James Joseph Sylvester: Life and Work in Letters
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Product details:
- Publisher OUP Oxford
- Date of Publication 1 October 1998
- ISBN 9780198503910
- Binding Hardback
- No. of pages340 pages
- Size 243x163x23 mm
- Weight 678 g
- Language English 0
Categories
Short description:
James Joseph Sylvester (1814-1897) was one of the great characters of British and American science of the last century. As a Jew he was barred from the upper echelons of British life and academia, but in America he was a hugely influential figure. He was a founding father of the American Mathematical Society, and established a blueprint for mathematics education in American universities. This book brings together for the first time 140 letters from his correspondence in an attempt to separate the fact from the many myths surrounding his life and work. It provides - through the letters and through detailed mathematical and historical commentary - new insights into Sylvester the man and the mathematician as well as into the development of the technical and social structures of mathematics and 19th century society.
MoreLong description:
In the folklore of mathematics, James Joseph Sylvester (1814-1897) is the eccentric, hot-tempered, sword-cane-wielding, nineteenth-century British Jew who, together with the taciturn Arthur Cayley, developed a theory and language of invariants that then died spectacularly in the 1890s as a result of David Hilbert's groundbreaking, `modern' techniques. This, like all folklore, has some grounding in fact but owes much to fiction. The present volume brings together for the first time 140 letters from Sylvester's correspondence in an effort to establish the true picture. It reveals - through the letters as well as through the detailed mathematical and historical commentary accompanying them - Sylvester the friend, man of principle, mathematician, poet, professor, scientific activist, social observer, traveller. It also provides a detailed look at Sylvester's thoughts and thought processes as it shows him acting in both personal and professional spheres over the course of his eighty-two year life. The Sylvester who emerges from this analysis - unlike the Sylvester of the folkloric caricature - offers deep insight into the development of the technical and social structures of mathematics.
'Professor Parshall has made it her buisiness to follow Sylvester down the years in all contries he visited and she has presented us with a vivid picture of the man.She has gone beyond the myth and beyond Bell's indelible journalism and has consolidated and updated R.C Archibald's pioneering work. Sylvester's blood courses through his veins as we witness those years of intense creativity.Mathematicians will appreciate the clear exposition of mathematics of time..The ample footnotes are exceptionally well researched and informative. This book will be most widely read by mathematicians but will also be invaluable to those interested in the social history of Britain and its European connections' The Mathematical Gazette
Table of Contents:
Negotiating 'the world's slippery path'
Laying the foundation of a theory of invariants
Battling the authorities and the muses
Ending and beginning a career
'Moulding the mathematical education of 55 million' Americans
Returning home
