Mathematics Commons^™

On Kuyk’S Complementarity In Mathematics, Gene B. Chase

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

This paper examines Willem Kuyk’s book, Complementarity in Mathematics, and the interplay between the subjects of mathematics.

Are Mathematical Objects Ontologically Real? Ideas And Suggestions, Frank R. Bernhart

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

This essay will consider a few ways that realism in the modern philosophy of mathematics might be understood and defined.

Intuitionism, Terence H. Perciante

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

Intuitionism derives philosophically from Kant's Conceptualism -- the object of the mathematical knowledge only have reality within the mind, they do not have reality apart from our thinking. This paper examines the nature of intuitionism and its strengths.

Non-Standard Calculus, Ron Friewald

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

This paper is intended to provide a very cursory introduction to how “nonstandard calculus” works, giving a sketch of how elementary calculus can be presented using hyperreal numbers.

Axiomatic Structure And The Method Of Analysis: Shifting Styles In The History Of Mathematics, Calvin Jongsma

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

This article surveys the different views of mathematical methodology that occurred from ancient Greek times through the early modern period up until its codification around 1900. After summarizing the axiomatic approach advocated by Aristotle and implemented in mathematics by Euclid, the talk explores the character of analysis in ancient Greek times, its development into a symbolic algebra by Viete and Descartes, and its expansion into a calculus of fluxions and differentials by Newton and Leibniz. The article concludes by touching on the recovery and transformation of the deductive ideal for mathematics by Pasch, Peano, and Hilbert during the late nineteenth …

Two Philosophical Problems About Mathematics, Stephen Barker

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

Mathematics is a flourishing field of human endeavor, a field that is accorded great respect and high standing. For 2500 years or more, many of the best minds available have worked in this field; and the results produced have indirectly been of enormous value to other fields, such as physics, engineering, architecture, economics, and so on. But with is mathematics about? Physics studies moving bodies; engineering studies bridges; architecture studies buildings; economics studies commercial behavior: here there are phenomena we can point to that constitute the subject matter. But what does mathematics study? If you answer “Numbers”, or “Abstract types …

Introduction (1979), Robert Brabenec

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents (1979), Association Of Christians In The Mathematical Sciences

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1979

A Second Conference on the Foundations of Mathematics

A Semilinear Dirichlet Problem, Alfonso Castro

All HMC Faculty Publications and Research

Let Ω be a bounded region in R^n. In this note we discuss the existence of weak solutions (see [4, Section 2]) of the Dirichlet problem:

Δu(x) + g(x, u(x)) + f(x, u(x), ∇u(x)) = 0 ; x є Ω

u(x) = 0 ; x є ∂Ω

where Δ is the Laplacian operator, g : Ω x R → R and f : Ω x Rⁿ⁺¹ → R are functions satisfying the Caratheodory condition (see [2, Section 3]), and ∇ is the gradient operator.

An Illustrative Model Describing The Refraction Of Long Water Waves By A Circular Island, Gregory A. Kriegsmann

Department of Mathematics: Faculty Publications

The refraction of small shallow water waves by an idealized island is studied in this paper. The island's shoal is modeled by a quartic polynomial in the radial variable. This particular model allows the explicit construction of the rays (wave orthogonals) and the determination of several important features of the wave motion. The various shortcomings of the particular profile are discussed.

Groups Expressed As The Set-Theoretic Union Of Proper Subgroups, Lana Barrett

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

In their paper “Groups as Unions of Proper Subgroups,” published in 1959, Haber and Rosenfeld posed the problem of characterizing groups which can be expressed as the set theoretic union of a finite collection of their proper subgroups. Haber and Rosenfeld established that a group G is the union of three proper subgroups (such a group G shall be called a U₃-group) if and only if the Klein 4-group is a homomorphic image of G. Further results concerning U₃-groups were obtained in the paper “Groups which are the Union of Three Subgroups” by Bruckhemier, Bryan and …

Quasi-Triangular Matrices, Joanne Dombrowski

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

It is shown that there exist quasitriangular operators which cannot be represented as quasitriangular matrices.

Complementary Extremum Principles, J. Swetits, C. Rogers

Mathematics & Statistics Faculty Publications

Important complementary extremum principles are generated without recourse to general variational theory. The results are illustrated by an application to a class of boundary value problems in Magnetohydrodynamics.

A Christian Point Of View, A. Wayne Roberts

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

Does the fact that you are a Christian affect the way that you teach mathematics? This paper seeks to answer the question, what contributions can a mathematics teacher in a Christian school make to the distinctive purpose of such a school?

Skolem’S Paradox And The Predestination/Free-Will Discussion, Gene B. Chase

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

The purpose of this paper is to show that both sides of the predestination/free-will discussion are admissible in a way that is more profound than simply the wave-particle duality of light. In wave-particle duality there are two competing physical models of reality which are contradictory. This paper will show that not a contradiction but a difference in viewpoint is the fundamental issue in the discussion of predestination and free will. A discussion of Skolem’s paradox is helpful in this demonstration.

