Questions tagged [mathematicians]
For questions about those who do mathematics.
340
questions
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8 views
Lost memoir of Évariste Galois
According to the Wikipedia article on Évariste Galois
He submitted his memoir on equation theory several times, but it was
never published in his lifetime due to various events. Though his
first ...
2
votes
0answers
71 views
How did Hamilton conclude the quaternions had to be four dimensional?
I have seen many times before that Hamilton started off believing he would need a three-dimensional system over the reals in order to describe 3D rotations. He considered numbers of the form $a + bi + ...
2
votes
2answers
130 views
Why don't inventors clearly describe or expound their ideas?
Kindly see the embolded sentence below.
To write Cauchy’s definitions down precisely takes a bit more work. This
was especially true for Cauchy himself, who had not quite phrased the ideas in
...
2
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0answers
60 views
Who first proved that the existence of a Euclidean algorithm implies unique factorization?
In Simachew's "A Survey on Euclidean Number Fields", he said that Gauss used the existence of a Euclidean algorithm in Gaussian integers to prove that it has unique factorization. Also, he ...
1
vote
0answers
96 views
Is it true that Mathematicians have a short shelf-life / peak early?
I have always heard this claim that, out of all disciplines, Mathematicians have the shortest 'shelf-life'. More specifically, that they peak early in their twenties (i.e. present their most important ...
3
votes
1answer
244 views
Did Euler produce any Russian text?
Wikipedia says that Euler (1707 - 1783) "mastered Russian and settled into life in Saint Petersburg" in 1727. Did he produce any Russian text, mathematical or personal? I can only find Latin,...
5
votes
0answers
71 views
Who coined the term: “Directed Graph”?
I found that the term "Digraph" was coined in 1955 by Frank Harary in "The number of linear, directed, rooted, and connected graphs", and that it was a term actually suggested by ...
0
votes
0answers
117 views
Origins of Stone duality
My question is a mix of mathematical and historical, if you consider my question will be better answered in the mathematics community, please tell me.
I want to know the historical roots of Stone's ...
6
votes
2answers
464 views
A branch of mathematics which refused to be rigorous?
I'm currently in a class on formal mathematics/formal logic/axiomatic set theory. Someone asked, "At the end of the day, as mathematicians, why do we care about rigor?" My professor gave an ...
3
votes
1answer
118 views
What was the influence of Gauss on the understanding of the importance of non-Euclidean geometry?
As is known, Gauss came to similar conclusions as Lobachevskii in the problem of fifth postulate, but I don't know whether Gauss had any impact to the contemporaries in that story. Can anybody ...
3
votes
1answer
99 views
Who was E. Busche?
Donald E. Knuth reports in his: TAOCP: Volume 1: Fundamental Algorithms (3rd ed.) in $\S1.2.4$: Integer Functions and Elementary Number Theory: Exercise 38 that this result:
$$\sum_{0 \mathop \le k \...
3
votes
1answer
125 views
Who was Paul Gerwien?
The famed Wallace–Bolyai–Gerwien theorem has got its name from three mathematicians who proved it independently. More precisely speaking
Farkas Bolyai first formulated the question. Gerwien proved ...
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0answers
26 views
Who was the first person to prove the invariance of the Euler characteristic under triangulations?
Given a compact orientable surface $S$ and any triangulation where $F$ denotes the amount of triangles, $E$ denotes the amount of edges, and $V$ denotes the amount of vertices, we know that the Euler-...
18
votes
1answer
3k views
Is the story about Fermat's writing on a margin true?
Is there any evidence that Fermat wrote on the margin of a book "I have discovered a truly marvelous demonstration of this proposition that this margin is too narrow to contain." Everyone ...
0
votes
1answer
78 views
Independent and dependent variables
Im doing this presentation for school and we have to find out who exactly first used independent and dependent variables. I've searched everywhere but no answer was found its either John radford young ...
0
votes
0answers
25 views
Is Robert Earl MacKenzie (co-author of Introduction to Differential Manifolds) still alive?
I am making sure that my information on certain mathematicians is up to date and accurate. To this end I am looking at Robert Earl MacKenzie, who (according to my records) was born March 17, 1920. I ...
0
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1answer
67 views
Did John Greever or John Jay Greever write “Theory and Examples of Point Set Topology”?
