Letter to the Editors

The Mathematical Intelligencer
encourages comments about the
material in this issue. Letters to the
editor should be sent to either of the
Opinion Survey: The Best The table below shows the books
Mathematical Books of the that received more than one vote.
Twentieth Century Despite the small sample size, we have
an interestingly varied list and a
clear winner. If any readers (whether

I
n The Mathematical Intelligencer,
editors-in-chief, Chandler Davis or vol. 29 (2007), no. 1, I asked
for suggestions for the best mathe-
Marjorie Senechal.
matical books of the twentieth
century. I am very grateful to the
seven readers who responded. There
was widespread disagreement about
which of my two categories—essen-
tially ‘‘academic’’ mathematics and
what I have now learned to call
‘‘paramathematics’’—the books fell
into, so I have abandoned the
distinction.
or not they are members of the van der
Waerden fan club) feel sufficiently
inspired or irritated by the results to
e-mail me some more suggestions, I
will happily incorporate their ideas
and write another letter to the editors.
Eric Grunwald
Mathematical Capital
187 Sheen Lane, London SW14 8LE
United Kingdom
e-mail: ericgrunwald@aol.com

Votes cast Book

4 B. van der Waerden, ‘‘Modern Algebra’’
3 N. Wiener, ‘‘Cybernetics’’
2 E. T. Bell, ‘‘Men of Mathematics’’
2 N. Bourbaki, ‘‘Éléments de Mathématique’’
2 H. Cartan, S. Eilenberg, ‘‘Homological Algebra’’
2 W. Feller, ‘‘An Introduction to Probability and its Applications’’
2 A. Grothendieck, ‘‘Éléments de Géometrie Algébrique’’
2 D. R. Hofstadter, ‘‘Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid’’
2 D. Knuth, ‘‘The Art of Computer Programming’’
2 B. Mandelbroit, ‘‘Les Objets Fractals’’
2 J. von Neumann, O. Morgenstern, ‘‘Theory of Games and Economic Behavior’’
2 R. Thom, ‘‘Stabilité Structurelle et Morphogénèse’’
2 E. Whittaker, G. Watson, ‘‘A Course of Modern Analysis’’

Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 1

 Mathematically Bent
The proof is in the pudding.
Opening a copy of The Mathematical
Intelligencer you may ask yourself
uneasily, ‘‘What is this anyway—a
mathematical journal, or what?’’ Or
you may ask ,‘‘Where am I?’’ Or even
‘‘Who am I?’’ This sense of disorienta-
tion is at its most acute when you
open to Colin Adams’s column.
Relax. Breathe regularly. It’s
mathematical, it’s a humor column,
and it may even be harmless.
Column editor’s address: Colin Adams,
Department of Mathematics,
Bronfman Science Center, Williams College,
Williamstown, MA 01267, USA
e-mail: Colin.C.Adams@williams.edu
2 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
Colin Adams, Editor
Riot at the
Calc Exam
COLIN ADAMS
here had been a lot of unrest in
T the classroom all semester. To a
certain extent, I was to blame. I
decided right at the beginning of the
course not to waste any time. So the
first day, I introduced the triple inte-
gral. It was quite a shock for students
who had yet to see a single integral.
But that’s what I wanted. Shock ther-
apy. Shock calculus. Embed an idea so
deeply in their brains it would never
get out. Brand their brains with a hot
branding iron that said $$$. That first
day, the smell of burning brain matter
was overwhelming.
Slack-jawed students with bulging
eyes gaped in disbelief and horror.
Several flipped frantically through their
class schedules to check if they were in
the right room.
I hit them with a Fourier series to
get their attention. By the end of that
first day, they looked like the morning
after an all night dorm party of the
‘‘Oktoberfest Meets Mardi Gras’’ vari-
ety; the bowed heads, the bloodshot
eyes, the looks of nausea and
anguish.
‘‘It’s no use sobbing,’’ I told one
woman as she staggered out of the
classroom. ‘‘Either you can do it or you
can’t. Toughen up or get stomped all
over.’’
Then she really started bawling.
But it’s the truth. Knowledge isn’t
for the faint of heart. There is some
nasty knowledge out there. You have
to be able to take it. The citadel of
learning isn’t for the lily-livered.
By the next class at least half of the
livers were gone. It was a big
improvement; we were down to a
much more workable group. Now I
could practice the one-on-one intimi-
dation at which I excelled.
We covered about 75 years of
mathematics that day, from about 1837
to 1912. But I still wanted three more
students to drop. Any more than that
and I would fall below the 18 student
minimum for the course to run.
So I gave them a pop quiz on
complex analytic functors over qua-
ternionic tangent bundles. At the end
of the 15 minutes, 13 students rushed
up with drop slips for me to sign. I
signed three.
The first few weeks of the semester,
I didn’t assign any homework. Why
should I collect assignments that I had
no intention of grading? It would just
clutter up my office. But the students
started to get nervous. Homework
began to appear in my mailbox,
problems from sections in the text that
we were supposed to be covering.
It infuriated me, this unsolicited
work. I would return it the next class
without having looked at it, only to
find it in my mailbox again several
hours later.
So, finally, I was forced to assign
and collect homework. I would slash
over it with red magic markers and
crayons at random. Then I would put
big red Fs at the top of each and write
things like, ‘‘Have you considered a job
at McDonald’s?’’
And so, we settled into the routine
of the semester. Every few weeks, I
would call the registrar to insist that the
classroom was inadequate and had to
be changed. It was a quick way to
ensure that the number of students
present was kept to a reasonable size. I
knew that those few who really wan-
ted to learn would find out where the
class had gone. Optimal teaching
conditions occur when the number of
students per faculty is kept to the
minimum possible. Logically, then, my
goal was to lose them all.
But students in pursuit of passing
grades are not easily shaken. Every
time the class moved, at least a few
would show up. Usually, though, the
search for the new classroom made
them late, and if there is one thing I
will not abide, it is a lack of respect for
time. At exactly 10:00, I would lock the
door to the classroom. No matter how
desperately the late students banged
on the door, whimpering and plead-
ing, I wouldn’t let them in. You have to
learn discipline before you can learn
mathematics.
There was one student named
Wattle who was consistently late. He
didn’t even bother coming to the door.
Each class meeting, at about 10:05, his
head would appear at the window of
whatever classroom we were in. He
would stand outside and take notes for
the entire hour. I considered having
the class moved to the second floor,
but after a while I became almost fond
of that head bobbing outside the
window.
As the semester progressed, stu-
dents began to hound me. I could no
longer go to my office during my office
hours for fear of running into them. It
got to where I would find them milling
around my door at all hours of the day
and night, wearing those sad hangdog
looks, asking me where the class had
moved to and what were the assign-
ments. The students, they just want to
suck you dry.
About the eighth week, I lost con-
trol of the class. The balance of power
in a classroom is always tenuous, and
keeping the respect and awe of the
students requires a delicate hand. I
realized I had lost that control when
they began to catch the blackboard
erasers I hurled at them and fling them
back. The student–teacher relationship
was breaking down.
Things deteriorated quickly. When I
strolled across campus, I was hit by too
many Frisbees.Ò Of course, anyone
strolling across a college campus has to
expect to be hit by one or two Fris-
bees. It’s part of being a pedestrian in a
youth-encumbered environment. But I
was averaging nearer to 10 or 12
Frisbees, a couple of footballs, and a
baseball or two. Those baseballs can
really sting.
And then, one day, I was late to
class. I had been debating the correct
definition of the word ‘‘tangential’’
with a colleague and, in my excite-
ment, I lost track of the time. I arrived
at the classroom at 10:05 and the door
was locked. I could hear snickering
inside. That was when I decided I had
had enough.
Wattle never saw me coming. I
grabbed him in a headlock and said
through the window, ‘‘Unlock it or
Wattle arrives in hell earlier than
expected.’’ There was some debate, as
Wattle was not particularly popular on
campus. But as he began to gurgle and
wave his arms dramatically, they
opened the door.
From then on, the students left me
alone. They kept their distance. The
few who continued to come to class
usually sat in the back and seemed
inordinately skittish.
On the day of the final, I passed out
the exam. I was pretty pleased with
myself. Instead of having to make up
two exams, one for the graduate
course I was teaching and one for the
calculus course, I used the graduate
exam for both. Perhaps that was unfair,
but there are a lot of constraints on a
faculty member’s time. One has to
weigh all one’s responsibilities. In this
case, making up the calc exam was
outweighed by the Barbara Mandrell
special on TV.
Unfortunately, Wattle noticed that
the exam was for the graduate course.
I had forgotten to change the course
number in the upper right hand corner
of the front page. He stood up.
‘‘That’s it. We don’t have to take this
anymore.’’ He picked up the exam
and crumpled it in his fist. A cheer
went up.
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
‘‘Sit down, Wattle. Sit down or you
flunk,’’ I yelled. He took the balled-up
exam and hurled it at me. Suddenly, all
the students were up, screaming and
yelling. Crumpled exams flew every-
where. A chair sailed across the room. I
ran for the door.
When the police arrived, two stu-
dents were wrapping the cord from the
overhead projector around my neck.
Quite frankly, I am lucky to be alive. I
have only the students’ penchant for
alcohol and their resultant slowed
motor skills to thank for my survival.
At the trial, I explained how the
students, disgruntled with the down-
ward spiral in their grades, had
decided to take action. But rather than
hitting the books and working dili-
gently to improve their minds, they
chose instead to murder the professor,
and, thereby, prevent the distribution
of grades. It was an unsuccessful
attempt at cold-blooded premeditated
first-degree murder. I was particularly
eloquent. The judge sentenced them
all to 10 to 12 years in one of America’s
oldest educational facilities, the Fed-
eral Penitentiary in Leavenworth,
Kansas.
It was difficult for me to decide on
the grades that they deserved. I con-
sidered petitioning the college to
introduce a new grade, Z, which
would essentially mean, ‘‘This student
did so abysmally in the course that
they deserve to die, but we did the
next best thing. We had them locked
away.’’ In the end I gave them all Fs
except for Wattle. In a moment of
weakness, I gave him a D-. I can
imagine exactly how his head must
look, bobbing behind the barred win-
dow at Leavenworth.
My next semester starts in a week. It
is clear that I will have to run my
classes more strictly this time. No more
Mr. Nice Guy.
3
 Mathematics Is Not
a Game But...
ROBERT THOMAS
A
s a mathematician I began to take an interest in phi-
losophy of mathematics on account of my resent-
ment at the incomprehensible notion I encountered
that mathematics was
‘a game played with meaningless symbols on paper’
—not a quotation to be attributed to anyone in particular,
but a notion that was around before Hilbert [1]. Various
elements of this notion are false and some are also
offensive.
Mathematical effort, especially in recent decades—and
the funding of it—indicate as clearly and concretely as is
possible that mathematics is a serious scientific-type activity
pursued by tens of thousands of persons at a professional
level. While a few games may be pursued seriously by
many and lucratively by a professional few, no one claims
spectator sports are like mathematics. At the other end of
the notion, paper is inessential, merely helpful to the
memory. Communication (which is what the paper might
hint at) is essential; our grip on the objectivity of mathe-
matics depends on our being able to communicate our
ideas effectively.
Turning to the more offensive aspects of the notion, we
think often of competition when we think of games, and in
mathematics one has no opponent. Such competitors as
there are are not opponents. Worst of all is the meaning-
lessness attributed to the paradigm of clear meaning; what
could be clearer than 2 + 2 = 4? Is this game idea not
irredeemably outrageous?
Yes, it is outrageous, but there is within it a kernel of
useful insight that is often obscured by outrage at the main
notion, which is not often advocated presumably for that
reason. I know of no one that claims that mathematics is a
game or bunch of games. The main advocate of the idea
that doing mathematics is like playing a game is David
Wells [3]. It is the purpose of this essay to point to the
obscured kernel of insight.
4 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
Mathematics Is Not a Game
Mathematics is not a collection of games, but perhaps it is
somehow like games, as written mathematics is somehow
like narrative. I became persuaded of the merit of some
comparison with games in two stages, during one of which
I noticed a further fault with the notion itself: there are no
meaningless games. Meaningless activities such as tics and
obsessions are not games, and no one mistakes them for
games. Meanings in games are internal, not having to do
with reference to things outside the game (as electrons, for
example, in physics are supposed to refer to electrons in
the world). The kings and queens of chess would not
become outdated if all nations were republics.
The ‘meaningless’ aspect of the mathematics-as-game
notion is self-contradictory; it might be interesting to know
how it got into it and why it stayed so long.
Taking it as given then that games are meaningful to
their players and often to spectators, how are mathematical
