On History of Epsilontics

Galina Iwanowna Sinkiewicz

Antiquitates Mathematicae, Tome 10 (2016), pp. 183-204.

Résumé

This is a review of genesis of „ε-δ" language in works of mathematicians of the 19th century. It shows that although the symbols ε and δ were initially introduced in 1823 by Cauchy, no functional relationship for δ as a function of ε was ever ever specified by Cauchy. It was only in 1861 that the epsilon-delta method manifested itself to the full in Weierstrass de_nition of a limit. The article gives various interpretations of these issues later provided by mathematicians. This article presents the text [Sinkevich, 2012d] of the same author which is slightly redone and translated into English.

Détail

DOI : 10.14708/am.v10i0.805

Classification : 01A50, 01A55, 01A60
Mots-clés : History of mathematics, analysis, continuity, Lagrange, Ampére, Cauchy, Bolzano, Heine, Cantor, Weierstrass, Lebesgue, Dini

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