Role Of Mathematicians Research Articles

Mathematics delivering the advantage: the role of mathematicians in manufacturing and beyond.

Much has been written about the benefits that mathematics can bring to the UK economy and the manufacturing sector in particular, but less on the value of mathematicians and a mathematical training. This article, written from an industry perspective, considers the value of mathematicians to the UK's industrial base and the importance to the UK economy of encouraging young people in the UK to choose to study mathematics at school as a gateway to a wide range of careers. The points are illustrated using examples from the author's 20 years' experience in the security and intelligence and manufacturing sectors.

Mathematicians and the early English life insurance industry

Motivated by a manuscript find in the Macclesfield Collection held by Cambridge University Library, the role of mathematicians in the emerging life insurance industry in eighteenth-century England is examined. Two early life insurance societies are examined here in detail. In one, a prominent mathematician's arguments were ignored thus confirming the generally accepted view among historians of insurance that the role of mathematicians at this time was minor or non-existent. For the other case, the promoter of two insurance schemes used his mathematical knowledge to design the operation of his insurance plans thus showing that mathematical activity was at least not non-existent. The manuscript find still leaves the question of what the motivation and impact was of the major writers on life annuities during the first half of the eighteenth century. This is addressed by considering the major economic background of early eighteenth-century England—land and property.

In accordance with a "more majestic order". The new math and the nature of mathematics at midcentury.

The "new math" curriculum, one version of which was developed in the 1950s and 1960s by the School Mathematics Study Group under the auspices of the National Science Foundation, occasioned a great deal of controversy among mathematicians. Well before its rejection by parents and teachers, some mathematicians were vocal critics, decrying the new curriculum because of the way it described the practice and history of the discipline. The nature of mathematics, despite the field's triumphs in helping to win World War II and its midcentury promotion as the key to a modern technological society, was surprisingly contested in this period. Supporters of the School Mathematics Study Group, like its director, Edward Begle, emphasized the importance of portraying mathematics as a system of abstract structures, while opponents like Morris Kline argued that math was essentially a tool for understanding the natural world. The debate about the curriculum--and the role of mathematicians in its design--was also a debate about the underlying identity of the subject itself.

The role of flow charts in the early automation of applied mathematics

The rapid spread of computers into almost all fields of commercial, intellectual, and social activity has obscured a great deal: the role of mathematicians in the early history of computing, the uses of early machines, the techniques developed by mathematicians to aid their use and the impact of automation on mathematics itself. Fortunately archives in both the United Kingdom and the United States have preserved some evidence of how mathematicians developed the techniques necessary to exploit early machines.

From Euclid as Textbook to the Giovanni Gentile Reform (1867–1923): Problems, Methods and Debates in Mathematics Teaching in Italy

The earliest legislation aimed to give comprehensive organization to the Italian education system was the Casati law, from the name of the then Minister for Education Gabrio Casati who drafted it. Promulgated by King Vittorio Emanuele II on 13 November 1859, the new law was designed to reorganize the school system in Piedmont and Lombardy, and was gradually and with difficulty extended to the other Italian regions. All legislation regarding education in Italy had been based on this law until 1923, when Giovanni Gentile, a prominent figure among Italian Idealist philosophers, introduced the reform that brought important changes to the school system, while maintaining various key features. To give a comprehensive view of the history of the teaching of mathematics in secondary schools in Italy over this 60‐year period, we must look beyond the legislative, political and social factors, however important these undoubtedly are, to examine other factors not comprehensively studied as yet. On the one hand, we need to consider the role of mathematicians involved in advanced research; on the other hand, the role played by many different factors: secondary school teachers and their associations; the textbooks; journals concerning the teaching of mathematics; publishers’ initiatives; conferences on teaching methods and practices; debates on methodology; international influences; teacher training. The purpose of this article is to give a general overview of the period, while describing in detail certain decisive moments, in order to show clearly the effects some decisions had, the debates they gave rise to, as well as the work carried out and the methodological approaches adopted by the mathematicians involved.