6A. Mathematics
19-th Century ROMANTIC AGE Mathematics Collected and edited by Prof. Zvi Kam, Weizmann Institute, Israel The 19th century is called “Romantic” because of the romantic trend in literature, music and arts opposing the rationalism of the 18th century. The romanticism adored individualism, folklore and nationalism and distanced itself from the universality of humanism and human spirit. Coming back to nature replaced the superiority of logics and reasoning human brain. In Literature: England-Lord byron, Percy Bysshe Shelly Germany –Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, Immanuel Kant. France – Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Alexandre Dumas (The Hunchback from Notre Dam), Victor Hugo (Les Miserable). Russia – Alexander Pushkin. Poland – Adam Mickiewicz (Pan Thaddeus) America – Fennimore Cooper (The last Mohican), Herman Melville (Moby Dick) In Music: Germany – Schumann, Mendelsohn, Brahms, Wagner. France – Berlioz, Offenbach, Meyerbeer, Massenet, Lalo, Ravel. Italy – Bellini, Donizetti, Rossini, Puccini, Verdi, Paganini. Hungary – List. Czech – Dvorak, Smetana. Poland – Chopin, Wieniawski. Russia – Mussorgsky. Finland – Sibelius. America – Gershwin. Painters: England – Turner, Constable. France – Delacroix. Spain – Goya. Economics: 1846 - The American Elias Howe Jr. builds the general purpose sawing machine, launching the clothing industry. 1848 – The communist manifest by Karl Marks & Friedrich Engels is published. Describes struggle between classes and replacement of Capitalism by Communism. But in the sciences, the Romantic era was very “practical”, and established in all fields the infrastructure for the modern sciences. In Mathematics – Differential and Integral Calculus, Logarithms. Theory of functions, defined over Euclidian spaces, developed the field of differential equations, the quantitative basis of physics. Matrix Algebra developed formalism for transformations in space and time, both orthonormal and distortive, preparing the way to Einstein’s relativity.
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