Abel's Proof

An Essay on the Sources and Meaning of Mathematical Unsolvability

By:

Peter Pesic

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Paperback / softback

Series:

The MIT Press

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Description

In 1824 a young Norwegian named Niels Henrik Abel proved conclusively that algebraic equations of the fifth order are not solvable in radicals. In this book Peter Pesic shows what an important event this was in the history of thought. He also presents it as a remarkable human story. Abel was twenty-one when he self-published his proof, and he died five years later, poor and depressed, just before the proof started to receive wide acclaim. Abel's attempts to reach out to the mathematical elite of the day had been spurned, and he was unable to find a position that would allow him to work in peace and marry his fiancee. But Pesic's story begins long before Abel and continues to the present day, for Abel's proof changed how we think about mathematics and its relation to the "real" world. Starting with the Greeks, who invented the idea of mathematical proof, Pesic shows how mathematics found its sources in the real world (the shapes of things, the accounting needs of merchants) and then reached beyond those sources toward something more universal. The Pythagoreans' attempts to deal with irrational numbers foreshadowed the slow emergence of abstract mathematics.

Author Biography:

Peter Pesic, writer, pianist, and scholar, is Director of the Science Institute and Musician-in-Residence at St. John's College, Santa Fe. He is the author of Abel's Proof- An Essay on the Sources and Meaning of Mathematical Unsolvability; Seeing Double- Shared Identities in Physics, Philosophy, and Literature; Sky in a Bottle; and Music and the Making of Modern Science, all published by the MIT Press.

Release date Australia

February 27th, 2004

Author

Peter Pesic

Audience

Professional & Vocational

Illustrations

46 illus.; 46 Illustrations, unspecified

Pages

222

Series

The MIT Press

Dimensions

137x203x13

ISBN-13

9780262661829

Product ID

3244601

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