Some time ago I asked a friend of this list a simple question, and as a
long prologue to his one-line-answer he addressed, in part, the passage
quoted below. From the style of his wording you might be able to guess
who he is, I presume!
Here goes:
The 17th century mathematicians' networks, eg those centred around
Collins in London and Mersenne in Paris, may have been efficient,
but they were rather slow! For the most famous example, between
Newton and Leibniz: Collins wrote to Leibniz via Oldenburg in early
in April 1675; Leibniz, a reply to Oldenburg dated May 2 1676, for
forwarding to Newton, which was done in mid May; Newton replied to
Leibniz on June 13 1976 (the epistola prior), to be sure after much
work on it, and Oldenburg passed it on 26 July 26; Then Leibniz to
Newton via Oldenburg and Collins on 17 August, which arrived at
Newton in early September; and then Newton replied, the epistola
posterior, again after much drafting and re-drafting, on 24 October
1676 - the whole exchange taking 18 months. (I don't guarantee that
those dates are correct. I've extracted them, possibly with errors,
from Whiteside's edition on Newton, vol IV, 666ff.)
What a long animadversion on a simple request for ...
a meaning of a word! :-)
CHASQUE (or CHASQUI) =: A South American
Indian post-boy or foot messenger.
There is much 'historia' in this word, but NOT of mathematical content,
I'm afraid!
Mis mejores saludos desde Montevideo,
-- Julio
At 08:04 AM 30/08/1998 -0400, Samuel S. Kutler asked:
| In our list name:
| What is the meaning of *chasque*?
|