activities like game-playing activities? The first stage of
winning me over to a toleration of this comparison came in
my study of the comparison with narrative [4].
One makes sense of narrative, whether fictional or fac-
tual, by a mental construction that is sometimes called the
world of the story. Keeping in mind that the world of the
story may be the real world at some other time or right now
in some other place, one sees that this imaginative effort is
a standard way of understanding things that people say; it
need have nothing at all to do with an intentionally creative
imagining like writing fiction. In order to understand con-
nected speech about concrete things, one imagines them.
This is as obvious as it is unclear how we do it. We often
say that we pretend that we are in the world of the story.
This pretence is one way—and a very effective way—of
indicating how we imagine what one of the persons we are
hearing about can see or hear under the circumstances of
the story. If I want to have some idea what a person in
certain circumstances can see, for example, I imagine
myself in those circumstances and ask myself what I can
see [5]. Pretending to be in those circumstances does not
conflict with my certain knowledge that on the contrary I
am listening to the news on my radio at home. This may
make it a weak sort of pretence, but it is no less useful for
that. The capacity to do this is of some importance. It
encourages empathy, but it also allows one to do mathe-
matics. One can pretend what one likes and consider the
consequences at any length, entirely without commitment.
This is often fun, and it is a form of playing with ideas.
Some element of this pretence is needed, it seems to me, in
changing one’s response to ‘what is 2 + 2?’ from ‘2 + 2
what?’ to the less concrete ‘four’ [6].
This ludic aspect of mathematics is emphasized by Brian
Rotman in his semiotic analysis of mathematics [7] and
acknowledged by David Wells in his comparison of
mathematics and games. Admitting this was the first stage
of my coming to terms with games. The ludic aspect is
something that undergraduates, many of whom have
decided that mathematics is either a guessing game (a bad
comparison of mathematics and games) or the execution of
rigidly defined procedures, need to be encouraged to do
when they are learning new ideas. They need to fool
around with them to become familiar with them. Changing
the parameters and seeing what a function looks like with
that variety of parameter values is a good way to learn how
the function behaves. And it is by no means only students
that need to fool around with ideas in order to become
familiar with them. Mathematical research involves a good
deal of fooling around, which is part of why it is a plea-
surable activity. This sort of play is the kind of play that
Kendall Walton illustrates with the example of boys in
woods not recently logged pretending that stumps are
bears [8]. This is not competitive, just imaginative fooling
around.
I do not think that this real and fairly widely acknowl-
edged—at least never denied—aspect of mathematics has
much to do with the canard with which I began. The
canard is a reductionistic attack on mathematics, for it says
it is ‘nothing but’ something it is not: the standard
.........................................................................
ROBERT THOMAS was an undergraduate
AUTHOR
at the University of Toronto when Chan-
dler Davis arrived there and obliged him to
get acquainted with quantifiers among
other things. He later studied also at
Waterloo and Southampton. He has been
at the University of Manitoba since 1970.
He is editor of Philosophia Mathematica
(www.philmat.oxfordjournals.org). A new
hobby is grandfathering.
St. John’s College and Department of
Mathematics, University of Manitoba,
Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3T 2N2
e-mail: thomas@cc.umanitoba.ca
reductionist tactic. In my opinion, mathematics is an
objective science, but a slightly strange one on account of
its subtle subject matter; in some hands it is also an art [9].
Having discussed this recently at some length [10], I do not
propose to say anything about what mathematics is here,
but to continue with what mathematics is like; because
such comparisons, like that with narrative, are instructive
and sometimes philosophically interesting.
The serious comparison of mathematics with games is
due in my experience to David Wells, who has summed up
what he has been saying on the matter for twenty years in a
strange document, draft zero of a book or two called
Mathematics and Abstract Games: An Intimate Connection
[3]. Wells is no reductionist and does not think that math-
ematics is any sort of a game, meaningless or otherwise. He
confines himself to the comparison (‘like a collection of
abstract games’—p. 7, a section on differences—pp. 45-51),
and I found this helpful in the second stage of my seeking
insight in the comparison. But I did not find Wells’s direct
comparison as helpful as I hope to make my own, which
builds on his with the intent of making it more compre-
hensible and attractive (cf. my opening sentence).
Doing Mathematics Is Not Like Playing a Game
Depending on when one thinks the activities of our intel-
lectual ancestors began to include what we acknowledge as
mathematics, one may or may not include as mathematics
the thoughts lost forever of those persons with the cunei-
form tablets on which they solved equations. The tablets
themselves indicate procedures for solving those particular
equations. Just keeping track of quantities of all sorts of
things obviously extended still farther back, to something
we would not recognize as mathematics but which gave
rise to arithmetic. Keeping track of some of the many things
that one cannot count presumably gave rise to geometrical
ideas. It does seem undeniable that such procedural ele-
ments are the historical if not the logical basis of
mathematics, and not only in the Near East but also in India
and China. I do not see how mathematics could arise
without such pre-existing procedures and reflections on
them— probably written down, for it is so much easier to
reflect on what is written down.
This consideration of procedures, and of course their
raw material and results, is of great importance to my
comparison of mathematics and games because my com-
parison is not between playing games and doing
mathematics. I am taking mathematics to be the sophisti-
cated activity that is the subject matter of philosophy of
mathematics and research in mathematics. I do not mean
actions such as adding up columns of figures. Mathematics
is not even those more complicated actions that we are
happy to transfer to computers. Mathematics is what we
want to keep for ourselves. When playing games, we stick
to the rules (or we are changing the game being played),
but when doing serious mathematics (not executing algo-
rithms) we make up the rules—definitions, axioms, and
some of us even logics. As Wells points out in the section of
his book on differences between games and mathematics,
in arithmetic we find prime numbers, which are a whole
new ‘game’ in themselves (metaphorically speaking).
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 5
 While mathematics requires reflection on pre-existing
procedures, reflection on procedures does not become
recognizable as mathematics until the reflection has
become sufficiently communicable to be convincing.
Conviction of something is a feeling, and so it can occur
without communication and without verbalizing or sym-
bolizing. But to convince someone else of something, we
need to communicate, and that does seem to be an
essential feature of mathematics, whether anything is
written down or not— a fortiori whether anything is sym-
bolic. And of course convincing argument is proof.
The analogy with games that I accept is based on the
possibility of convincing argument about abstract games.
Anyone knowing the rules of chess can be convinced that a
move has certain consequences. Such argument does not
follow the rules of chess or any other rules, but it is based
on the rules of chess in a way different from the way it is
based on the rules of logic that it might obey. To discuss the
analogy of this with mathematics, I think it may be useful to
call upon two ways of talking about mathematics, those of
Philip Kitcher and of Brian Rotman.
Ideal Agents
In his book The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge [11],
Kitcher introduced a theoretical device he called the ideal
agent. ‘We can conceive of the principles of [empirical]
Arithmetic as implicit definitions of an ideal agent. An ideal
agent is a being whose physical operations of segregation
do satisfy the principles [that allow the deduction in
physical terms of the theorems of elementary arithmetic].’
(p. 117). No ontological commitment is given to the ideal
agent; in this it is likened to an ideal gas. And for this reason
we are able to ‘specify the capacities of the ideal agent by
abstracting from the incidental limitations on our own
collective practice’ (ibid.).
The agent can do what we can do but can do it for
collections however large, as we cannot. Thus modality is
introduced without regard to human physical limitations.
‘Our geometrical statements can finally be understood as
describing the performances of an ideal agent on ideal
objects in an ideal space.’ (p. 124). Kitcher also alludes to the
‘double functioning of mathematical language—its use as a
vehicle for the performance of mathematical operations as
well as its reporting on those operations’ (p. 130). ‘To solve a
problem is to discover a truth about mathematical opera-
tions, and to fiddle with the notation or to discern analogies
in it is, on my account, to engage in those mathematical
operations which one is attempting to characterize.’ (p. 131).
Rotman is at pains to distinguish what he says from what
Kitcher had written some years before the 1993 publication
of The Ghost in Turing’s Machine [7] because he developed
his theory independently and with different aims, but
we readers can regard his apparatus as a refinement of
Kitcher’s, for Rotman’s cast of characters includes an Agent
to do the bidding of the character called the Subject. The
Subject is Rotman’s idealization of the person that reads
and writes mathematical text, and also the person that
carries out some of the commands of the text. For example,
it is the reader that obeys the command, ‘Consider triangle
6 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
ABC.’ But it is the Agent (p. 73) that carries out such
commands as, ‘Drop a perpendicular from vertex A to the
line BC,’ provided that the command is within the Agent’s
capacities. We humans are well aware that we cannot draw
straight lines; that is the work of the agents, Kitcher’s and
Rotman’s. We reflect on the potential actions of these
agents and address our reflections to other thinking Sub-
jects. Rotman’s discussion of this is rich with details like the
tenselessness of the commands to the Agent, indeed the
complete lack of all indexicality in such texts. The tense-
lessness is an indication of how the Subject is an
idealization as the Agent is, despite not being blessed with
the supernatural powers of the Agent. The Agent, Rotman
says, is like the person in a dream, the Subject like the
person dreaming the dream, whereas in our normal state
we real folk are more like the dreamer awake, what Rot-
man calls the Person to complete his semiotic hierarchy.
Rotman then transfers the whole enterprise to the texts,
so that mathematical statements are claims about what will
result when certain operations are performed on signs
(p. 77). We need not follow him there to appreciate the
serviceability of his semiotic distinctions.
The need for superhuman capacities was noted long ago
in Frege’s ridicule [2] of the thought that mathematics is
about empty symbols:
([...] we would need an infinitely long blackboard, an
infinite supply of chalk, and an infinite length of time—
p. 199, § 124).
He also objected to a comparison to chess for Thomae’s
formal theory of numbers, while admitting that ‘there can
