The Best of All Possible Worlds: Mathematics and Destiny
Optimists believe this is the best of all possible worlds. And pessimists fear that might really be the case. But what is the best of all possible worlds? How do we define it? Is it the world that operates the most efficiently? Or the one in which most people are comfortable and content?
"In his Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics, Wittgenstein claims, puzzlingly, that ‘the proof creates a new concept’ (RFM III-41). This paper aims to contribute to clarifying this idea, and to showing how it marks a major break with the traditional conception of proof."
Omar Khayyam Persian mathematician, astronomer, and poet died #OTD in 1131. As a mathematician, he is most notable for his work on the classification and solution of cubic equations, where he provided geometric solutions by the intersection of conics. As an astronomer, he calculated the duration of the solar year and designed the Jalali calendar. via @wikipedia
Russian mathematician and geometer Nikolai Lobachevsky was born #OTD in 1792.
He is known primarily for his work on hyperbolic geometry, otherwise known as Lobachevskian geometry, and also for his fundamental study on Dirichlet integrals, known as the Lobachevsky integral formula.
Another of his achievements was developing a method for the approximation of the roots of algebraic equations (Lobachevsky method). via @wikipedia
"Abraham de Moivre (born May 26, 1667, Vitry, Fr.—died Nov. 27, 1754, London) French mathematician who was a pioneer in the development of analytic trigonometry and in the theory of probability"
Prime Numbers: The Most Mysterious Figures in Math
A fascinating journey into the mind-bending world of prime numbers.
Mathematicians have been asking questions about prime numbers for more than twenty-five centuries, and every answer seems to generate a new rash of questions.
I find myself not understanding the concept of atheism. Who wants to explain it to me in a coherent way for a beginner? With a metaphysical substantiation please, if that is at all possible.
>I'm trying to figure out how the atheist defines god.
So damn easy. It is this: there is no such thing as "god", & all organised religions are unmitigated bullshit. All there is in the universe is #science & #mathematics; everything flows from these.
Nancy Gradwell, left, and Bradley Johnson, 8th graders at Philadelphia's Wagner Jr High, listen intently as Mrs, Phyllis Eggleston,
mathematics teacher, explains how to use an IBM 1050 terminal to help solve homework problems, 1966.
"After introducing plural logic and its main applications, the book provides a systematic analysis of the relation between this logic and other theoretical frameworks such as set theory, mereology, higher-order logic, and modal logic."