Mathematicians Of The Day

21st September



On this day in 1908 Hermann Minkowski began his famous lecture at the University of Cologne with these words:-
The views of space and time which I wish to lay before you have sprung from the soil of experimental physics, and therein lies their strength. They are radical. Henceforth space by itself, and time by itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality.
A (personally designed) stamp of one of today's mathematicians is at THIS LINK.

Click on for a poster.


Quotation of the day

From Girolamo Cardano
Since this art surpasses all human subtelty and the perspecuity of mortal talent and is truly a celestial gift and a very clear test of the capacity of man's minds, whoever applies himself to it will believe that there is nothing that he cannot understand.
Artis Magnae, sive de Regulis Algebraicis (1545)