My objection is that the timeline given concentrates on pure mathematics.
Many of the people featured, and many people today, are also interested in
applied mathematics. A few suggestions:
> Al-B and Al-K (Al-Biruni and Al-Khwarizmi) were two prominent Arab
> mathematicians from Khwarizm (Khorezmskaya), the region south of the Aral
> sea. They were both central figures in developing the decimal number system
> that we use today, and in bringing it to the West.
Al-B also did both the spherical trig and the collation of travellers'
itineraries needed to find the direction to Mecca. (He was in what is now
Afghanistan; his answer was certainly good enough for Muslims to use.)
> August: Maths around the year 1700
> Newton (1642-1727)
Newton's Principia gave the principles on which most modern engineering
and much modern physics depends.
> September: Maths around the year 1800 (bi-biography? Gauss & Sophie
> Germain)
> Gauss (1777-1855) : 17-gon 1796
Least-squares fitting (ubiquitous in modern applied mathematics).
Beginnings of mathematical electromagnetism.
> October: Maths around the year 1900
Severe problem reconciling Maxwell's electromagnetism with Newton's
mechanics. Eventually solved by Einstein (special relativity 1905)
> November: Maths around the year 2000
> Super-strings?
We need something to do the same job for quantum mechanics and general
relativity that Einstein did nearly 100 years ago for Newtonian mechanics
and electromagnetism. Superstrings haven't done it yet; they may soon,
or we may have to wait until 2100.
> December: Maths around the year 2100
Settling the Riemann Hypothesis? (Important, but not easy to explain in a
popular way!!!)
John Harper, School of Mathematical and Computing Sciences,
Victoria University, Wellington, New Zealand. e-mail john.harper@vuw.ac.nz
[ temporarily at Mathematical Institute, 24-29 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3LB,
England, but e-mail to either my New Zealand address or my Oxford one will
reach me. Phone (+44)(1865)280607 fax (+44)(1865)70515 ]