Proof Techniques
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Proof Techniques
A mathematical proof is a deductive argument for a mathematical statement, showing that the stated assumptions logically guarantee the conclusion. The argument may use other previously established statements, such as theorems; but every proof can, in principle, be constructed using only certain basic or original assumptions known as axioms, along with the accepted rules of inference. Proofs are examples of exhaustive deductive reasoning that establish logical certainty, to be distinguished from empirical arguments or non-exhaustive inductive reasoning that establish "reasonable expectation". Presenting many cases in which the statement holds is not enough for a proof, which must demonstrate that the statement is true in ''all'' possible cases. A proposition that has not been proved but is believed to be true is known as a conjecture, or a hypothesis if frequently used as an assumption for further mathematical work. Proofs employ logic expressed in mathematical symbols, along wit ...
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Deductive Reasoning
Deductive reasoning is the process of drawing valid inferences. An inference is valid if its conclusion follows logically from its premises, meaning that it is impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion to be false. For example, the inference from the premises "all men are mortal" and " Socrates is a man" to the conclusion "Socrates is mortal" is deductively valid. An argument is ''sound'' if it is valid ''and'' all its premises are true. One approach defines deduction in terms of the intentions of the author: they have to intend for the premises to offer deductive support to the conclusion. With the help of this modification, it is possible to distinguish valid from invalid deductive reasoning: it is invalid if the author's belief about the deductive support is false, but even invalid deductive reasoning is a form of deductive reasoning. Deductive logic studies under what conditions an argument is valid. According to the semantic approach, an argument is valid ...
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Proof Theory
Proof theory is a major branchAccording to , proof theory is one of four domains mathematical logic, together with model theory, axiomatic set theory, and recursion theory. consists of four corresponding parts, with part D being about "Proof Theory and Constructive Mathematics". of mathematical logic and theoretical computer science within which proofs are treated as formal mathematical objects, facilitating their analysis by mathematical techniques. Proofs are typically presented as inductively defined data structures such as lists, boxed lists, or trees, which are constructed according to the axioms and rules of inference of a given logical system. Consequently, proof theory is syntactic in nature, in contrast to model theory, which is semantic in nature. Some of the major areas of proof theory include structural proof theory, ordinal analysis, provability logic, reverse mathematics, proof mining, automated theorem proving, and proof complexity. Much research also ...
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Eudoxus Of Cnidus
Eudoxus of Cnidus (; , ''Eúdoxos ho Knídios''; ) was an Ancient Greece, ancient Greek Ancient Greek astronomy, astronomer, Greek mathematics, mathematician, doctor, and lawmaker. He was a student of Archytas and Plato. All of his original works are lost, though some fragments are preserved in Hipparchus' ''Commentaries on the Phenomena of Aratus and Eudoxus''. ''Theodosius' Spherics, Spherics'' by Theodosius of Bithynia may be based on a work by Eudoxus. Life Eudoxus, son of Aeschines, was born and died in Cnidus (also transliterated Knidos), a city on the southwest coast of Anatolia. The years of Eudoxus' birth and death are not fully known but Diogenes Laertius, Diogenes Laërtius gave several biographical details, mentioned that Apollodorus of Athens, Apollodorus said he reached his wikt:acme#English, acme in the 103rd Olympiad (368–), and claimed he died in his 53rd year. From this 19th century mathematical historians reconstructed dates of 408–, but 20th century schola ...
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Hippocrates Of Chios
Hippocrates of Chios (; c. 470 – c. 421 BC) was an ancient Greek mathematician, geometer, and astronomer. He was born on the isle of Chios, where he was originally a merchant. After some misadventures (he was robbed by either pirates or fraudulent customs officials) he went to Athens, possibly for litigation, where he became a leading mathematician. On Chios, Hippocrates may have been a pupil of the mathematician and astronomer Oenopides of Chios. In his mathematical work there probably was some Pythagorean influence too, perhaps via contacts between Chios and the neighboring island of Samos, a center of Pythagorean thinking: Hippocrates has been described as a 'para-Pythagorean', a philosophical 'fellow traveler'. "Reduction" arguments such as ''reductio ad absurdum'' argument (or proof by contradiction) have been traced to him, as has the use of power to denote the square of a line. W. W. Rouse Ball, A Short Account of the History of Mathematics' (1888) p. 36. Mat ...
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Thales
Thales of Miletus ( ; ; ) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek Pre-Socratic philosophy, pre-Socratic Philosophy, philosopher from Miletus in Ionia, Asia Minor. Thales was one of the Seven Sages of Greece, Seven Sages, founding figures of Ancient Greece. Beginning in eighteenth-century historiography, many came to regard him as the first philosopher in the Greek philosophy, Greek tradition, breaking from the prior use of mythology to explain the world and instead using natural philosophy. He is thus otherwise referred to as the first to have engaged in mathematics, History of science#Pre-socratics, science, and deductive reasoning. Thales's view that all of nature is based on the existence of a Arche, single ultimate substance, which he Theory, theorized to be Water (classical element), water, was widely influential among the philosophers of his time. Thales thought the Earth floated on water. In mathematics, Thales is the namesake of Thales's theorem, and the interc ...