be theorems in a theory of chess’ (p. 168, § 93, my
emphasis). According to Frege,
The distinction between the game itself and its theory,
not drawn by Thomae, makes an essential contribution
towards our understanding of the matter. [...] in the
theory of chess it is not the chess pieces which are
actually investigated; it is a question of the rules and
their consequences. (pp. 168-169, § 93)
The Analogies Between Mathematics and Games
Having at our disposal the superhuman agents of Kitcher
and Rotman, we are in a position to see what is analogous
between mathematics and games.
It is not playing the game that is analogous to mathe-
matics, but our reflection in the role of subject on the
playing of the game, which is done by the agent. When a
column of figures is added up, we do it, and sometimes
when the product of two elements of a group is required,
we calculate it; but mathematics in the sense I am using
here is not such mechanical processes at all, but the
investigation of their possibility, impossibility, and results.
For that highly sophisticated reflective mathematical activ-
ity, the agent does the work because the agent can draw
straight lines. Whether points are collinear depends on
whether they are on the agent’s straight lines, not on
whether they appear on the line in our sketch. We can put
them on or off the line at will; the agent’s results are con-
strained by the rules of the system in which the agent is
working. Typically we have to deduce whether the agent’s
line is through a point or not. The agent, ‘playing the game’
according to the rules, gets the line through the point or
not, but we have to figure it out. We can figure it out; the
agent just does it. The analogy to games is two-fold.
1. The agent’s mathematical activity (not playing a game) is
analogous to the activity of playing a game like chess
where it is clear what is possible and what is impossi-
ble—the same for every player—often superhuman but
bound by rules. (Games like tennis depend for what is
possible on physical skill, which has no pertinence
here.)
2. Our mathematical activity is analogous to (a) game
invention and development, (b) the reflection on the
playing of a game like chess that distinguishes expert
play from novice play, or (c) consideration of matters of
play for their intrinsic interest apart from playing any
particular match—merely human but not bound by rules.
It is we that deduce; the agent just does what it is told,
provided that it is within the rules we have chosen. Anal-
ogous to the hypotheses of our theorems are chess
positions, about which it is possible to reason as depend-
ably as in mathematics because the structure is sufficiently
precisely set out that everyone who knows the rules can
see what statements about chess positions are legitimate
and what are not. Chains of reasoning can be as long as we
like without degenerating into the vagueness that plagues
chains of reasoning about the real world. The ability to
make and depend on such chains of reasoning in chess and
other games is the ability that we need to make such chains
in mathematics, as David Wells points out.
To obtain a useful analogy here, it is necessary to rise
above the agent in the mathematics and the mere physical
player in the game, but the useful analogy is dependent on
the positions in the game and the relations in the mathe-
matics. The reflection in the game is about positions more
than the play, and the mathematics is about relations and
their possibility more than drawing circles or taking com-
pact closures. Certainly the physical pieces used in chess
and the symbols on paper are some distance below what is
importantly going on.
I hope that the previous discussion makes clear why
some rules are necessary to the analogy despite the fact that
we are not bound by those rules. The rules are essential
because we could not do what we do without them, but it
is the agent that is bound by them. We are talking about, as
it were, what a particular choice of them does and does not
allow. But our own activity is not bound by rules; we can
say anything that conveys our meaning, anything that is
convincing to others.
Here is objectivity without objects. Chess reasoning is
not dependent upon chess boards and chess men; it is
dependent on the relations of positions mandated by the
rules of the game of chess. Mathematics is not dependent
on symbols (although they are as handy as chess sets) but
on the relations of whatever we imagine the agent to work
on, specified and reasoned about. Our conclusions are
right or wrong as plainly as if we were ideal agents loose in
Plato’s heaven, but they are right or wrong dependent on
what the axioms, conventions, or procedures we have
chosen dictate.
Outside mathematics, we reason routinely about what
does not exist, most particularly about the future. As the
novelist Jim Crace was quoted on page R10 of the 2007 6 2
Toronto Globe and Mail, ‘As a good Darwinist, I know that
what doesn’t confer an advantage dies out. One advantage
[of narrative (Globe and Mail addition)] is that it enables us
to play out the bad things that might happen to us and to
rehearse what we might do.’ In order to tell our own sto-
ries, it is essential to project them hypothetically into the
future based on observations and assumptions about the
present. At its simplest and most certain, the skill involved
is what allows one to note that if one moves this pawn
forward one square the opponent’s pawn can take it. It’s
about possibilities and of course impossibilities, all of them
hypothetical. It is this fundamental skill that is used both in
reflection on games and in mathematics to see what is
necessary in their respective worlds.
I must make clear that David Wells thinks that entities in
maths and abstract games have the same epistemological
status but that doing mathematics is like (an expert’s) play-
ing a game in several crucial respects, no more; he disagrees
with the usefulness of bringing in ideal agents, indeed
opposes doing so, apparently not seeing the advantage of
splitting the analogy into the two numbered aspects above.
This section is my attempt to outline a different but accept-
able game analogy—a game-analysis analogy.
Conclusion
Games such as bridge and backgammon, which certainly
involve strategy, have a stochastic element that prevents
long chains of reasoning from being as useful as they are in
chess. Such chains are, after all, an important part of how
computers play chess. The probabilistic mathematics
advocated by Doron Zeilberger [12] is analogous to the
analysis of such a stochastic game, and will be shunned by
those uninterested in such analysis of something in which
they see nothing stochastic. Classical (von Neumann) game
theory, on the other hand, actually is the analysis of situa-
tions that are called games and do involve strategy. The
game theory of that current Princeton genius, John Con-
way, is likewise the actual analysis of game situations [13].
Does the existence of such mathematical analysis count for
or against the general analogy between mathematics and
game analysis?
On my version of the analogy, to identify mathematics
with games would be one of those part-for-whole mistakes
(like ‘all geometry is projective geometry’ or ‘arithmetic is
just logic’ from the nineteenth century); but identification is
not the issue. It seems to me that my separation of game
analysis from playing games tells in favour of the analogy
of mathematics to analysis of games played by other—not
necessarily superhuman—agents, and against the analogy
of mathematics to the expert play of the game itself. This is
not a question David Wells has discussed. For Wells, him-
self an expert at abstract games such as chess and go, play
is expert play based unavoidably on analysis; analysis is just
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 7
part of playing the game. Many are able to distinguish these
activities, and not just hypothetically.
One occasionally hears the question, is mathematics
invented or discovered?—or an answer. As David Wells
points out, even his game analogy shows why both
answers and the answer ‘both’ are appropriate. Once a
game is invented, the consequences are discovered—gen-
uinely discovered, as it would require a divine intelligence
to know just from the rules how a complex game could
best be played. When in practice rules are changed, one
makes adjustments that will not alter the consequences too
drastically. Analogously, axioms are usually only adjusted
and the altered consequences discovered.
What use can one make of this analogy? One use that
one cannot make of it is as a stick to beat philosophers into
admitting that mathematics is not problematic. Like math-
ematicians, philosophers thrive on problems. Problems are
the business of both mathematics and philosophy. Solving
problems is the business of mathematics. If a philosopher
came to regard the analogy as of some validity, then she
would import into the hitherto unexamined territory of
abstract games all of the philosophical problems concern-
ing mathematics. Are chess positions real? How do we
know about them? And so on; a new branch of philosophy
would be invented.
What use then can mathematicians make of the analogy?
We can use it as comparatively unproblematic material in
discussing mathematics with those nonphilosophers desir-
ing to understand mathematics better. I have tried to
indicate above some of the ways in which the analogy is
both apt and of sufficient complexity to be interesting; it is
no simple metaphor but can stand some exploration. Some
of this exploration has been carried out by David Wells, to
whose work I need to refer the reader.
REFERENCES
[1] Thomae, Johannes. Elementare Theorie der analytischen Func-
tionen einer complexen Veränderlichen. 2nd ed. Halle: L. Nebert,
1898 (1st ed. 1880), ridiculed by Frege [2].
8 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
[2] Frege, Gottlob. ‘Frege against the formalists’ from Grundgesetze
der Arithmetik, Jena: H. Pohle. Vol. 2, Sections 86-137, in
Translations from the philosophical writings of Gottlob Frege. 3rd
ed. Peter Geach and Max Black, eds. Oxford: Blackwell, 1980. I
am grateful to a referee for pointing this out to me.
[3] Wells, David. Mathematics and Abstract Games: An Intimate
Connection. London: Rain Press, 2007. (Address: 27 Cedar
Lodge, Exeter Road, London NW2 3UL, U.K. Price: £10; $20
including surface postage.)
[4] Thomas, Robert. ‘Mathematics and Narrative’. The Mathematical
Intelligencer 24 (2002), 3, 43–46
[5] O’Neill, Daniella K., and Rebecca M. Shultis. ‘The emergence of
the ability to track a character’s mental perspective in narrative’,
Developmental Psychology, 43 (2007), 1032–1037.
[6] Donaldson, Margaret. Human Minds, London: Penguin, 1993.
[7] Rotman, Brian. Ad Infinitum: The Ghost in Turing’s Machine.
Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993.
[8] Walton, Kendall L. Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the Foundations
of the Representational Arts. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni-
versity Press, 1990. Also Currie, Gregory. The Nature of Fiction.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
[9] Davis, Chandler, and Erich W. Ellers. The Coxeter Legacy:
Reflections and Projections. Providence, R. I.: American Mathe-
matical Society, 2006.
[10] Thomas, Robert. ‘Extreme Science: Mathematics as the Science
of Relations as such,’ in Proof and Other Dilemmas: Mathematics
and Philosophy, Ed. Bonnie Gold and Roger Simons, Washing-
ton, D.C.: Mathematical Association of America, 2008.
[11] Kitcher, Philip. The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1984.
[12] Zeilberger, Doron. ‘Theorems for a price: Tomorrow’s semi-rig-
orous mathematical culture’. Notices of the Amer. Math. Soc. 40
(1993), 978-981. Reprinted in The Mathematical Intelligencer 16
(1994), 4, 11-14.
[13] Conway, John H. On Numbers and Games. 2nd ed. Natick,
Mass.: AK Peters, 2001. (1st ed. LMS Monographs; 6. London:
Academic Press, 1976). Also Berlekamp, E.R., J.H. Conway, and
R.K. Guy. Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays. 2 volumes.
London: Academic Press, 1982.
 + + =

