Humanizing Mathematics - Detailseite

This seminar attempts to place significant mathematical knowledge in the context of its original appearance, in order to root mathematics as a human endeavor. We will examine ideas in their historical and social context, and study how different approaches to knowledge and science have influenced mathematical practice, and how mathematicians’ perspectives, including their social and cultural backgrounds, have shaped their work. Our goal in taking this historical and social view is to promote a better understanding of mathematics and its function in society.

The first main goal of this project is to, as a group, gain knowledge of important mathematical concepts and ideas about Mathematics by studying them in their socio-historical context. This will help us develop a comprehensive grasp of Mathematics in history. Our second goal, which we will work towards during the whole semester, but most in depth at the end of our historical investigations, is to set the grounds for an Oral-History project that will consist of personal interviews with working Mathematicians of the present.

Ekkehard Kopp. Making up Numbers: A History of Invention in Mathematics. Oct. 2020. isbn: 978-1-80064-095-5. doi: 10.11647/ obp.0236.

Reuben Hersh. What is Mathematics, Really? New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.

David Mumford. “What’s so Baffling About Negative Numbers? — a Cross-Cultural Comparison”. In: Jan. 2010, pp. 113–143. isbn:
978-93-80250-06-9. doi: 10.1007/ 978-93-86279-49-1_6.

Richard Dedekind. “Das Endliche und Unendliche”. In: Was sind und was sollen die Zahlen? Wiesbaden: Vieweg+Teubner Verlag, 1961, pp. 13–16. isbn: 978-3-663- 02788-1. doi: 10.1007/978-3-663-02788-1_5. url: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-02788-1_5.

Londa Schiebinger. “The History and Philosophy of Women in Science: A Review Essay”. In: Signs 12.2 (1987), pp. 305–332. issn: 00979740, 15456943. url: http: //www.jstor.org/stable/3173988

Ausgleichsberechtigte Studierende wenden sich zur bevorzugten Platzvergabe per E-Mail mit einem Nachweis der Ausgleichsberechtigung an die Studienkoordinationsstelle Geschichte. Ausschlussfrist für die Geltendmachung von Ausgleichsberechtigungen ist der letzte Tag der zentralen Frist, 16 Uhr. Textnachrichten in AGNES werden hingegen nicht gelesen!