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Greek Mathematics
Ancient Greek mathematics refers to the history of mathematical ideas and texts in Ancient Greece during Classical antiquity, classical and late antiquity, mostly from the 5th century BC to the 6th century AD. Greek mathematicians lived in cities spread around the shores of the ancient Mediterranean, from Anatolia to Italy and North Africa, but were united by Greek culture and the Ancient Greek, Greek language. The development of mathematics as a theoretical discipline and the use of deductive reasoning in Mathematical proof, proofs is an important difference between Greek mathematics and those of preceding civilizations. The early history of Greek mathematics is obscure, and traditional narratives of Theorem, mathematical theorems found before the fifth century BC are regarded as later inventions. It is now generally accepted that treatises of deductive mathematics written in Greek began circulating around the mid-fifth century BC, but the earliest complete work on the subje ...
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Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books by decree in 1586. It is the second-oldest university press after Cambridge University Press, which was founded in 1534. It is a department of the University of Oxford. It is governed by a group of 15 academics, the Delegates of the Press, appointed by the Vice Chancellor, vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford. The Delegates of the Press are led by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as OUP's chief executive and as its major representative on other university bodies. Oxford University Press has had a similar governance structure since the 17th century. The press is located on Walton Street, Oxford, Walton Street, Oxford, opposite Somerville College, Oxford, Somerville College, in the inner suburb of Jericho, Oxford, Jericho. ...
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Geometry
Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is called a ''List of geometers, geometer''. Until the 19th century, geometry was almost exclusively devoted to Euclidean geometry, which includes the notions of point (geometry), point, line (geometry), line, plane (geometry), plane, distance, angle, surface (mathematics), surface, and curve, as fundamental concepts. Originally developed to model the physical world, geometry has applications in almost all sciences, and also in art, architecture, and other activities that are related to graphics. Geometry also has applications in areas of mathematics that are apparently unrelated. For example, methods of algebraic geometry are fundamental in Wiles's proof of Fermat's Last Theorem, Wiles's proof of Fermat's ...
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Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessment to form Cambridge University Press and Assessment under Queen Elizabeth II's approval in August 2021. With a global sales presence, publishing hubs, and offices in more than 40 countries, it published over 50,000 titles by authors from over 100 countries. Its publications include more than 420 academic journals, monographs, reference works, school and university textbooks, and English language teaching and learning publications. It also published Bibles, runs a bookshop in Cambridge, sells through Amazon, and has a conference venues business in Cambridge at the Pitt Building and the Sir Geoffrey Cass Sports and Social Centre. It also served as the King's Printer. Cambridge University Press, as part of the University of Cambridge, was a ...
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Mathematics As A Language
The language of mathematics or mathematical language is an extension of the natural language (for example English) that is used in mathematics and in science for expressing results (scientific laws, theorems, proofs, logical deductions, etc.) with concision, precision and unambiguity. Features The main features of the mathematical language are the following. * Use of common words with a derived meaning, generally more specific and more precise. For example, " or" means "one, the other or both", while, in common language, "both" is sometimes included and sometimes not. Also, a " line" is straight and has zero width. * Use of common words with a meaning that is completely different from their common meaning. For example, a mathematical ring is not related to any other meaning of "ring". Real numbers and imaginary numbers are two sorts of numbers, none being more real or more imaginary than the others. * Use of neologisms. For example polynomial, homomorphism. * Use of symbols as w ...
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Philosophy Of Mathematics
Philosophy of mathematics is the branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of mathematics and its relationship to other areas of philosophy, particularly epistemology and metaphysics. Central questions posed include whether or not mathematical objects are purely abstract entities or are in some way concrete, and in what the relationship such objects have with physical reality consists. Major themes that are dealt with in philosophy of mathematics include: *''Reality'': The question is whether mathematics is a pure product of human mind or whether it has some reality by itself. *''Logic and rigor'' *''Relationship with physical reality'' *''Relationship with science'' *''Relationship with applications'' *''Mathematical truth'' *''Nature as human activity'' (science, the arts, art, game, or all together) Major themes Reality Logic and rigor Mathematical reasoning requires Mathematical rigor, rigor. This means that the definitions must be absolutely unambiguous and th ...
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Mathematical Folklore
In common mathematical parlance, a mathematical result is called folklore if it is an unpublished result with no clear originator, but which is well-circulated and believed to be true among the specialists. More specifically, folk mathematics, or mathematical folklore, is the body of theorems, definitions, proofs, facts or techniques that circulate among mathematicians by word of mouth, but have not yet appeared in print, either in books or in scholarly journals. Quite important at times for researchers are folk theorems, which are results known, at least to experts in a field, and are considered to have established status, though not published in complete form. Sometimes, these are only alluded to in the public literature. An example is a book of exercises, described on the back cover: Another distinct category is well-knowable mathematics, a term introduced by John Conway. These mathematical matters are known and factual, but not in active circulation in relation with curren ...
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