Delta-K
Journal of the Mathematics Council of the Alberta Teachers’ Association
Volume 54 Issue 1, June 2017
4 to 6
History of Mathematics and the Forgotten Century
Glen Van Brummelen
The history of mathematics is being reinvented. Over the past few decades, we have started to realize how delicate a matter it is to portray historical mathematics without distorting it with our modem viewpoints, especially if the subject is centuries old. For instance, we are now careful to avoid expressing , say, Elements 11.4: ” If a straight line be cut at random, the square on the whole is equal to the squares on the segments and twice the rectangle contained by the segments.” as its algebraic equivalent, (a+ h)2 = a2 + b2 + 2ab . This repre sentation changes the impact the theorem would have had on Euclid ‘s audience, in this case obscuring its applications to irrational magnitudes and conic sections . This new sensitivity is a good thing. History isn’t about translating ancient accomplishments into modem equivalents; it’s about understanding how other communities and cultures thought differently from ours.
