Speculations in the history of mathematics

Hybrid Zoom talk

Abstract: The aim of this talk, which will be unashamedly presentistic/antihistorical/anachronistic, is to present some speculations of a present-day mathematician on what may have been in the minds of his "colleagues" from earlier centuries. I will discuss a number of instances ranging from Greek mathematics and the Bible via Seki and Takebe in 17th century Japan to Galois and Ramanujan in the more recent past, where I would like to present possibly interesting (and surely unprovable) ideas about what may have been the invisible or even subconscious background of certain mathematical discoveries or assertions. So I will take full advantage of the fact that I am not a historian and that the lecture is advertised as a mathematical one.