Formulas of Brion,
Lawrence, and
Varchenko on
Rational Generating
Functions for Cones
MATTHIAS BECK, CHRISTIAN HAASE, AND FRANK SOTTILE

O
ur aim is to illustrate two gems of discrete geome- Adding the two rational function right-hand sides leads to a
try, namely formulas of Michel Brion [7] and of miraculous cancellation
James Lawrence [15] and Alexander N. Varchenko
[16], which at first sight seem hard to believe, and which— x x5 x x6 x  x6
þ 1
¼ þ ¼
even after some years of studying them—still provoke a 1x 1x 1x x1 1x ð3Þ
slight feeling of mystery in us. Let us start with some 2
¼xþx þx þx þx : 3 4 5
examples.
Suppose we would like to list all positive integers. This sum of rational functions representing two infinite
Although there are many, we may list them compactly in series collapses into a polynomial representing a finite
the form of a generating function: series. This is a one-dimensional instance of a theorem due
X x to Michel Brion. We can think of (1) as a function listing the
x1 þ x2 þ x3 þ


¼ xk ¼ : ð1Þ integer points in the ray [1,?) and of (2) as a function
1  x
k[0 listing the integer points in the ray (-?,5]. The respective
Let us list, in a similar way, all integers less than or equal rational generating functions add up to the polynomial (3)
to 5: that lists the integer points in the interval [1, 5]. Here is a
X picture of this arithmetic.