I have a reference to "Theory and Examples of Point Set Topology" by J. Greever (1967: Brooks/Cole).
I searched for biographical information on J. Greever and I identified:
John Greever, b. ...
3
votes
0answers
134 views
How did Euler obtain this formula from a paper/work in 1748?
I am reading this book on trigonometric series, "Тригонометрические ряды от Эйлера до Лебега" (Trigonometric series from Euler to Lebesgue) , it is in Russian, and my Russian is abysmal. But ...
2
votes
1answer
61 views
Who is the John Thomas of “Thomas's Plank” and “Thomas's Corkscrew”?
Entries $93$ and $94$ in Steen and Seebach's "Counterexamples in Topology" are named "Thomas's Plank" and "Thomas's Corkscrew". These are apparently named for a certain &...
2
votes
1answer
124 views
What did Roger Apery mean by “Oh they grow in my garden”
Roger Apery, a French mathematician most remembered for proving that $\zeta(3)\in\mathbb{R}\setminus\mathbb{Q}$ (irrational) in $1979$. In this video posted by Numberphile: https://www.youtube.com/...
9
votes
1answer
2k views
Story of a student who solves an open problem
A number of years ago, I read a (non-fiction) story about a young mathematician whose professor wrote an open problem on the board and the student went ahead and wrote down a solution after a moment ...
2
votes
1answer
61 views
Heyting and Lugano
I read in Wikipedia that Arend Heyting, logician, died in Lugano while all the biographies focus on his career in Amsterdam and nearby.
Do we know if he lived in Lugano or not, and why died there?
-1
votes
2answers
180 views
Who were the mathematicians who hated teaching in class or disliked teaching?
Who were the mathematicians who hated teaching in class or disliked teaching?
From this Article:
Gauss hated teaching, and believed some students robbed him of his time.
From this Article:
Perelman ...
-3
votes
2answers
280 views
Why we got so many geniuses after 19th century? [closed]
Albert Einstein was a genius, Kurt Gödel was a genius, John Von Neumann was a genius (I hope that people over here will share the meaning of "genius" which I understand, for me I always find ...
4
votes
1answer
128 views
Who was Fleury? And what was his first name?
One of the algorithms for finding Eulerian paths and circuits in graphs that have them is due to Fleury. Lucas mentioned this in his 1892 recreational mathematics collection, referring to "M. ...
-2
votes
1answer
107 views
Why theology plays a great role in becoming great mathematicians? [closed]
Why theology play a great role in becoming great mathematicians?
I have some confusion about theology with mathematics.
I read the biography of Euler and Bernhard Riemann.
Both were studying ...
0
votes
4answers
821 views
Who were some mathematicians who have a musical background?
Who were some mathematicians who have a musical background ?
I know one mathematician , I see his video on you tube .He is a tabla player + field medal winner.
His name is Manjul_Bhargava
My ...
1
vote
1answer
85 views
How did Gaussian and Eisenstein integers get their names?
I can separate this into two questions at some point if necessary, but it's possible that sources for the answer to one will provide the answer to the other at the same time.
I learned about ...
3
votes
1answer
127 views
Did Fourier use heated metal rings as experimental evidence to justify his mathematical discoveries?
In his answer to a previous question Alexandre Eremenko pointed out that Joseph Fourier in his book Analytic Theory of Heat gave all kinds of arguments in favor of the following mathematical ...
0
votes
1answer
54 views
An English translation of Simon Stevin's De Thiende
I enjoy reading manuscripts written by mathematicians of old, and I would love to read the famous De Thiende by Simon Steven. I've done some research online here and there, but I have not found any ...
5
votes
0answers
127 views
Photo of Wilhelm Ackermann
I am writing a text on the Theory of Computation. I am looking for a photo of the mathematician Wilhelm Ackermann. He is well-known in the field, was a student of one of the most famous ...
6
votes
1answer
272 views
Who is the Göbel who is the eponym of Göbel's Sequence?
Richard K. Guy refers to him as "F. Göbel" in his Unsolved Problems of Number Theory but that's as close as I can get.
For reference:
https://mathworld.wolfram.com/GoebelsSequence.html
4
votes
1answer
129 views
Mathematicians who often didn't use notebooks/devices to work?
