Philosophy And Fun Of Algebra
| Date: 27 April 2011, 10:21
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Table of Contents: 1. From Arithmetic To Algebra2. The Making Of Algebras3. Simultaneous Problems4. Partial Solutions And The Provisional Elimination Of Elements Of Complexity5. Mathematical Certainty And Reductio Ad Absurdum6. The First Hebrew Algebra7. How To Choose Our Hypotheses8. The Limits Of The Teacher's Function9. The Use Of Sewing Cards10. The Story Of A Working Hypothesis11. Macbeth's Mistake12. Jacob's Ladder13. The Great X Of The World14. Go Out Of My Class-Room15. Philosophy And Fun Of Algebra16. Infinity17. From Bondage To Freedom Appendix *** a selection from: CHAPTER XIII THE GREAT X OF THE WORLD A great question which people like to quarrel about is: Who or What made things be as they are? As soon as people grew clever enough to think about anything except scrambling for food and taking care of their own babies, they began quarrelling about Who or What made things be. Nobody knew anything about it; and most people had a great deal to say about it. Moses saw that there was no hope of getting a country orderly while all this confusion was going on; so he said to the Hebrews," I must not allow all this confusion to go on among a people that I am made responsible for. None of us have ever seen the Maker of things. We can see the things growing, but not the force that makes them. That is our X; our Unknown. We are going to begin by stating that we don't know. We are going to call the Maker of things I Am, or 'That which is, whatever it is'; and we are going to make two hypotheses to start with. We are going to try thinking of I Am' as Unity; one, and not several or a fraction. We will also try thinking of I Am as No-Thing, we are not going to suppose at present that any particular kind of thing made the rest; we will suppose that I Am' is not a thing. When we find that any particular proceeding or behaviour destroys men, or makes them too sickly or weak or stupid or quarrelsome to manage other creatures and keep the upper hand of the world, we will say, for short, that I Am' does not like or does not intend the people of Israel to go on with that kind of proceeding or behaviour. "Now these two hypotheses are as much as we can deal with for the present. Anybody who wants to think out other hypotheses than those will have to think to himself, or go out of the country that I am to manage.
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