þ x 1 þ x 0 þ x 1 þ x 2 þ x 3 þ x 4 þ x 5 ¼ xk
k5
ð2Þ +
5
x
¼ : =
1  x 1
1 2 3 4 5

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 9

 Let us move up one dimension. Consider the quadri- 1 y2
lateral Q with vertices (0, 0), (2, 0), (4, 2), and (0, 2). þ
ð1  xÞð1  yÞ ð1  xÞð1  y 1 Þ
x 4 y2 x2
þ þ
ð1  x 1 Þð1  x 1 y1 Þ ð1  xyÞð1  x 1 Þ
¼ y2 þ xy 2 þ x 2 y 2 þ x 3 y2 þ x 4 y2
þ y þ xy þ x 2 y þ x 3 y
þ 1 þ x þ x2:

The sum of rational functions again collapses to a poly-

nomial, which encodes precisely those integer points that
are contained in the quadrilateral Q:
Analogous to the generating functions (1) and (2) are the Brion’s Theorem says that this magic happens for any
generating functions of the cones at each vertex generated polytope P in any dimension d; provided that P has
by the edges at that vertex. For example, the two edges rational vertices. (More precisely, the edges of P have
touching the origin generate the nonnegative quadrant, rational directions.) The vertex cone Kv at vertex v is the
which has the generating function cone with apex v and generators the edge directions
X X X 1 1 emanating from v. The generating function
x m yn ¼ xm
yn ¼
: X
m;n  0 m0 n0
ð1  xÞ ð1  yÞ rKv ðxÞ :¼ xm
m2Kv \Zd
The two edges incident to (0, 2) generate the cone ð0; 2Þ þ
R  0 ð0; 2Þ þ R  0 ð4; 0Þ; with the generating function for such a cone is a rational function (again, provided that
X 2 P has rational vertices). Here we abbreviate x m for
y
x m yn ¼ : x1m1 x2m2


xdmd : Brion’s Formula says that the rational
m  0;n  2
ð1  xÞð1  y1 Þ functions representing the integer points in each vertex
cone sum up to the polynomial rP ðxÞ encoding the integer
The third such vertex cone, at (4, 2), is ð4; 2Þ þ R  0 ð4; 0Þ þ
points in P:
R  0 ð2; 2Þ, which has the generating function X
x4 y2 rP ðxÞ ¼ rKv ðxÞ:
: v a vertex of P
ð1  x 1 Þð1 x 1 y 1 Þ
A second theorem, which shows a similar collapse of
Finally, the fourth vertex cone is ð2; 0Þ þ R  0 ð2; 2Þ þ generating functions of cones, is due (independently) to
R  0 ð2; 0Þ; with the generating function James Lawrence and to Alexander Varchenko. We illustrate
x2 it with the example of the quadrilateral Q: Choose a
: direction vector n that is not perpendicular to any edge of
ð1  xyÞð1  x 1 Þ
Q; for example we could take n = (2, 1). Now at each
Inspired by our one-dimensional example above, we add vertex v of Q; we form a (not necessarily closed) cone
those four rational functions: generated by the edge directions m as follows. If w
n [ 0,

.........................................................................................................................................................
MATTHIAS BECK was an undergraduate CHRISTIAN HAASE was born and raised in
AUTHORS

at Würzburg, Germany, where he also had Berlin. After a respectable apprenticeship as

a brief sideline as a street musician. He an algebraic topologist, he ventured into
received his Ph.D. from Temple University. polyhedral geometry, presaging his slide into
Before coming to San Francisco State Uni- lattice-point addiction (2000–date). At
versity, he held postdoctoral positions at Berkeley and Duke he also contracted a
SUNY Binghamton, MSRI, and the Max serious case of algebraic geometry. Since
Planck Institute. His research is in discrete 2005 he is in Berlin with an Emmy Noether
and combinatorial geometry and number Award from the German Research
theory—and more particularly in enumer- Foundation.
ating integer points in polyhedra.
Fachbereich Mathematik & Informatik
Department of Mathematics Freie Universität Berlin, 14195 Berlin,
San Francisco State University Germany
San Francisco, CA 94132, USA e-mail: christian.haase@math.fu-berlin.de
e-mail: beck@math.sfsu.org URL: http://erhart.math.fu-berlin.de
URL: http://math.sfsu.edu/beck

10 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

then we take its nonnegative span, and if w
n \ 0, we
take its strictly negative span.
For example, the edge directions at the origin are along
the positive axes, and so this cone is again the nonnegative
quadrant. At the vertex (2, 0) the edge directions are
(-2, 0) and (2, 2). The first has negative dot product
with n and the second has positive dot product, and so we
obtain the half-open cone ð2; 0Þ þ R\0 ð2; 0Þ þ R  0 ð2; 2Þ
¼ ð2; 0Þ þ R [ 0 ð2; 0Þ þ R  0 ð2; 2Þ: At the vertex (4, 2) both
edge directions have negative dot product with n and we
get the open cone ð4; 2Þ þ R [ 0 ð0; 4Þ þ R [ 0 ð2; 2Þ; and at
the vertex (0, 2) we get the half-open cone ð0; 2Þ þ
R  0 ð2; 0Þ þ R [ 0 ð0; 2Þ: The respective generating functions
turn out to be
1 x3
; ;
ð1  xÞð1  yÞ ð1  xÞð1  xyÞ
x y 6 3
y 3
; and : identity, which also distinguishes it from Brion’s Formula, is
ð1  xyÞð1  yÞ ð1  xÞð1  yÞ
Now we add them with signs according to the parity of the
number of negative (w
n \ 0) edge directions w at the
vertex. In our example, we obtain
1 x3
 (the common region of convergence).
ð1  xÞð1  yÞ ð1  xÞð1  xyÞ
x 6 y3 y3
þ 
ð1  xyÞð1  yÞ ð1  xÞð1  yÞ
¼ y2 þ xy 2 þ x 2 y2 þ x 3 y2 þ x 4 y 2
þ y þ xy þ x 2 y þ x 3 y
þ 1 þ x þ x2 :
.........................................................................
FRANK SOTTILE earned his Ph.D. at the
University of Chicago in 1994. After
appointments at the University of Toronto,
the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and
elsewhere, he landed at Texas A&M in 2004.
His research interests include real algebraic
geometry, Schubert calculus, and geometric
combinatorics. He was a member of the
editorial board of the Young Mathematicians
Network 1994–1999.
Department of Mathematics
Texas A&M University, College Station
TX 77843, USA
e-mail: sottile@math.tamu.edu
URL: http://www.math.tamu.edu/~sottile
This sum of rational functions again collapses to the
polynomial that encodes the integer points in Q: This
should be clear here, for the integer points in the non-
negative quadrant are counted with a sign ±, depending
upon the cone in which they lie, and these coefficients cancel
except for the integer points in the polytope Q:
The identity illustrated by this example works for any
simple polyope—a d-polytope where every vertex meets
exactly d edges. Given a simple polytope, choose a direc-
tion vector n 2 Rd that is not perpendicular to any edge
direction. Let Evþ ðnÞ be the edge directions w at a vertex v
with w
n [ 0, and Ev ðnÞ be those with w
n \ 0. Define
the cone
X X
Kn;v :¼ v þ R  0w þ R\0 w:
w2Evþ ðnÞ w2Ev ðnÞ
This is the analogue of the cones in our previous example.
The Lawrence–Varchenko Formula says that adding the
rational functions of these cones with appropriate signs
gives the polynomial rP ðxÞ encoding the integer points in
P:
X 
rP ðxÞ ¼ ð1ÞjEv ðnÞj rKn;v ðxÞ:
v a vertex of P
Here, rKn;v ðxÞ is the generating function encoding the
integer points in the cone Kn;v : An interesting feature of this
that the power series generating functions have a common
region of convergence. Also, it holds without any restric-
tion that the polytope be rational. In the general case, the
generating functions of the cones are holomorphic func-
tions, which we can add, as they have a common domain
Proofs
Brion’s original proof of his formula [7] used the
Lefschetz–Riemann–Roch theorem in equivariant K-theory
[3] applied to a singular toric variety. Fortunately for us, the
remarkable formulas of Brion and of Lawrence–Varchenko
now have easy proofs, based on counting.
Let us first consider an example based on the cone K ¼
R  0 ð0; 1Þ þ R  0 ð2; 1Þ: The open circles in the picture on
the left in Figure 1 represent the semigroup Nð0; 1Þ þ
Nð2; 1Þ; which is a proper subsemigroup of the integer
points K \ Z2 in K: The picture on the right shows how
translates of the fundamental half-open parallelepiped P
by this subsemigroup cover K: This gives the formula
X 1 þ xy
rK ðxÞ ¼ rP ðxÞ
x m ðx 2 yÞn ¼ ;
m;n  0
ð1  xÞð1  x 2 yÞ
Figure 1. Tiling a simple cone by translates of its
fundamental parallelepiped.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 11
as the fundamental parallelepiped P contains two integer w1 ¼ ð1; 0; 1Þ; w2 ¼ ð0; 1; 1Þ; w3 ¼ ð0; 1; 1Þ;
points, the origin and the point (1, 1).
and w4 ¼ ð1; 0; 1Þ:
A simple rational cone in Rd has the form
( ) If we let K1 be the simple cone with generators
Xd X
d
w1 ; w2 ; w3 ; and K2 be the simple cone with generators
K :¼ v þ ki wi j ki 2 R  0 ¼ v þ R  0 wi ;
i¼1 i¼1 w2 ; w3 ; w4 ; then K1 and K2 decompose K into simple cones.
If s ¼ ð18 ; 0;  13Þ; then (4) holds, and no facet of s þ K1 or of
where w1 ; . . .; wd 2 Z are linearly independent. This cone
d
s þ K2 contains any integer points. We display these cones,
is tiled by the ðNw1 þ


