097: Hellenistic Science - Mathematics

The Hellenistic Age Podcast

History

4.7 • 557 Ratings

🗓️ 31 May 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The third century B.C. witnessed the greatest outburst of Greco-Roman mathematics in the entirety of antiquity. Euclid of Alexandria's "Elements" served as *the* textbook in the study of geometry for over two thousand years, while the archetypal mad scientist Archimedes of Syracuse allegedly was so fond of mathematical inquiries that it lead to his own demise. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here, as we look at the theoretical developments pioneered by the Hellenistic mathematicians. Episode Notes: (https://hellenisticagepodcast.wordpress.com/2024/05/31/097-hellenistic-science-mathematics/) Episode Transcript: (https://hellenisticagepodcast.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/097-hellenistic-science-mathematics-transcript.pdf) Social Media: Twitter (https://twitter.com/HellenisticPod) Facebook (www.facebook.com/hellenisticagepodcast/) Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/hellenistic_age_podcast/) Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/hellenisticagepodcast) Show Merchandise: Etsy (https://www.etsy.com/shop/HellenisticAgePod) Redbubble (https://www.redbubble.com/people/HellenisticPod/shop?asc=u) Donations: Patreon (https://patreon.com/TheHellenisticAgePodcast) Ko-Fi (https://ko-fi.com/hellenisticagepodcast) Amazon Book Wish List (https://tinyurl.com/vfw6ask)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi there, you're listening to the Hellenistic Age podcast.
0:13.6	Episode 97, Hellenistic Science, Mathematics. mathematics.
0:31.3	According to a Christian neoplatonist author of the 6th century AD,
0:35.5	Plato is said to have carved into the doorway of his academy the line,
0:39.4	Let no one ignorant of geometry come under my roof.
0:43.2	Mathematics, derived from the Greek name Mathema,
0:45.5	meaning what one learns,
0:50.3	was considered a fundamentally important branch of knowledge in the Greek school of thought.
0:53.8	The Babylonians and Egyptians were pioneers in their own right,
0:54.7	but the Greeks were among the first to truly study it for its own sake. To thinkers like Plato, math was seen
1:00.1	as the essential prerequisite for those attempting to grasp the sciences and other aspects
1:04.8	of logic. Names such as Pythagoras, Thales, and Plato himself were key figures in this regard.
1:12.0	But the Hellenistic period witnessed perhaps the greatest contributions to the field of
1:16.0	mathematics and the entirety of antiquity.
1:19.1	Like with so many other areas, Alexandria was a hub for mathematical innovations.
1:24.6	There was nothing akin to an established school of Alexandrian mathematics, but the most
1:29.1	successful of the Hellenistic mathematicians either lived or studied there for a significant
1:33.5	amount of time. The entirety of the 3rd century BC witnessed a flourishing network of geometers
1:39.7	and arithmeticians that was unrivaled throughout the ancient world. View exclusively focused on mathematics, though, as their work often overlapped with fields such as engineering, mechanics, or astronomy.
1:51.0	Some of the persons I have chosen will be repeatedly mentioned in future episodes because of this,
1:56.0	but I have also chosen to omit others who could also be classified as mathematicians, yet their careers
2:01.8	are more relevant to my discussions on those aforementioned topics.
	...

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