Exactness in the construction of figures is neglected; it is taken
for granted and stress is laid on the proof. With us, on the other
hand, there will be no question of proof. Our chief business will
be to draw very straight, accurate, and even lines, a perfect
square, a really round circle. To verify the exactness of a figure
we will test it by each of its sensible properties, and that will
give us a chance to discover fresh properties day by day. We will
fold the two semi-circles along the diameter, the two halves of
the square by the diagonal; he will compare our two figures to see
who has got the edges to fit most exactly, i.e., who has done it
best; we should argue whether this equal division would always be
possible in parallelograms, trapezes, etc. We shall sometimes try
to forecast the result of an experiment, to find reasons, etc.
Geometry means to my scholar the successful use of the rule
and compass; he must not confuse it with drawing, in which these
instruments are not used. The rule and compass will be locked up,
so that he will not get into the way of messing about with them,
but we may sometimes take our figures with us when we go for a
walk, and talk over what we have done, or what we mean to do.
I shall never forget seeing a young man at Turin, who had learnt as
a child the relations of contours and surfaces by having to choose
every day isoperimetric cakes among cakes of every geometrical
figure. The greedy little fellow had exhausted the art of Archimedes
to find which were the biggest.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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