Newton was known to keep manuscripts of his thoughts and workings on math/physics (and even more related to religion) which are kept in Cambridge I believe.
My question is, are there examples of the ...
0
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0answers
69 views
Are there any accounts of Charles Peirce's character,cognition and physical appearance?
I am interested in any historical account of the following attributes of Peirce:character,cognition and appearance.
5
votes
1answer
94 views
Was Charles Sanders Peirce aware of Charles Babbage's difference engine?
Is there any indication that Charles Peirce was aware of Babbage and his work on mechanical computing?
1
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0answers
23 views
Founders of undetermined forms [duplicate]
Who are the people actually 1st to mention about undetermined forms like 0^∞ or 0/0 or ∞/∞ etc .
In which books these forms are mentioned and if the people were not known specifically , mention the ...
3
votes
1answer
105 views
Was Lebesgue differentiation theorem the motivation for Vitali's, Riesz's and Hardy-Littlewood's results used to prove it?
I have been reading about the Lebesgue differentiation theorem from Terence Tao's book and came across a bunch of things. In his book, Tao uses the Vitali Covering lemma (finite), Hardy-Littlewood ...
3
votes
1answer
116 views
How to pronounce Jacobson [closed]
Nathan Jacobson was one of the leading algebraists in the last century. Several mathematical objects are named after him such as the Jacobson radical. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Jacobson ...
15
votes
1answer
3k views
Which mathematician traveled to and moved in with each collaborator?
I remember a video, perhaps a Numberphile episode where a mathematician was described who would simply move in to the home of a collaborator with which they were engaged to so that they could work ...
0
votes
1answer
83 views
What are the Peirce's axioms of arithmetic and how do they relate to the Peano axioms?
I will be glad if someone who has seen Peirce's paper could summarily describe here Peirce's axioms and describe their relation to Peano's.
3
votes
1answer
193 views
“Family tree” of mathematicians and their PhD advisors and students
Whilst looking at the Wikipedia pages for some well known mathematicians I was surprised at how many of them were advised by other recognisable mathematicians. In some cases I could back track 5 or ...
3
votes
1answer
95 views
Complete list of publications of Rebecca Barlow
Rebecca Barlow is the discoverer of an interesting surface in algebraic geometry. Is anybody aware of a full list of her contributions? Has she continued working in mathematics in the 21st century?
5
votes
1answer
190 views
Some references for Vladimir Arnold's thesis “Mathematics is a part of physics”?
The mathematician Vladimir Arnold claimed that mathematics is a part of physics.
I am aware of Arnold's On Teaching Mathematics where he stated this view, but is there any piece of writing where ...
2
votes
1answer
179 views
Are there any mathematicians who expressed non-obvious sets of rules on how to do research?
I recently saw a paper where there are presented some rules on how to learn mathematics (and do research) which were firstly articulated by Lagrange.
Are there any similar rules that were expressed ...
5
votes
1answer
90 views
What were Riemann's “semi-physical” methods?
In John Von Neumann's The Mathematician one can read that
[$\dots$] even after the reign of rigour was essentially re-established with Cauchy, a very peculiar relapse into semi-physical methods took ...
3
votes
1answer
127 views
Mr. Newton at the Royal Mint
I would like to ask how Isaac Newton specifically applied mathematics to reducing forgeries and improving coinage while he was Master of the Royal Mint.
Thank you.
1
vote
2answers
104 views
Was Giuseppe Peano one of the greatest mathematicians of his era? [closed]
Besides the Peano axioms which perhaps brought him fame but which are considered a refinement of similar previous axioms Peano seems to have done relatively little original work.
Does the rest of his ...
12
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0answers
271 views
Who was that forgetful mathematician?
Who was the (Japanese?) mathematician who said in a lecture that a certain conjecture still remained to be proved, and one of the students present told him that he (the mathematician) had already ...
8
votes
2answers
1k views
Where did Leibniz explore the product rule of differential calculus?
In what book/letter did Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz explore the product rule as part of differential calculus?
1
vote
1answer
154 views
How did the Vietnamese manage set up the Vietnamese Mathematical Society during the Vietnam War?
The Vietnamese Mathematical Society was set up in 1965 by Le Van Thiem and Hoang Tuy. Both had studied in Europe, the former in Paris and Germany and the latter in Moscow. By 1965, the Vietnam War, ...
