|  | | | Pierre de Fermat |
Meeting Times--MW 2:00-3:30
Meeting Place--Maria Sanford Room 101
Rene Descarte was one of the dominant thinkers of the 17th century. His "Discours de la methode pour bien conduire sa raison et chercher la verite dans les sciences" contains an appendix titled "La geometrie". This appendix is one of the most significant writings in all of mathematics. In many ways, it reads like an algebra text written today. It merges the notions of algebra and geometry and contains the first mention of a coordinte system (albeit in an embryonic form) and led to the creation of calculus within a generation. See the M 101 page for an image of Descartes.
Pierre de Fermat should be given equal credit for the discovery and creation of these ideas although he did not publish his work. Descartes used algebra to solve problems in geometry while Fermat saw that the equations that Descartes used were objects of interest that were worthy of study in their own right. Fermat was able to find tangent lines to curves but is best know for his contributions to number theory. Although he only published one paper in his lifetime (and that under a pseudonym) he is communicated widely with the leading mathematicians of his era. He is considered to be one of the greatest mathematicians in history.
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