πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ haxadecimal πŸš«πŸ‘‘Feb 26
The Man Who Stole Infinity, by Joseph Howlett
https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-man-who-stole-infinity-20260225/
Demian Goos finally tracked down Dedekind's copies of letters he sent to Cantor, showing that Cantor on at least two occasions published papers on orders of infinity, based in part on Dedekind's work, without crediting him. The letters had been preserved by Dedekind's heirs, and were made available to Goos by Karin Richter.
#mathematics #infinity #continuum #Cantor #Dedekind
The Man Who Stole Infinity | Quanta Magazine

In an 1874 paper, Georg Cantor proved that there are different sizes of infinity and changed math forever. A trove of newly unearthed letters shows that it was also an act of plagiarism.

Quanta Magazine
Show threadπŸ’‘πš‚π—†π–Ίπ—‹π—π—†π–Ίπ—‡ π™°π—‰π—‰π—ŒπŸ“±Feb 27
@brouhaha
It was never a proof to begin with anyway, anymore than if Cantor had written 1+1=3 and claimed that it "proved" that 1+1=3 πŸ™„
https://dotnet.social/@SmartmanApps/115642725878742794
πŸ’‘πš‚π—†π–Ίπ—‹π—π—†π–Ίπ—‡ π™°π—‰π—‰π—ŒπŸ“± (@[email protected])

Attached: 1 image 1/7 This air-quote #Mathematics unquote article https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-new-bridge-links-the-strange-math-of-infinity-to-computer-science-20251121/ keeps appearing in my feed, and I initially made some comments the first time, debunking it from a #Maths point-of-view, but given how it keeps popping up I think I need to do a more thorough #MathsMonday thread about it Firstly, the author is a Physics journo, so you can take what he says about #math with a grain of salt (for some reason I see a lot of them doing this overreach, instead of checking with a Mathematician)…

dotnet.social
Show threadπŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ haxadecimal πŸš«πŸ‘‘Feb 27
@SmartmanApps
Sorry, that is incorrect. Cantor most definitely did publish proofs of the existence of infinite sets of differing cardinalities, which have been accepted by essentially all mathematicians since the mid-20th century, if not earlier.
Cantor definitely upset many of his contemporary mathematicians' Apple carts.
Dedekind may not have gotten credit for his contribution to that, but he is credited with a proof by construction of the infinite set of real numbers.
Show threadπŸ’‘πš‚π—†π–Ίπ—‹π—π—†π–Ίπ—‡ π™°π—‰π—‰π—ŒπŸ“±

@brouhaha
"that is incorrect" - no it isn't.

"Cantor most definitely did publish" - something, but it wasn't a proof, anymore than 1+1=3 "proves" 1+1=3 πŸ™„

"which have been accepted by essentially all mathematicians since the mid-20th century" - no they haven't. e.g. look up Finitism for starters

"real numbers" - all irrational reals are scalars, not numbers, that's their fundamental mis-understanding about numbers in the first place.

Feb 27 at 12:52amWeb
Show threadπŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ haxadecimal πŸš«πŸ‘‘Feb 27
@SmartmanApps
I'm not going to debate mathematical philosophy with anyone (finitist or otherwise) who denies the existence of the set ⁠ℕ. We'll just have to agree to disagree.