Current Work On Mathematical Truth, Michael Detlefsen

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

The overall aim of this paper is to serve as an introduction to the work currently being done on the topic of mathematical truth. It provides an overview of the major developments concerning mathematical truth and also evaluates those developments as potential contributions to mathematician’s understanding of the subject.

Wanted: Christian Perspectives In The Philosophy Of Mathematics, Arthur F. Holmes

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

This paper describes the three types of theory about universals, beginning in each case with a classical historical formulation and moving to its restatement in recent analytic philosophy. It will then suggest ways in which Christian perspectives bear on theories of universals and so on mathematics.

Recent Problems In The Foundationsof Mathematics, Terence H. Perciante

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

This paper examines the foundational crises that have haunted twentieth-century mathematics, beginning with a brief review of the effects generated by Gauss, Lobachevsky, and Bolyai who each developed non-Euclidean parallel axiom. Though of mathematical interest in their own right, the significance of the new geometries was greatly magnified when it was discerned that they could be used to adequately model physical space, even to the extent that Einstein’s theory of relativity later employed as its model a non-Euclidean geometry developed by Riemann. The question that obviously presented itself was how could any given geometry be called true when it and …

Infinity & Reality, John W. Warner

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

This paper examines the topics of infinity and reality as relevant to the conference, proposing a possible relationship between the two in order to stimulate further discussions.

A Brief Introduction To Gödel’S Theorems, Michael Detlefsen

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

Gödel’s two famous incompleteness theorems are results that have come up a number of times in the discussions at the 1977 ACMS conference. This paper provides a brief and relatively non-technical statement on these results and of their significance for the foundations of mathematics.

Recent Parallels Between The Philosophy Of Science And Mathematics, Joseph Spradley

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

Following World War I European philosophy of science formed an alliance with mathematics culminating in an attitude of certainty and autonomy that rejected all non empirical claims to truth and purported to make all science presupposition less. The rise and fall of logical positivism has been one of the major themes of of twentieth century thought and illustrates the danger of placing too much emphasis on science and mathematics as an ideal for all knowledge. The restriction of rational inquiry to the modes of scientific verification and the processes of mathematical logic was far too confining for the containment of …

Existence In Mathematics, Willis Alberda

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

Contemplation of the existence of mathematical entities for very apparent reasons generates a mental cycling of arguments dealing with the nature of mathematical truth, meaning in mathematics, and the obviously related question of which of these two problems should be solved first. The problem of the existence of mathematical entities dates from the first thoughts and ideas of a mathematical nature. The problem of existence in mathematics is fundamental to the domain of speculation and research on the foundations of mathematics. When we try to put ourselves in the place of those philosophers who first explored this problem we must …

The Foundations Of Mathematics And The Mathematics Curriculum, Bayard Baylis

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

In teaching the foundations of mathematics within the framework of a Christian college, and particularly that of a Christian liberal arts college, there are two groups of students which must be served. The first consisted of the non-mathematics majors—those non-scientifically oriented “general anything” students who, as a catalog might put it, are to receive “an introduction to and an appreciation of the history, foundations, culture and applications of mathematics.” The second group consists of the mathematics majors, and the few science majors who have not been frightened away by the calculus. The gulf between these two groups is sufficiently large, …

Epistomology To Ontology, Charles R. Hampton

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

This paper offers commentary on the various philosophical approaches to the foundations of mathematics and then indicates how these ideas have implications in consideration of the existence question.

Introduction (1977), Robert Brabenec

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents (1977), Association Of Christians In The Mathematical Sciences

ACMS Conference Proceedings 1977

No abstract provided.

Positive Perturbations Of Unbounded Operators, Joanne Dombrowski

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

This work studies the spectral properties of certain unbounded selfadjoint operators by considering positive perturbations of such operators and the unitary equivalence of the perturbed and unperturbed transformations. Conditions are obtained on the unitary operators implementing this equivalence which guarantee that the selfadjoint operators have an absolutely continuous part.

The Absolute Continuity Of Phase Operators, Joanne Dombrowski, G. H. Fricke

Mathematics and Statistics Faculty Publications

This paper studies the spectral properties of a class of operators known as phase operators which originated in the study of harmonic oscillator phase. Ifantis conjectured that such operators had no point spectrum. It was later shown that certain phase operators were, in fact, absolutely continuous and that all phase operators at least had an absolutely continuous part. The present work completes the discussion by showing that all phase operators are absolutely continuous.

Toeplitz Operators On Locally Compact Abelian Groups, Henry A. Krieger, C.A. Schaffner

All HMC Faculty Publications and Research

The problem of global optimization of M incoherent phase signals in N complex dimensions is formulated. Then, by using the geometric approach of Landau and Slepian, conditions for optimality are established for $N = 2$, and the optimal signal sets are determined for $M = 2,3,4,6$ and 12.

The method is the following: The signals are assumed to be equally probable and to have equal energy, and thus are represented by points ${\bf s}_j $, $j = 1,2, \cdots ,M$, on the unit sphere $S_1 $ in $C^N $. If $W_{jk} $ is the half space determined by ${\bf s}_j …