Talk:Augustin-Louis Cauchy

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Can someone provide a correct pronunciation of "Cauchy"?

I think it should be something like "koh-shee".

The correct French pronunciation is like "koh-shee." The American bastardization version is like "Cushy." - K. Cauchy

Not sure about statement on complex numbers[edit]

The article claims that Cauchy "was the first to define complex numbers as pairs of real numbers". Is this misleading? I would like to see a reference, because David M. Burton, in his The History of Mathematics: An Introduction, p. 611, states that Karl Gauss used a geometric interpretation of complex numbers without discussion in his dissertation (1799), explained it to Bessel in a letter in 1811, and published it in 1831. Burton goes on to say that Gauss' representation was in terms of points in the plane. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Scorwin (talkcontribs) 20:34, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Besides, shouldn't consideration be given to Riemann and Weierstrass. Cauchy was the first of the three but not by much, but as distinguished a mathematician as Reinhold Remmert talks about the three different but equivalent approaches taken by the three and he gives due and equal respect to all three. Besides, the Cauchy-Riemann equations are named after two of these geniuses although the first appear in the work of d'Alembert. And Gauss was in possession of the Cauchy integral theorem by 1811. Honorary mention is also due to Jean-Robert Argand and Caspar Wessel. All the best (talk) 20:17, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Cauchy's talent is not nearly as rare as claims. Certainly, he is no match to either Euler, Gauss or Abel among many other mathematicians. Moreover, Cauchy's scientific integrity was and remains questionable, since no one is able to resolve this issue in his favor. Whoever thinks he is a genius better refrain from imposing own biased and faulty beliefs upon others. For fairness, one ought not forget the many dubious mistakes he made such as confusing continuity with uniform continuity. He criticized Euler's infinite summation but contemporary mathematics (and physics) has upheld Euler's point of view, unlike common textbooks in analysis. He vulgarly criticized Gauss for being thought "constipated" and was justly answered that "Cauchy suffers from thought diarrhea". Unlike Euler's, much his writings suffer from low quality. Apparently, he was overly concerned with raising his citation index, so he succeeded to be "most known and regarded" among lesser mathematicians. Certainly, "genius" is not the right word to summarize Cauchy, and one must not be guided by personal sympathies to Cauchy's monarchist and catholic ideology in order to exaggerate his modest scientific merits.Highness 06:13, 1 July 2016 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by J20160628 (talkcontribs)

i don't see any citations behind your claims, and it sure sounds personal. further, you're presumably criticising translations of Cauchy's writing, which was in french. your writing skills are hardly exemplary, yet you keep signing your posts with "highness" as if you're some sort of powerful being (weird).
@David Eppstein: yo dr eppstein can you check this guy out? he registers and first thing he does is bash Cauchy. i'm to revert his insertion again because he seems to have a vendetta. what's especially laughable is someone with poor english criticising a great mathematician whose works were in FRENCH, thus it immediately invalidates his claims about "poor writings" because the author doesn't understand what the point of translations are. just because Cauchy was controversial, it should not compromise his standing in field of mathematics. (talk) 17:35, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
So far there seems little need of action other than paying attention to J20160628's edits. I disagreed with one of them on Pell's equation, and the views above on Cauchy are idiosyncratic, but on the other hand I do agree with J20160628's removal of some WP:PEACOCK phrasing from this article (this edit and some earlier ones that this one redid). —David Eppstein (talk) 17:47, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
@David Eppstein: sure, it can be changed somewhat given that Cauchy wasn't the *only* one but i want to add that there is a "politics & religious beliefs" section for a reason; no one is saying Cauchy's career is without controversy. i don't see why this editor is taking it upon themselves to edit Cauchy's accomplishments so that it aligns with their view of his conduct. no one doubts he said mean things; you can deduce that from what's given in the "politics & religious beliefs" section. however, this site is not about reducing someone's place in history because of some insults. cauchy's temperament is quite accurately portrayed throughout this article, and the anecdotal evidence of his vulgarity provided by the author is unrelated to the edits he is making.
someone above stated that "Cauchy was first of the three, but not by much". are you familiar at all with what results were published in the documents that lead historians to conclude Cauchy was "first"? i would be open to altering this sentence if we can find out what exactly was published, as we could determine if those documents were lacking some major subtopic of complex analysis (thereby diminishing the term "single handedly developed complex analysis") (talk) 17:54, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
edit: saw your post on pell's equation and it's comedy lol. i felt the same way but i'm trying to look past it, and at the arguments. i feel i did exactly that. hahahhaha you're awesome.

* Comment: Not sure why this is an RFC. Nor what the ratty tone is all about. I checked the article (very superficially) and though I am not obsessive about citations, there is no doubt that it is under-cited, perhaps a bit POV, and not always "encyclopedically" phrased. But those are things that can be fixed with a bit of editing, tagging, or maybe supplying citations oneself, or correcting arguable points, urban legends, or exaggerations. If the guilty parties get snotty about it, then will be the time to start RFCs, call in admins etc. Meanwhile... JonRichfield (talk) 07:04, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

Many of them also resented his having earlier used the ultra-conservative political climate of the Restauration to advance his career?[edit]

This phrase was added without attribution in the recent edits. Since this amounts to a significant allegation, it should be presented as an allegation rather than fact. If included at all it should be properly sourced. Tkuvho (talk) 10:41, 30 March 2015 (UTC)


Hi main authors, the sentence "Cauchy had two brothers: ... who also wrote several mathematical works." appears twice in the article. Is that intentional? Regards: Herbmuell (talk) 21:06, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

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