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1500 questions
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Are there examples of influential scientific articles first rejected and later proved to be valid?
Can you think of examples of influential scientific articles that at first were rejected by the reviewers but where later recognized as a great and influential contribution?
Marco Disce
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What is the story behind various uses of the word "spectrum"?
Here are five distinct uses of the word spectrum in physics and mathematics:
Spectrum (optics): The range of colors in the rainbow
Spectrum (particle physics): The range of electromagnetic frequencies emitted when an electron in an atom moves from…
Paul Siegel
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When were numbers first used for anything other than counting?
The most obvious occurrence of numbers in nature are the counting (natural) numbers, as they describe how many of something there are. It took a long time for people to even realize that the numbers extended to zero and the non-integers, and even…
ApproachingDarknessFish
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Where did John Wallis get the idea for $\infty$?
I read in an offhand comment in Amir Alexander's 2014 book Infinitesimal (p.280), that John Wallis introduced the symbol $\infty$ for infinity.
Was there any logic, reason, or precedent for this symbol, or did he
(as far as we know) just make it…
Joseph O'Rourke
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How did Galileo know that objects rolling down a ramp was an accurate model for free fall?
Galileo used balls rolling down ramps to study the relationship between time and distance traveled. However, without any knowledge of physics, it doesn't seem immediately obvious that the time-distance relationship of an object rolling down a ramp…
Ovi
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14
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What is the original source for Abel's quote about Gauss:"He is like the fox, who effaces his tracks in the sand with his tail"?
According to the editor of the German version of Ian Stewart's "The Problems of Mathematics", on page 226 of the biography of Gauß authored by Erich Worbs (C. F. Gauß: Ein Lebensbild. Koehler & Amelang, Leipzig, 1955) we can find the following…
José Hdz. Stgo.
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Do the titles starting with "On the ..." have a historical tradition?
In my field of research (theoretical physics), titles of publications occasionally begin with "On the ..." (a German language equivalent which was also in use is "Über ... " meaning "About ...".)
This seems a bit artificial because in these cases…
highsciguy
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14
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3 answers
Why wasn't probability developed in ancient Greece?
The modern axiomatic approach to probability was established by Kolmogorov nearly 70 years ago. According to Wikipedia, the first ideas connected to a mathematical theory of probability arose with Cardano, Fermat, Pascal during the 16th century.
I…
Ludwig
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How did quantum mechanics operators come into being?
Now I am starting to learn Quantum Mechanics. In the class I am taught about operators, postulates and all other basic stuff.
I understand operators to be +, -, /, etc; but quantum mechanical operators are entirely different; to understand them, I…
Sensebe
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What are the earliest accounts of publication bias?
Publication bias is a huge issue is some academic fields. What are the earliest accounts of publication bias?
As requested in the comments, publication bias intuitively means that if you read one article showing that drug X works to treat disease…
Franck Dernoncourt
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14
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Why is Leibniz less well regarded?
A well-known and specific example is that Leibniz is less well regarded than Newton for his calculus, the reason being notation,
Leibniz notation lets you incorrectly work with derivatives as though
they were a mathematical fraction
although…
Ellie Kesselman
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1 answer
How did Poincaré discover the fundamental group?
How did Poincare discover the fundamental group? What was the first instance that led Poincaré to discover this amazing theory?
albo
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Why is the notation $\sin^{-1} x$ so common?
$\sin^{-1} x$ means the inverse of $\sin x$ (it is also often called $\arcsin x$), but it can fairly easily be confused with $\sin(x)^{-1}$. Why is it used, when $\arcsin x$ is easier to type and is not easily confused with other things?
The Guy with The Hat
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14
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Have reviewers never been paid?
Nowadays researchers are generally not paid to review research articles. Has it always been the case? If not, how come it has changed?
Franck Dernoncourt
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14
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Who invented short and long division?
I am curious who came up with algorithms that we use today to manually solve mathematical division problems, such as short or long division; how were they established or standardized that way and why? Who first used or invented them, and how did…
Rok
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