Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World

Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World PDF Author: Karine Chemla
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108880932
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This is the first book-length analysis of the techniques and procedures of ancient mathematical commentaries. It focuses on examples in Chinese, Sanskrit, Akkadian and Sumerian, and Ancient Greek, presenting the general issues by constant detailed reference to these commentaries, of which substantial extracts are included in the original languages and in translation, sometimes for the first time. This makes the issues accessible to readers without specialized training in mathematics or in the languages involved. The result is a much richer understanding than was hitherto possible of the crucial role of commentaries in the history of mathematics in four different linguistic areas, of the nature of mathematical commentaries in general, of the contribution that the study of mathematical commentaries can make to the history of science and to the study of commentaries in general, and of the ways in which mathematical commentaries are like and unlike other kinds of commentaries.

Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World

Mathematical Commentaries in the Ancient World PDF Author: Karine Chemla
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108839576
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 475

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Book Description
Comparative analysis of the techniques and procedures of important mathematical commentaries in five ancient cultures from China to Greece.

Cultures of Computation and Quantification in the Ancient World

Cultures of Computation and Quantification in the Ancient World PDF Author: Karine Chemla
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030983617
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 764

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Book Description
This book sheds light on the variety of mathematical cultures in general. To do so, it concentrates on cultures of computation and quantification in the ancient world, mainly in ancient China, South Asia, and the Ancient Near East and offers case studies focused on numbers, quantities, and operations, in particular in relation to mathematics as well as administrative and economic activities. The various chapters focus on the different ways and contexts of shaping numbers and quantities, and on the procedures applied to them. The book places special emphasis on the processes of emergence of place-value number systems, evidenced in the three geographical areas under study All these features yield essential elements that will enable historians of mathematics to further capture the diversity of computation practices in their contexts, whereas previous historical approaches have tended to emphasize elements that displayed uniformity within “civilizational” blocks. The book includes editions and translations of texts, some of them published here for the first time, maps, and conventions for editions of ancient texts. It thereby offers primary sources and methodological tools for teaching and learning. The volume is aimed at historians and philosophers of science and mathematics, historians of the ancient worlds, historians of economics, sinologists, indologists, assyriologists, as well as undergraduate, graduate students and teachers in mathematics, the history and philosophy of science and mathematics, and in the history of ancient worlds.

The History of Mathematical Proof in Ancient Traditions

The History of Mathematical Proof in Ancient Traditions PDF Author: Karine Chemla
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139510584
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 522

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Book Description
This radical, profoundly scholarly book explores the purposes and nature of proof in a range of historical settings. It overturns the view that the first mathematical proofs were in Greek geometry and rested on the logical insights of Aristotle by showing how much of that view is an artefact of nineteenth-century historical scholarship. It documents the existence of proofs in ancient mathematical writings about numbers and shows that practitioners of mathematics in Mesopotamian, Chinese and Indian cultures knew how to prove the correctness of algorithms, which are much more prominent outside the limited range of surviving classical Greek texts that historians have taken as the paradigm of ancient mathematics. It opens the way to providing the first comprehensive, textually based history of proof.

Monographs in Tang Official Historiography

Monographs in Tang Official Historiography PDF Author: Daniel Patrick Morgan
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030180387
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
This book examines the role of medieval authors in writing the history of ancient science. It features essays that explore the content, structure, and ideas behind technical writings on medieval Chinese state history. In particular, it looks at the Ten Treatises of the current History of Sui, which provide insights into the writing on the history of such fields as astronomy, astrology, omenology, economics, law, geography, metrology, and library science. Three treatises are known to have been written by Li Chunfeng, one of the most important mathematicians, astronomers, and astrologers in Chinese history. The book not only opens a new window on the figure of Li Chunfeng by exploring what his writings as a historian of science tell us about him as a scientist and vice versa, it also discusses how and on what basis the individual treatises were written. The essays address such themes as (1) the recycling of sources and the question of reliability and objectivity in premodern history-writing; (2) the tug of war between conservatism and innovation; (3) the imposition of the author’s voice, worldview, and personal and professional history in writing a history of a field of technical expertise in a state history; (4) the degree to which modern historians are compelled to speak to their own milieu and ideological beliefs.

Euclid's Elements

Euclid's Elements PDF Author: Euclid
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 544

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Book Description
"The book includes introductions, terminology and biographical notes, bibliography, and an index and glossary" --from book jacket.

Manuscripts and Performances in Religions, Arts, and Sciences

Manuscripts and Performances in Religions, Arts, and Sciences PDF Author: Antonella Brita, Janina Karolewski, Matthieu Husson, Laure Miolo, Hanna Wimmer
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 311134388X
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 507

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Book Description


The Hydraulic State

The Hydraulic State PDF Author: Charles R. Ortloff
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000088235
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 415

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Book Description
The Hydraulic State explores the hydraulic engineering technology underlying water system constructions of many of the ancient World Heritage sites in South America, the Middle East and Asia as used in their urban and agricultural water supply systems. Using a range of methods and techniques, some new to archaeology, Ortloff analyzes various ancient water systems such as agricultural field system designs known in ancient Peruvian and Bolivian Andean societies, water management at Nabataean Petra, the Roman Pont du Garde water distribution castellum, the Minoan site of Knossos and the water systems of dynastic (and modern) China, particularly the Grand Canal and early water systems designed to control flood episodes. In doing so the book greatly increases our understanding of the hydraulic/hydrological engineering of ancient societies through the application of Complexity Theory, Similitude Theory and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis, as well as traditional archaeological analysis methods. Serving to highlight the engineering science behind water structures of the ancient World Heritage sites discussed, this book will be of interest to archaeologists working on landscape archaeology, urbanism, agriculture and water management.

Shaping the Sciences of the Ancient and Medieval World

Shaping the Sciences of the Ancient and Medieval World PDF Author: Agathe Keller
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031496175
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 582

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Book Description


Greek Mathematical Thought and the Origin of Algebra

Greek Mathematical Thought and the Origin of Algebra PDF Author: Jacob Klein
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 0486319814
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
Important study focuses on the revival and assimilation of ancient Greek mathematics in the 13th-16th centuries, via Arabic science, and the 16th-century development of symbolic algebra. 1968 edition. Bibliography.

The Shaping of Deduction in Greek Mathematics

The Shaping of Deduction in Greek Mathematics PDF Author: Reviel Netz
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521541206
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
The aim of this book is to explain the shape of Greek mathematical thinking. It can be read on three levels: as a description of the practices of Greek mathematics; as a theory of the emergence of the deductive method; and as a case-study for a general view on the history of science. The starting point for the enquiry is geometry and the lettered diagram. Reviel Netz exploits the mathematicians' practices in the construction and lettering of their diagrams, and the continuing interaction between text and diagram in their proofs, to illuminate the underlying cognitive processes. A close examination of the mathematical use of language follows, especially mathematicians' use of repeated formulae. Two crucial chapters set out to show how mathematical proofs are structured and explain why Greek mathematical practice manages to be so satisfactory. A final chapter looks into the broader historical setting of Greek mathematical practice.