[FOM] R: constructivism and physics
Todd Wilson
twilson at csufresno.edu
Wed Feb 8 22:56:47 EST 2006
Antonino Drago wrote:
> Surely since its beginnings theoretical physicists (Cavalieri, Torricelli,
> Newton) made use of infinitesimals, whereas Galilei, Huygens and Leibniz
> resisted to them. Almost two centuries after, rigorous calculus confirmed
> almost all the results obtained by infinitesimals; but not all.
I'm giving an informal talk on infinitesimal analysis at our math
seminar in a couple of weeks, and I would love to include an example of
a result obtained by infinitesimals that has not been confirmed by
"rigorous calculus". Can you give an example (or, better, a few)?
--
Todd Wilson
Department of Computer Science
California State University, Fresno
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