HISTORY OF MATHEMATICS
From:(Michael A. Stueben)
In the interest of historical accuracy let it be known
Fibonacci's daughter was not named "Bunny."
Michael Rolle was not Danish, and did not call his
William Horner was not called "Little-Jack" by his
The "G" in G. Peano does not stand for "grand."
Rene Descartes' middle name is not "push."
Isaac Barrow's middle name is not "wheel."
There is no such place as the University of Wis-cosine,
and if there was, the motto of their mathematics
department would not be "Secant ye shall find."
Although Euler is pronounced oil-er, it does not follow
that Euclid is pronounced oi-clid.
Franklin D. Roosevelt never said "The only thing we
have to sphere is sphere itself."
Fibonacci is not a shortened form of the Italian name
that is actually spelled: F i bb ooo nnnnn aaaaaaaa
It is true that August Mobius was a difficult and
opinionated man. But he was not so rigid that he could
only see one side to every question.
It is true that Johannes Kepler had an uphill struggle
in explaining his theory of elliptical orbits to the
other astronomers of his time. And it is also true
that his first attempt was a failure. But it is not
true that after his lecture the first three questions
he was asked were "What is elliptical?" What is an
orbit?" and "What is a planet?
It is true that primitive societies use only rough
approximations for the known constants of mathematics.
For example, the northern tribes of Alaska consider
the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a
circle to be 3. But it is not true that the value of 3
is called Eskimo pi. Incidentally, the survival of
these tribes is dependent upon government assistance,
which is not always forthcoming. For example, the
Canadian firm of Tait and Sons sold a stock of
defective compasses to the government at half-price,
and the government passed them onto the northern
natives. Hence the saying among these peoples:
"He who has a Tait's is lost."