þ Nwd Þ-translates of the half- together with their integer points having z-coordinate 0,
open parallelepiped 1, or 2.
( )
Xd
P :¼ v þ ki wi j 0  ki \1 :
i¼1

The generating function for P is the polynomial

X
rP ðxÞ ¼ xm ;
m2P\Zd

and so the generating function for K is

X rP ðxÞ
rK ðxÞ ¼ x a
rP ðxÞ ¼ ;
a2Nw1 þ


þNwd
ð1  x w1 Þ


ð1  x wd Þ

which is a rational function. This formula and its proof do

not require that the apex v be rational, but only that the
The cone s þ K1 contains the 5 magenta points shown
generators wi of the cone be linearly independent vectors
with positive first coordinate, whereas s þ K2 contains
in Zd :
the other displayed points. Their integer generating func-
A general rational cone K with apex v and generators
tions are
w1 ; . . .; wn 2 Zd has the form
xz þ xz 2
K ¼ v þ R  0 w1 þ


þ R  0 wn : rsþK1 ðxÞ ¼ ;
ð1  yzÞð1  y1 zÞð1  xzÞ
If there is a vector n 2 Rd with n
wi [ 0 for i = 1,...,n, 1þz
rsþK2 ðxÞ ¼ ; and
then K is strictly convex. A fundamental result on convexity ð1  yzÞð1  y1 zÞð1  x 1 zÞ
[2, Lemma VIII.2.3] is that such a K may be decomposed ð1 þ zÞ2 ð1  zÞ
into simple cones K1 ; . . .; Kl having pairwise disjoint inte- rK ðxÞ ¼ :
ð1  yzÞð1  y1 zÞð1  xzÞð1  x 1 zÞ
riors, each with apex v and generated by d of the
generators w1 ; . . .; wn of K: We would like to add the Then rsþK1 ðxÞ þ rsþK2 ðxÞ ¼ rK ðxÞ, as
generating functions for each cone Ki to obtain the gen-
ðxz þ xz 2 Þð1  x 1 zÞ þ ð1 þ zÞð1  xzÞ ¼ 1 þ z  z 2  z 3
erating function for K: However, some of the cones may
have lattice points in common, and some device is needed ¼ ð1 þ zÞ2 ð1  zÞ:
to treat the subsequent overcounting.
An elegant way to do this is to avoid the overcounting While the cones that appear in the Lawrence–Varchenko
altogether by translating all the cones [5]. We explain this. formula are all simple, and those in Brion’s formula are
There exists a short vector s 2 Rd such that strictly convex, we use yet more general cones in their
proof. A rational (closed) halfspace is the convex subset of
K \ Zd ¼ ðs þ KÞ \ Zd ; ð4Þ Rd defined by
and no facet of any cone s þ K1 ; . . .; s þ Kl contains any fx 2 Rd j w
x  bg;
integer points. This gives the disjoint irrational
decomposition where w 2 Zd and b 2 R: Its boundary is the rational
hyperplane fx 2 Rd j w
x ¼ bg: A (closed) cone K is the
K \ Zd ¼ ðs þ K1 Þ \ Zd t


t ðs þ Kl Þ \ Zd ; interection of finitely many closed halfspaces whose
boundary hyperplanes have some point in common. We
and so
assume this intersection is irredundant. The apex of K is the
X X
l intersection of these boundary hyperplanes, which is an
rK ðxÞ ¼ xm ¼ rsþKi ðxÞ ð5Þ affine subspace.
m2K\Zd i¼1 The generating function for the integer points in K is the
is a rational function. formal Laurent series
X
For example, suppose that K is the cone in R3 with apex SK :¼ xm : ð6Þ
the origin and generators m2K

12 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

It is a priori less clear how to interpret this formal series as a case. (A d-dimensional simplex is the intersection of d + 1
rational function if K is not strictly convex, that is, if its apex halfspaces, one for each facet.)
is not a single point. The apex is a rational affine subspace For a face F of the simplex P; let KF be the tangent cone
L, and the cone K is stable under translation by any integer to F, which is the intersection of the halfspaces corresponding
vector w that is parallel to L. If m 2 K \ Zd ; then the series to the d - dim(F) facets containing F. Let ; be the empty
SK contains the series face of P; which has dimension -1. Its tangent cone is P:
X
xm
x nw
T HEOREM 9 If P is a simplex, then
n2Z
X
as a subsum. As this can converge only for x = 0, the series 0¼ ð1ÞdimðF Þ SKF ; ð10Þ
F
SK can converge only for x = 0.
We relate these formal Laurent series to rational functions. the sum over all faces of P.
The product of a formal series and a polynomial is another
formal series. Thus the additive group C½½x11 ; . . .; xd1  of P ROOF . Consider the coefficient of xm for some m 2 Zd in
formal Laurent series is a module over the ring the sum on the right. Then m lies in the tangent cone KF to
C½x11 ; . . .; xd1  of Laurent polynomials. The space PL of a unique face F of minimal dimension, as P is a simplex.
polyhedral Laurent series is the C½x11 ; . . .; xd1 -submodule The coefficient of xm in the sum becomes
of C½½x11 ; . . .; xd1  generated by the set of formal series X
ð1ÞdimðGÞ :
fSK j K is a simple rational coneg: GF

