History and Culture
History of mathematics and cultural connections
2022 Fields Medals: some lovely surprises
The Fields Medals, awarded every four years, were announced in early July! France can take pride in a new triumph with Hugo Duminil-Copin. For the second time, a woman, Maryna Viazovska, has been honored. British mathematician James Maynard and American–South Korean June Huh round out this year's medalists.
Van der Waerden's conjecture solved | Tangente
Manjul Bhargava, a mathematician of Indian origin who was born in Canada in 1974 and is now a professor at Princeton University in the United States, has just proved van der Waerden's conjecture.
Marie Lhuissier awarded the d'Alembert Prize | Tangente
Marie Lhuissier is the 2022 winner of the Société mathématique de France's d'Alembert Prize.
A short mathematical history of the game of go
Both millennia-old, as a game and as a science, go and mathematics are two worlds of phenomenal depth that intertwine, enrich each other, and shed light on one another. Go constantly draws on various forms of mathematics, to the point of becoming a research subject in its own right.
Tangente Awards 2022: take part | Tangente
As usual, the Club Tangente is delighted to invite you to take part in several awards. Whether or not you read Tangente, there is bound to be a category that sparks your interest.
A tribute to Gérard Cohen-Zardi | Tangente
Sad news. A few days after André Antibi, another friend of Tangente has passed away. Gérard Cohen-Zardi, who taught mathematics at the Université de Jussieu, was passionate about popularizing mathematics and exploring its links with other disciplines.
A delightful conjecture by Paul Erdős…
The convergence of certain series is a classic topic in analysis (see Suites et Séries, Bibliothèque Tangente 41, 2011). For example, it is fairly easy to prove that the harmonic series—the sum of the reciprocals of the positive integers—diverges.
André Antibi: A tribute to an educator | Tangente
Holding two doctoral degrees, André Antibi was professor emeritus at Université Toulouse-III-Paul-Sabatier and Sup-Aéro. He became best known for his original ideas on mathematics education, but his work ranged far more widely.
Bertrand Russell: A century of passionate living | Tangente
Bertrand Russell was no ordinary mathematician. His Nobel Prize in Literature attests to the breadth of his talents. His advocacy of sexual freedom and his campaigning for peace gave this exceptional man his full stature.
A genius off the beaten track
In the scientific world, Bertrand Russell is known first and foremost as a logician and philosopher. His contribution cannot be understood without grasping the major shift then taking place in the development of mathematics: this was the era of the "foundational crisis."
Alfred Whitehead, Russell's collaborator | Tangente
Russell's fame has overshadowed Whitehead's immense contribution to the development of logicist theories. The two men wrote the Principia Mathematica together.
From intuition to rigor
In Euclid’s geometry, a line already divided the plane into two distinct regions, but negative lengths were not accepted. How can the algebraic notions of direction and measurement be brought into geometry?
Russell: logic, faith and reason | Tangente
A free thinker, Bertrand Russell made no secret of his agnosticism and did not hesitate to criticize religion. He deplored the fact that people's reasons for embracing faith had little to do with rational argument. In his view, hatred of reason seems to be a constant throughout human history.
Wittgenstein and Russell at Cambridge | Tangente
Born in Vienna in 1889, Ludwig Wittgenstein began studying mechanical engineering in 1906. Drawn to mathematics, he initially explored its applications before becoming fascinated by Russell's writings.
A mathematical critique of liberalism | Tangente
In our "modern" and "civilized" societies, some workers are overwhelmed with work while a whole section of the population is shut out of employment. Is this situation inevitable? Bertrand Russell dismantled certain dogmas of economic liberalism point by point and showed that other models of society are possible.
Bertrand Russell's politically engaged writings | Tangente
Bertrand Russell's literary writings range widely; they are tinged with philosophy, politics, and sociology. What unites them is that they all have a message to convey.
A graphic novel on the foundational crisis | Tangente
Logicomix is a graphic novel centered on Bertrand Russell.
Bertrand Russell: a man of letters and numbers | Tangente
At 78, too old for a Fields Medal, and with no prize specifically devoted to philosophy, the mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell was awarded the 1950 Nobel Prize in Literature, much to his surprise.
The Möbius strip in art | Tangente
The legendary Möbius strip—a two-dimensional, non-orientable surface with only one side, easily made from a strip of paper—has inspired several artists.
Hilbert's thirteenth problem
At the second Congress of Mathematicians, held in Paris in the summer of 1900, David Hilbert presented a list of research questions that he considered important. The list contains twenty-three problems spanning every field: algebra, geometry and analysis.