清华科史哲讲座第102讲预告：Victor J. Katz，“Musings on Greek Mathematics”

讲座摘要

Recently Clemency Montelle and I completed work on a new Sourcebook in Greek Mathematics.  We made great attempts to broaden the definition of Greek mathematics well beyond the normal main characters of Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonius, although, of course, we had to include much material from these authors.  But there was more to Greek mathematics than wonderful theorems proved by logical deduction from explicit axioms and definitions.  First, when Greek civilization spread over the entire Eastern Mediterranean through the conquests of Alexander the Great, the Greeks encountered other peoples who also studied mathematics.  And once the Roman Empire took over this entire region, mathematics continued to be taught and learned, although often not in the Greek language or in the formal Greek manner.  In this talk, I will discuss various pieces of mathematics that were not part of formal Greek mathematics but were in fact written about and taught to students in the Eastern Mediterranean region during the period of strongest Greek cultural influence, from approximately 400BCE to 600CE.

主讲人简介

Victor J. Katz received his PhD from Brandeis University in 1968 and was Professor of Mathematics at the University of the District of Columbia until 2005.  His primary professional interest has been in how to use the history of mathematics in the teaching of mathematics.  In the 1990s, he led three projects designed to help both university and secondary teachers use this history in their classrooms. His textbook, The History of Mathematics: An Introduction, now in its fourth edition, has been translated into Chinese, among other languages.  He edited three sourcebooks, on mathematics in Egypt, Mesopotamia, China, India, and eastern Islam, on medieval mathematics in Europe and North Africa, and on Greek mathematics. He was the founding editor of Convergence, the journal of the Mathematical Association of America on the history of mathematics and its use in teaching. In 2023 he received the Gung and Hu Award of the MAA for Distinguished Service to Mathematics.