for History of Exact Sciences This content downloaded from 140.233.2.214 on Mon, 23 Oct 2017 15:57:11 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Wallis' s Product, Brouncker's Continued Fraction^ and Leibniz s Series Jacques Dutka Communicated by M. Kline Abstract A historical sketch is given of Wallis's infinite product for 4/a, and of the at- tempts which have been made, over more than three centuries, to find the method by which Brouncker obtained his equivalent continued fraction. A derivation of Brouncker's formula is given. -
Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences
Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences Editorial Board J.Z. Buchwald J. Lützen G.J. Toomer Advisory Board P.J. Davis T. Hawkins A.E. Shapiro D. Whiteside Springer Science+Business Media, LLC Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Seiences K. Andersen Brook Taylor's Work on Linear Perspective H.l.M. Bos Redefining Geometrical Exactness: Descartes' Transformation of the Early Modern Concept of Construction 1. Cannon/S. Dostrovsky The Evolution of Dynamics: Vibration Theory from 1687 to 1742 B. ChandIerlW. Magnus The History of Combinatorial Group Theory A.I. Dale AHistory of Inverse Probability: From Thomas Bayes to Karl Pearson, Second Edition A.I. Dale Most Honourable Remembrance: The Life and Work of Thomas Bayes A.I. Dale Pierre-Simon Laplace, Philosophical Essay on Probabilities, Translated from the fifth French edition of 1825, with Notes by the Translator P. Damerow/G. FreudenthallP. McLaugWin/l. Renn Exploring the Limits of Preclassical Mechanics: A Study of Conceptual Development in Early Modem Science: Free Fall and Compounded Motion in the Work of Descartes, Galileo, and Beeckman, Second Edition P.l. Federico Descartes on Polyhedra: A Study of the De Solworum Elementis B.R. Goldstein The Astronomy of Levi ben Gerson (1288-1344) H.H. Goldstine A History of Numerical Analysis from the 16th Through the 19th Century H.H. Goldstine A History of the Calculus of Variations from the 17th Through the 19th Century G. Graßhoff The History of Ptolemy's Star Catalogue A.W. Grootendorst Jan de Witt's Eiementa Curvarum Linearum, über Primus Continued after Index The Arithmetic of Infinitesimals John Wallis 1656 Translated from Latin to English with an Introduction by Jacqueline A. -
John Wallis and Transcendence: Measuring the Circle
John Wallis and Transcendence: measuring the circle January 25, 2010 MATH 160 (seminar-course) Tuesdays 2-4 p.m. Sci Center Room 530 Barry Mazur and Mark Reeder What does it mean to know a length, an area, a volume? We do it by relating lengths to other lengths, areas to areas, volumes to volumes. Archimedes had his \mechanical" method and modern mathematics has the Calculus. John Wallis grappled with an approach that lies somewhere in between Archimedes and the Calculus. We will read John Wallis's treatise The arithmetic of infinitesimals to learn what this is1. Archimedes2 related the area of a circle to that of a certain triangle built on its circumference. He related the area of parabolic segments to the area of appropriate triangles, and the volumes of spheres to that of cones and cylinders. Lurking behind many of these wonderful theorems is π (which providentially cancels out in all of the ratios that occur in these theorems). How can we study this (as it turns out, transcendental) number π? Wallis shows how the circle forces us to expand the idea of Number to include such things as π, and he gives new ways of representing such numbers. (His own Proposition 191 was quite a shocker to him|and remains a startling thing to us: it is great fun trying to get into his way of thinking, and watch it emerge.) It is also constructive, and Wallis describes (sometimes tortuously) his path to the result. In Wallis's exposition one can glimpse, as well, an implied rebuke to the ancients, who{in contrast to him| were fond of hiding their ideas; this is made explicit by Wallis in one of several interesting comments he makes. -
John Wallis (1616–1703), Oxford's Savilian Professor
