Table of Contents

Preface; 1. The Ancient Greeks; 2. Zeno's Paradox and the concept of limit; 3. The mystical mathematics of Hypatia; 4. The Islamic world and the development of algebra; 5. Cardano, Abel, Galois, and the solving of equations; 6. Rene Descartes and the idea of coordinates; 7. The invention of differential calculus; 8. The great Isaac Newton; 9. Complex numbers and polynomials; 10. The prince of mathematics; 11. Sophie Germain and Fermat's Problem; 12. Cauchy and the foundations of analysis; 13. The prime numbers; 14. Dirichlet and how to count; 15. Riemann and the geometry of surfaces; 16. Georg Cantor and the orders of infinity; 17. The natural numbers; 18. Henri Poincaré, child phenomenon; 19. Sonya Kovalevskaya and mechanics; 20. Emmy Noether and algebra; 21. Methods of proof; 22. Alan Turing and cryptography; Bibliography; Index.

Promotional Information

A series of snapshots of the history of mathematics from ancient times to the twentieth century.

About the Author

Steven G. Krantz received his BA from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and his Ph.D. from Princeton University. He has taught at UCLA, Princeton University, Penn State University, and Washington University in St Louis. He has directed 17 Ph.D. theses, authored over 50 books, and over 150 scholarly papers. He has served on several editorial boards, and is Editor-in-Chief of three journals. Krantz is the holder of the Chauvenet Prize, the Beckenbach Book Award, and the Kemper Foundation Award.

Reviews

This important work is not as detailed as Howard Eves's An Introduction to the History of Mathematics, but it is more manageable and better suited to teaching the subject. Krantz selects key eras and topics to illustrate how mathematics in the Western world evolved from the ancient Greeks to the early modern era...The carefully written work contains numerous examples, an excellent selection of problems and projects, and an extensive bibliography. Useful for history of mathematics or senior capstone courses. Highly recommended."" - R.L. Pour for CHOICE Magazine

""This is a remarkable book. It is exactly what the title promises it to be. It is a history of mathematics that teaches the student what mathematics is about through problem solving. Through biographical data and anecdotes the reader gets a feeling for the historical dimension of mathematics while at the same time the well chosen subjects and the exercises bring across the exciting character of mathematics and its development. Excellent stuff for undergraduate students and future teachers."" - Teun Koetsier for Zentrallblatt