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A carregar... Naming Infinity: A True Story of Religious Mysticism and Mathematical Creativity (Belknap Press) (original 2009; edição 2009)por Loren Graham (Autor), Jean-Michel Kantor (Autor)
Informação Sobre a ObraNaming Infinity: A True Story of Religious Mysticism and Mathematical Creativity por Loren R. Graham (2009)
A carregar...
Adira ao LibraryThing para descobrir se irá gostar deste livro. Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro. From at least the days of the ancient Greek philosophers, mathematical and philosophical inquiry has gone hand in hand, especially where the infinite is involved. And infinities have always involved paradox. For instance, Zeno gave us the example of a fast runner trying to catch a tortoise. First the runner gets halfway to the tortoise, then gets halfway from that point to the tortoise, and so on. The runner can never catch the tortoise because he must make an infinite number of these "half-steps" to get to the tortoise. And yet in real life, runners catch tortoises quite easily. Trying to understand the nature of reality is a major effort in mathematical research - and set theory was developed in part to try to answer these questions. Georg Cantor developed an approach to explore the nature of mathematical infinities that was extended by the French mathematical community, but the reality-based nature of the French approach to mathematics prevented them from getting to what we would consider modern set theory. The French approach to philosophical thinking in the late 19th and early 20th century also struggled with the nature of the infinite in consistent ways; is infinity an ideal or can an infinity be made actual? But in Moscow, a small group of young mathematicians discovered Cantor's work and came at it from an approach informed by their religious thinking. All were strongly aligned with the Russian Orthodox Church and a mystical approach known as "Name Worship" (sometimes even considered heretical by the church hierarchy). Name Worshipers recite prayers that recognize the names of God, and they consider that the prayers by naming God in some sense bring God into actuality. This difference in outlook from the French mathematical community led this group that became the Moscow School of Mathematics to develop descriptive set theory, an early version of modern set theory. Naming Infinity is a nicely done history of this process of mathematical research. The set theory and Cantor's approach to infinities is well described at a level appropriate for a general audience. But the majority of the book isn't about the math. It's about the people doing the math. These are some fascinating people who lived through some difficult times, especially after the Soviet Union was established and through Stalin's reign. It's the story of competition between mathematical communities, between individuals within the Moscow School and the Soviet system, even between the Soviet government and the Russian Orthodox Church. It's a short book - about 200 pages of text - but there's a great history in it. sem críticas | adicionar uma crítica
In 1913, Russian imperial marines stormed an Orthodox monastery at Mt. Athos, Greece to haul off monks engaged in a dangerously heretical practice known as Name Worshipping. Loren Graham and Jean-Michel Kantor take us on an exciting mathematical mystery tour as they unravel a bizarre tale of political struggles, psychological crises, sexual complexities, and ethical dilemmas. The men and women of the leading French and Russian mathematical schools are central characters in this absorbing tale that could not be told until now. Naming Infinity is a poignant human interest story that raises provocative questions about science and religion, intuition and creativity. Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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Google Books — A carregar... GénerosSistema Decimal de Melvil (DDC)510.947Natural sciences and mathematics Mathematics General Mathematics Biography And History EuropeClassificação da Biblioteca do Congresso dos EUA (LCC)AvaliaçãoMédia:
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De gruwelijkheden van het communisme komen er in voor, en hoe ieder van hun daar mee omgingen.
Enige minpunt vond ik het gebrek aan wiskundige formules. Ik kan me voorstellen dat veel redacteurs daar een streep doorzetten, maar in een boek over geschiedenis van wiskunde mag een formule niet ontbreken. ( )