John Wallis (1616–1703), Oxford’s Savilian Professor of Geometry from 1649 to 1703, was the most influential English mathematician before the rise of Isaac Newton. His most important works were his Arithmetic of Infinitesimals and his treatise on Conic Sections, both published in the 1650s. It was through studying the former that Newton came to discover his version of the binomial theorem. Wallis’s last great mathematical work A Treatise of Algebra was published in his seventieth year. John Wallis Wallis’ time-line “In the year 1649 I removed to 1616 Born in Ashford, Kent Oxford, being then Publick 1632–40 Studied at Emmanuel College, Professor of Geometry, of the Cambridge Foundation of Sr. Henry Savile. 1640 Ordained a priest in the And Mathematicks which Church of England had before been a pleasing 1642 Started deciphering secret codes diversion, was now to be for Oliver Cromwell’s intelligence my serious Study.” service during the English Civil Wars John Wallis 1647 Inspired by William Oughtred’s Clavis Mathematicae (Key to Mathematics) which considerably extended his mathematical knowledge 1648 Initiated mathematical correspondence with continental scholars (Hevelius, van Schooten, etc.) 1649 Appointed Savilian Professor of Geometry at Oxford 31 October: Inaugural lecture 1655–56 Arithmetica Infinitorum (The Arithmetic of Infinitesimals) and De Sectionibus Conicis (On Conic Sections) 1658 Elected Oxford University Archivist 1663 11 July: Lecture on Euclid’s parallel postulate 1655–79 Disputes with Thomas Hobbes 1685 Treatise of Algebra 1693–99 Opera Mathematica 1701 Appointed England’s first official decipherer (alongside his grandson William Blencowe) 1703 Died in Oxford John Wallis (1616–1703) Savilian Professor During the English Civil Wars John Wallis was appointed Savilian Professor of Geometry in 1649. -
The Birth of Calculus: Towards a More Leibnizian View
The Birth of Calculus: Towards a More Leibnizian View Nicholas Kollerstrom [email protected] We re-evaluate the great Leibniz-Newton calculus debate, exactly three hundred years after it culminated, in 1712. We reflect upon the concept of invention, and to what extent there were indeed two independent inventors of this new mathematical method. We are to a considerable extent agreeing with the mathematics historians Tom Whiteside in the 20th century and Augustus de Morgan in the 19th. By way of introduction we recall two apposite quotations: “After two and a half centuries the Newton-Leibniz disputes continue to inflame the passions. Only the very learned (or the very foolish) dare to enter this great killing- ground of the history of ideas” from Stephen Shapin1 and “When de l’Hôpital, in 1696, published at Paris a treatise so systematic, and so much resembling one of modern times, that it might be used even now, he could find nothing English to quote, except a slight treatise of Craig on quadratures, published in 1693” from Augustus de Morgan 2. Introduction The birth of calculus was experienced as a gradual transition from geometrical to algebraic modes of reasoning, sealing the victory of algebra over geometry around the dawn of the 18 th century. ‘Quadrature’ or the integral calculus had developed first: Kepler had computed how much wine was laid down in his wine-cellar by determining the volume of a wine-barrel, in 1615, 1 which marks a kind of beginning for that calculus. The newly-developing realm of infinitesimal problems was pursued simultaneously in France, Italy and England. -
Ways of Relating to the Mathematics of the Past
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics Volume 8 | Issue 1 January 2018 Ways of Relating to the Mathematics of the Past Michael N. Fried Ben Gurion University of the Negev Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons, and the Mathematics Commons Recommended Citation Fried, M. N. "Ways of Relating to the Mathematics of the Past," Journal of Humanistic Mathematics, Volume 8 Issue 1 (January 2018), pages 3-23. DOI: 10.5642/jhummath.201801.03 . Available at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/vol8/iss1/3 ©2018 by the authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. JHM is an open access bi-annual journal sponsored by the Claremont Center for the Mathematical Sciences and published by the Claremont Colleges Library | ISSN 2159-8118 | http://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/ The editorial staff of JHM works hard to make sure the scholarship disseminated in JHM is accurate and upholds professional ethical guidelines. However the views and opinions expressed in each published manuscript belong exclusively to the individual