Assignments for Week 3/4

R = Readings ._._. W = Writings

  1. (R) In our online textbook read the Early Period part of the chapter on Greece, and the relevant part of "Background readings from the Internet" (especially "Trisectrix animation", and also the "How do we know ..." pages). Also read my "lecture" for the week (when available).

  2. (RW) STANDING ASSIGNMENT EVERY WEEK: Read the parts (if any) of your "general history" book corresponding to this week's material. You are encouraged to mail in ("report to the class") anything interesting or important that you found in your reading that's not in the online material.

  3. (W) (For Friday, Sept. 26) From the exercises on Early Greek mathematics:

  4. (W) Two essay questions (also due 9/26):
    1. Explain Iaglom's dictum (quoted by both Allen and Panchenko), "In practical mathematics there can exist no irrational numbers." Could one reasonably argue the contrary position?
    2. Although often regarded as the beginnings of science as we know it, the pronouncements of the early Greek thinkers sometimes strike us as weird or meaningless. Pick one figure from this period (not Thales, since Panchenko has already covered him thoroughly) and discuss in a paragraph or two (1) in what respects (if any) his ideas (mathematics, science, philosophy) represent a qualitative advance over what the Egyptian and Babylonian cultures apparently had to offer; (2) what aspects of his work would be rejected today as unscientific. (In the second part, concentrate on basic methodological or conceptual issues, not factual errors (like the size of the sun) that have been superseded by modern data.)