Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Mathematics is the language of nature, and is the primary conceptual structure we would have in common with extraterrestrial aliens, if any such there be. Mathematical proof is the gateway to a realm of transcendent truth. Reasoning is logic, and logic is essentially mathematical. Hence mathematics structures all possible reasoning.
It created mathematical proof for the Pythagorean theorem, [111] and a mathematical formula for Gaussian elimination. [112] The treatise also provides values of π , [ 106 ] which Chinese mathematicians originally approximated as 3 until Liu Xin (d. 23 AD) provided a figure of 3.1457 and subsequently Zhang Heng (78–139) approximated pi as 3. ...
The expression "mathematical proof" is used by lay people to refer to using mathematical methods or arguing with mathematical objects, such as numbers, to demonstrate something about everyday life, or when data used in an argument is numerical. It is sometimes also used to mean a "statistical proof" (below), especially when used to argue from data.
[8] [9] Islamic mathematics, in turn, developed and expanded the mathematics known to these civilizations. [10] Contemporaneous with but independent of these traditions were the mathematics developed by the Maya civilization of Mexico and Central America, where the concept of zero was given a standard symbol in Maya numerals.
Philosophy of mathematics is the branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of mathematics and its relationship to other areas of philosophy, particularly epistemology and metaphysics. Central questions posed include whether or not mathematical objects are purely abstract entities or are in some way concrete, and in what the relationship ...
The independence of the mathematical objects is such that they are non physical and do not exist in space or time. Neither does their existence rely on thought or language. For this reason, mathematical proofs are discovered, not invented. The proof existed before its discovery, and merely became known to the one who discovered it. [13]
For example, when mere scalars proved awkward for understanding forces, first vectors, then tensors, were invented. 3. Mathematics addresses only a part of human experience. Much of human experience does not fall under science or mathematics but under the philosophy of value, including ethics, aesthetics, and political philosophy. To assert ...
God Created the Integers: The Mathematical Breakthroughs That Changed History is a 2005 anthology, edited by Stephen Hawking, of "excerpts from thirty-one of the most important works in the history of mathematics." [1]