contributor(s). The publisher and the editors do not endorse or accept responsibility for them. See https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/policies.html for more information. Ways of Relating to the Mathematics of the Past Cover Page Footnote This piece was originally presented as a lecture at the MAA-Short Course: Reading, Writing and Doing the History of Mathematics: Learning the Methods of Historical Research, held in Baltimore, MD, January, 2014. This work is available in Journal of Humanistic Mathematics: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/vol8/iss1/3 Ways of Relating to the Mathematics of the Past1 Michael N. -
The History and Philosophy of Astronomy
Astronomy 350L (Spring 2005) The History and Philosophy of Astronomy (Lecture 13: Newton I) Instructor: Volker Bromm TA: Amanda Bauer The University of Texas at Austin Isaac Newton: Founding Father of Physics • 1642 (Woolsthorpe) – 1727 (London) • Principia Mathematica Philosophiae Naturalis (“Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy”, 1687) - universal gravity (inverse-square law) - three laws of motion • invented calculus (differentiation and integration) Newton: Timeline and Context Descartes • building upon Galileo, Kepler, and Descartes • completes Copernican Revolution! Newton: Geography of his Life N D 1642: Birth in Woolsthorpe • born in rural Lincolnshire • father died before his birth (‘posthumous child’) 1642 – 49: The English Civil War • bitter struggle between King (Charles I Stuart) and Parliament (“Cavaliers” vs “Roundheads”) • King desires to rule without Parliament 1649: Execution of the King • King Charles I (Stuart) beheaded 1642 – 49: The English Civil War • Victory for Parliament • Republic (“Commonwealth”) • Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658) - Lord Protector • Anarchy after his death • Army recalls son of former (executed) king from exile 1660: The Restoration • Return of the Stuarts: Charles II (son of behead king) London Coffee-House Culture • New venue for meetings of intellectuals The Royal Society of London Gresham College • founded 1660: institution to foster exchange of scientific knowledge Philosophical Transactions • published by Royal Society • first scientific journal • a public registry of new scientific -
Baden Powell (1796–1860), Henry John Stephen Smith (1826–83) and James Joseph Sylvester (1814–97)
Three Savilian Professors of Geometry dominated Oxford’s mathematical scene during the Victorian era: Baden Powell (1796–1860), Henry John Stephen Smith (1826–83) and James Joseph Sylvester (1814–97). None was primarily a geometer, but each brought a different contribution to the role. Oxford’s Victorian Time-line 1827 Baden Powell elected Savilian Professor 1828 Mathematics Finals papers first Savilian Professors published 1831 Mathematical Scholarships founded 1832 Powell’s lecture on The Present State of Geometry and Future Prospects of Mathematics 1847 BAAS meeting in Oxford 1849 School of Natural Science approved The University Museum, constructed in the late 1850s, realised in brick and iron Oxford’s mid-century aspirations to improve the 1850–52 Royal Commission on Oxford University facilities for teaching mathematics and the sciences. 1853 First college science laboratory 1859–65 Smith’s Reports on the Theory of Numbers 1860 Opening of the University Museum Death of Baden Powell Henry Smith elected Savilian Professor 1861 The ‘Smith normal form’ of a matrix 1867 Smith’s sums of squares 1868 Smith awarded Berlin Academy prize 1871 Non-Anglicans eligible to be members of Oxford University 1874 Smith appointed Keeper of the University Museum 1874–76 Henry Smith becomes President of the London Mathematical Society 1875 Smith’s ‘Cantor set’ 1876 Ferdinand Lindemann visits Oxford Smith’s lecture On the Present State and Prospects of some Branches of Pure Mathematics 1881 French Academy announces Grand Prix competition 1883 Death of Henry Smith J J Sylvester elected Savilian Professor 1885 Sylvester’s inaugural lecture 1888 Oxford Mathematical Society founded 1894 William Esson elected Sylvester’s deputy 1895–97 Smith’s Collected Papers published 1897 Death of J J Sylvester William Esson elected Savilian Professor Oxford’s Victorian Savilian Professors of Geometry Baden Powell Baden Powell was Savilian Professor of Geometry from 1827 to 1860.