Recently I have enjoyed browsing a voluminous online 19th century Science-Poetry collection (Watchers of the Moon) hosted by MIT, gathered and edited by Norman Hugh Redington and Karen Rae Keck. Google led me to the site in a search for " poetry of calculus" and I found there found a fascinating item by J. M. Child:
The Cal-Dif-Fluk Saga (from The Monist: A Quarterly Magazine Devoted to the Philosophy of Science -- Open Court Publishing, 1917) and described as "a pseudo-epic about the invention of calculus."
Child was a translator (from Latin into English) of the works of Isaac Barrow and Gottfried Leibniz and his poem presents the names of well-known mathematicians in clever scrambles: Isa-Tonu is Newton, Zin-Bli is Leibniz, Isa-Roba is Barrow, Gen-Tan-Agg stands for Barrow's Gen-eral method of Tan-gents and of Agg-regates while Shun-Fluk and Cal-Dof refer to the methods of Newton and Leibniz. One may, with a fair amount of work, enjoy this dramatization of warriors and weapons -- battles that were part of the development of calculus. Here from the middle of the Saga (from Section 6 (of 17)), is a sample of Child's lines illustrating the struggles that calculus required.
Showing posts with label Karen Rae Keck. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Karen Rae Keck. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
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