Naming Infinity

By L. Graham, J. Kantor. 2009

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During the nineteenth century, a foundational crisis in mathematics led to signal events of fundamental importance. The first was the creation of set theory by Georg Cantor at the end of the nineteenth century. The second was the creation of the theory of functions and of measure theory and integration theory by the French trio Emile Borel, René Baire, and Henri Lebesgue. Their works relied heavily on Cantor’s set theory. A major contribution to the further development of set theory, function theory, and topology was made by Russian mathematicians: Dmitry Egorov, Nikolai Luzin, and their school, the famous Lusitania. The book of Jean-Michel Kantor and Loren Graham presents the history of this important period of mathematics through vivid portraits that bring to life the personalities of the mathematicians. The main heros of the book are Cantor, the above-mentioned French trio, and a Russian trio consisting of Egorov, Luzin, and their close friend Pavel Florensky, an extremely talented scientist and engineer and a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church. The book intertwines and links their mathematical research with their cultural and religious backgrounds. The authors describe the continuous development of mathematics from Cantor to the Russians.

Subfields: Social Psychology, Theoretical Computer Science, Visual Arts and Performing Arts

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/5369356e5a2dae94342fc76e87804def8a486ac4