Mathematicians Of The Day

15th April



On this day in 1831 Gauss introduces the term "complex" for a + bi. Most of the 17th and 18th century writers spoke of a + bi as an imaginary quantity. Gauss saw the desirability of having different names for ai and a + bi, so he gave to the latter the Latin expression numeros integros complexos.
See THIS LINK.

On this day in 2013 Google released an Euler doodle.

The postage stamp of one of today's mathematicians at THIS LINK was issued in 1938.

Click on for a poster.


Quotation of the day

From Leonhard Euler
Mathematicians have tried in vain to this day to discover some order in the sequence of prime numbers, and we have reason to believe that it is a mystery into which the human mind will never penetrate.
Quoted in G Simmons Calculus Gems (New York 1992).