The Legacy of Greece: Essays By: Gilbert Murray, W. R. Inge, J. Burnet, Sir T. L. Heath, D'arcy W. Thompson, Charles Singer, R. W. Livingston, A. Toynbee, A. E. Zimmern, Percy Gardner, Sir Reginald Blomfield
Philosophy
The Legacy of Greece: Essays By: Gilbert Murray, W. R. Inge, J. Burnet, Sir T. L. Heath, D'arcy W. Thompson, Charles Singer, R. W. Livingston, A. Toynbee, A. E. Zimmern, Percy Gardner, Sir Reginald Blomfield
Greece -- Civilization
Next there is the method of mathematical _analysis_. This method is said
to have been 'communicated' or 'explained' by Plato to Leodamas of
Thasos; but, like reduction (to which it is closely akin), analysis in
the mathematical sense must have been in use much earlier. _Analysis_
and its correlative _synthesis_ are defined by Pappus: 'in analysis we
assume that which is sought as if it were already done, and we inquire
what it is from which this results, and again what is the antecedent
cause of the latter, and so on, until by so retracing our steps we come
upon something already known or belonging to the class of principles.
But in synthesis, reversing the process, we take as already done that
which was last arrived at in the analysis, and, by arranging in their
natural order as consequences what were before antecedents and
successively connecting them one with another, we arrive finally at the
construction of that which was sought.'
The method of _reductio ad absurdum_ is a variety of analysis. Starting
from a hypothesis, namely the contradictory of what we desire to prove,
we use the same process of analysis, carrying it back until we arrive at
something admittedly false or absurd. Aristotle describes this method in
various ways as _reductio ad absurdum_, proof _per impossibile_, or
proof leading to the impossible. But here again, though the term was
new, the method was not. The paradoxes of Zeno are classical instances.
Lastly, the Greeks established the form of exposition which still
governs geometrical work, simply because it is dictated by strict logic.
It is seen in Euclid's propositions, with their separate formal
divisions, to which specific names were afterwards assigned, (1) the
_enunciation_ (προτασις {protasis}), (2) the _setting-out_ (εκθεσις
{ekthesis}), (3) the διορισμος {diorismos}, being a re-statement of what
we are required to do or prove, not in general terms (as in the
_enunciation_), but with reference to the particular data contained in
the _setting-out_, (4) the _construction_ (κατασκευη {kataskeuê}), (5)
the _proof_ (αποδειξις {apodeixis}), (6) the _conclusion_ (συμπερασμα
{symperasma}). In the case of a problem it often happens that a solution
is not possible unless the particular data are such as to satisfy
certain conditions; in this case there is yet another constituent part
in the proposition, namely the statement of the conditions or limits of
possibility, which was called by the same name διορισμος {diorismos},
definition or delimitation, as that applied to the third constituent
part of a theorem.
We have so far endeavoured to indicate generally the finality and the
abiding value of the work done by the creators of mathematical science.
It remains to summarize, as briefly as possible, the history of Greek
mathematics according to periods and subjects.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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