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Did the Greeks Discover the Irrationals?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 April 2001

Philip Hugly  and
Charles Sayward
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Abstract

A popular view is that the great discovery of Pythagoras was that there are irrational numbers, e.g., the positive square root of two. Against this it is argued that mathematics and geometry, together with their applications, do not show that there are irrational numbers or compel assent to that proposition.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy , Volume 74 , Issue 2 , April 1999 , pp. 169 - 176
Copyright
© The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1999

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