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Author
Wagner, Roy
Date
2010-10Type
- Book Chapter
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Abstract
This paper studies the ways algebra and geometry are related in Bombelli's L'algebra. I show that despite Bombelli's careful adherence to a from of homogeneity, he constructs several different ways of relating between algebra and geometry, building on Greek, Arabic, abbacist and original approaches. I further show how Bombelli's technique of reading diagrams, especially when representing algebraic unknowns, requires a multiple view that makes lines stand for much more than the diagrams present to an untrained eye. This multiplicity reflects an exploratory approach that seeks to integrate the algebraic and geometric strata without reducing one to the other and without suppressing the idiosyncrasies of either stratum Show more
Permanent link
https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000121566Publication status
publishedExternal links
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Editor
Heeffer, Albrecht
van Dyck, Maarten
Book title
Philosophical Aspects of Symbolic Reasoning in Early Modern MathematicsJournal / series
Studies in LogicVolume
Pages
Publisher
College PublicationsOrganisational unit
09591 - Wagner, Roy
Notes
Philosophical Aspects of Symbolic Reasoning in Early modern Science and Mathematics (PASR) Conference, Gent, 2009More
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