Questions tagged [terminology]
For questions about terms, definitions and related concepts used in science and mathematics.
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First use of term "Hilbert's Nullstellensatz"
This year (2021) marks the 100th anniversary of Emmy Noether's 1921 paper in which she introduced Noetherian rings and proved the primary ideal decomposition for them. The original version of her ...
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Who was the first to use the "does not exist" sign ∄?
Who was the first to use the "does not exist" sign ∄? I'm aware that Giuseppe Peano originated serifed ∃ and, moreover that Whitehead and Russell repurposed Peano's serifed ∃; I'm also aware that ...
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Whence “homomorphism”, “homomorphic”?
The kernel question leads to another : Today, homomorphism (resp. isomorphism) means what Jordan (1870) had called isomorphism (resp. holoedric isomorphism). How did the switch happen?
“Homomorphic” ...
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Who coined the Hawaiian Earrings?
I hope to know who first used the name "Hawaiian Earrings."
Barratt, Milnor(1962) says "This example was suggested by Steenrod" in its Introduction:
https://www.ams.org/journals/...
user12897
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How did early physicists experimentally assign electronic transitions in atoms?
The spectrum of hydrogen was very well studied by the mid-19th century. However, if one were doing experimental spectroscopy for more complex atoms, one would see plenty of spectral lines in the ...
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Is $\Gamma^i_{jk}$ the Christoffel symbol or the Christoffel symbols?
For years, I have been perplexed that the expression $\Gamma^i_{jk}$ is often referred to in the plural as "the Christoffel symbols", although sometimes it is referred to in the singular as "the ...
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Who coined the term: "Directed Graph"?
I found that the term "Digraph" was coined in 1955 by Frank Harary in "The number of linear, directed, rooted, and connected graphs", and that it was a term actually suggested by ...
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Where is the first reference to the "Z combinator", a call-by-value fix-point combinator?
I'd like to know the earliest reference to the Z-combinator. This could be either where the name was first coined, or even the first discussion of a need for an applicative-order Y combinator. I didn'...
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Origin of the expression “Fundamental theorem of Algebra”
Who was the first person to use the expression “Fundamental theorem of Algebra”? It is well-known that Gauss called it “Fundamental theorem of algebraic equations”. Grattan-Guiness, in his The Rainbow ...
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Origin of the Hankel contour?
Who was the first to publish a Hankel contour integral?
See notes in my answer to the MO-Q How does one motivate the analytic continuation of the Riemann zeta function?.
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Sparse matrix ("matrice creuse") etymology in French
I am looking for the etymology of matrice creuse.
According to Wikipedia, it seems James Joseph Sylvester used the term "matrix" in 1850, and Harry Markowitz used the term "sparse ...
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Terminology associated with mathematical induction
In "Number: The Language of Science" (1930), Tobias Dantzig refers to what we call the base case of mathematical induction as "the induction step" (and refers to what we call the ...
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How did the terms stress and strain come to describe two different things?
In physics, stress essentially captures forces in a body, where as strain captures displacements. Two dimensionally very different concepts. If you look it up in a thesaurus, stress and strain are ...
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Who was the first to use the term field in physics?
Faraday, after drawing his lines of force in 19th century, is normally credited as the first to use the term field in physics. But...
... was not the term field used in the context of gravitational ...
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Who coined the term Orthonormal?
Does anyone know who coined the term orthonormal to refer to a basis that is orthogonal and normal?
In such a poorly named mathematical world (looking at you, conditionally convergent series) I think ...
