History and Culture
History of mathematics and cultural connections
Pythagoras: much more than a theorem
Pythagoras is more than the name of a famous theorem: he inspired an entire philosophical tradition that would influence not only mathematics and astronomy but music itself. Beyond the sciences, history has not heard the last of the "long-haired Samian"!
Yves Bonnefoy: poetry and mathematics | Tangente
On July 2, 2016, at the opening of the second Nuit des maths in Tours (Indre-et-Loire), university president Jean-Jacques Nattiez paid tribute to Yves Bonnefoy, the poet, translator and art critic who had died the previous day.
Yoccoz: thirty years in dynamical systems | Tangente
The French mathematician Jean-Christophe Yoccoz died on September 3; he was 59.
Roger Godement: an extraordinary mathematician | Tangente
Who has not had Roger Godement's monumental Cours d'algèbre on their shelves—the textbook that introduced generations of budding mathematicians to linear algebra and undoubtedly taught them to love it?
The "happy ending" problem
In 1933, Hungarian mathematician Eszter Klein posed an apparently elementary geometry problem to a group of young colleagues. It would lead to the birth of a new field of mathematics, discrete geometry, and... a marriage.
Solar System stability: the KAM theorem | Tangente
Jürgen Moser belongs to the long line of mathematicians who have tackled the problem of the Solar System's stability. He is the "M" in the KAM theorem's trinity—Kolmogorov, Arnold and Moser—which links number theory and celestial mechanics.
Celebrating mathematical literature | Tangente
As has become tradition, Tangente readers are invited to vote from July until the end of September to select the nominees for the Tangente Book Prize, from whom the jury will choose the 2016 winner. The inaugural Tangente High School Students' Prize will be announced at the same time.
Shadows revealed: mathematics and vision | Tangente
As summer begins and temperatures soar, we all seek out a little spot sheltered from the sun. Let us not forget that drawing shadows is where perspective begins! Seeing an object's shadow already means recognizing it to some extent—and therefore knowing how to draw it in 3D.
François Morellet: geometry staged | Tangente
How many times, in these pages, have we mentioned the works of François Morellet, this artist possessed by geometry...
André Warusfel: popularizer and educator | Tangente
André Warusfel, who passed away on 6 June 2016 at the age of 80, was active across every facet of mathematics over the course of his fifty-year career.
Plaque in memory of Évariste Galois in Paris | Tangente
Passersby on the rue des Bernardins will now be able to pause and wonder at this plaque, which was missing from the capital.
Rademacher's error on the Riemann hypothesis | Tangente
The German-born mathematician Hans Adolph Rademacher (1892-1969), a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, was a giant of number theory.
Babies love numbers too: an innate number sense | Tangente
"At three days old, babies are sensitive to a ratio of 3 to 1. They can tell 3 and 9 apart, 4 and 12. At six months, it's 2 to 1. At nine months, 3 to 12."
A sculptor of polyhedra in Paris: art & geometry | Tangente
In the "Village Saint-Paul" in Paris is a shop called Cabinet de curiosités géométriques, where numerous polyhedra pile up. Our editorial team got in touch with its owner, Sylvain Calvier.
The foundations of differential calculus: the 1700 quarrel | Tangente
A famous scientific quarrel over infinitesimals pitted Rolle against Varignon.
Euclid, master of division
With the Greek mathematicians—Euclid in particular—numbers moved from the concrete to the abstract. One key concept endured: Euclidean division and the host of developments it spawned. These methods have not aged a bit: Euclid's algorithm is still used today... by computer scientists!
Number theory in 2016: a wealth of news | Tangente
An unexpected bias in the distribution of prime numbers has just come to light. At the same time, Andrew Wiles receives the Abel Prize.
Porto: in Gomes Teixeira's footsteps | Tangente
When we think of Porto, we think of its wine, its river and bridges, or the much-missed filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira. We never think of its mathematician, Francisco Gomes Teixeira Costa! Let's revisit the Portuguese city by following in his footsteps.
The Liouville Journal: a key mathematics publication | Tangente
In 1832, the Annales de mathématiques pures et appliquées, better known as the Annales de Gergonne, ceased publication after twenty-two years.
Heine and the rigorous study of continuous functions | Tangente
Eduard Heine is not among the best-known mathematicians, even though his name is attached to a theorem on the uniform continuity of continuous functions on a closed interval.