But this vanishes, as every interval in the face poset of P is a

Since any rational cone may be triangulated by simple
Boolean lattice.
cones, PL contains the integer generating series of all
rational cones.
Now we apply the evaluation map u of Theorem 7 to the
Let Cðx1 ; . . .; xd Þ be the field of rational functions on Cd ;
formula (10). Lemma 8 implies that uðSKF Þ ¼ 0 except when
which is the quotient field of C½x11 ; . . .; xd1 : According to
F ¼ ; or F is a vertex, and then uðSKF Þ ¼ rKF ðxÞ: This gives
Ishida [11], the proof of the following theorem is due to
X
Brion. 0 ¼ rP ðxÞ þ rKv ðxÞ;
v a vertex of P
T HEOREM 7 There is a unique homomorphism of
which is Brion’s Formula for simplices.
C½x11 ; . . .; xd1 -modules
Just as for rational cones, every polytope P may be
u : PL ! Cðx1 ; . . .; xd Þ; decomposed into simplices P 1 ; . . .; P l having pairwise
disjoint interiors, using only the vertices of P :
such that uðSK Þ ¼ rK for every simple cone K in Rd :
P ROOF . Given a simple rational cone K ¼ v þ hw1 ; . . .; wd i P ¼ P1 [


[ Pl :
with fundamental parallelepiped P; we have
Then there exists a small real number
[ 0 and a short
Y
d vector s such that if we set
ð1  x wi Þ
SK ¼ rP ðxÞ:
i¼1 P 0 :¼ s þ ð1 þ
ÞP and P 0i :¼ s þ ð1 þ
ÞP i
for i ¼ 1; . . .; l;
Hence, for each S 2 PL, there is a nonzero Laurent
polynomial g 2 C½x11 ; . . .; xd1  such that gS ¼ f 2 then P 0 \ Zd ¼ P \ Zd ; and no hyperplane supporting any
C½x11 ; . . .; xd1 . If we define uðSÞ :¼ f =g 2 Cðx1 ; . . .; xd Þ; facet of any simplex P 0i meets Zd : If we write KðQÞw for the
then u(S) is independent of the choice of g. This defines the tangent cone to a polytope Q at a vertex w; then for v a
required homomorphism. vertex of P with v0 = (1 +
)v + s the corresponding ver-
tex of P 0 ; we have KðP 0 Þv0 \ Zd ¼ KðPÞv \ Zd and so this is
The map u takes care of the nonconvergence of the an irrational decomposition. Then
generating series SK when K is not strictly convex. X X
rKðPÞv ðxÞ ¼ rKðP 0 Þv ðxÞ
L EMMA 8 If a rational polyhedral cone K is not strictly v a vertex of P v a vertex of P 0

convex, then uðSK Þ ¼ 0: X

l X
¼ rKðP 0i Þv ðxÞ
i¼1 v a vertex of P 0i
P ROOF . Let K be a rational polyhedral cone that is not
strictly convex. Then there is a nonzero vector w 2 Zd such X
l

that w þ K ¼ K; and so x w
SK ¼ SK : Thus x w uðSK Þ ¼ ¼ rP i ðxÞ ¼ rP 0 ðxÞ ¼ rP ðxÞ:

uðSK Þ: Since 1  x w is not a zero-divisor in Cðx1 ; . . .; xd Þ;
we conclude that uðSK Þ ¼ 0:
We now establish Brion’s Formula, first for a simplex,
and then, using irrational decomposition, for the general
i¼1
The second equality holds because the vertex cones KðP 0i Þv
form an irrational decomposition of the vertex cone KðP 0 Þv ;
and because the same is true for the polytopes. This
completes our proof of Brion’s Formula.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 13

 Consider the quadrilateral Q; which may be triangu- along [0, 1) and (2, 3], the value 2 along [1, 2], and vanishes
lated by adding an edge between the vertices (2, 0) and everywhere else.
(0, 2). Let
¼ 14 and s ¼ ð 12 ;  14Þ: Then ð1 þ
ÞQ þ s has
vertices
ð 12;  14Þ; ð2;  14Þ; ð 12; 2 þ 14Þ; ð4 þ 12; 2 þ 14Þ :

We display the resulting irrational decomposition.

Already this simple example shows that our generators do

not form a basis: they are linearly dependent. For P 0 ¼
Q ½0; 3 and Q0 ¼ ½1; 2; we get the same sum.

We use the map u to deduce a very general form of the

Lawrence–Varchenko formula. Let P be a simple polytope,
and for each vertex v of P choose a vector nv that is not
perpendicular to any edge direction at v. Form the cone But this is the only thing that can happen.
Knv ;v as before. Then we have
X 
T HEOREM 12 ([10, 18]) The linear space of relations
rP ðxÞ ¼ ð1ÞjEv ðnv Þj rKnv ;v ðxÞ: ð11Þ among the indicator functions ½P of convex polyhedra is
v a vertex of P generated by the relations ½P þ ½Q ¼ ½P [ Q þ ½P \ Q;
Brion’s formula is the special case when each vector nv where P and Q run over polyhedra for which P [ Q is
points into the interior of the polytope. We establish (11) convex.
by showing that the sum on the right does not change
A valuation is a linear map m: V ! V , where V is some
when any of the vectors nv is rotated.
vector space. Some standard examples are
Pick a vertex v and vectors n, n0 that are not perpen-
dicular to any edge direction at v such that n
w and n
w0
have the same sign for all except one edge direction m at v.
Then Kn;v and Kn0 ;v are disjoint and their union is the V mðPÞ
(possibly) half-open cone K generated by the edge direc- R volðPÞ
tions w at v such that n
w and n0
w have the same sign,
but with apex the affine line v þ Rm: Thus we have the PL SP ðxÞ
identity of formal series Cðx1 ; . . .; xd Þ rP ðxÞ
SKn;v  SK ¼ SKn0 ;v : R 1
Applying the evaluation map u gives
rKn;v ðxÞ ¼ rKn0 ;v ðxÞ;
That rP ðxÞ is a valuation is a deep result of Khovanskii–
which proves the claim, and the generalized Lawrence– Pukhlikov [12] and of Lawrence [14]. The last example is
Varchenko formula (11). called the Euler characteristic. This valuation is surprisingly
useful. For example, it can be used to prove Theorem 13
below.
Valuations The most interesting valuation for us comes from the
Valuations provide a conceptual approach to these ideas. polar construction. The polar P _ of a polyhedron P is the
Once the theory is set up, both Brion’s Formula and the polyhedron given by
Lawrence–Varchenko Formula are easy corollaries of
duality being a valuation. We are indebted to Sasha Barv- P _ :¼ fx j hx; yi  1 for all y 2 Pg:
inok who pointed out this correspondence to the second It is instructive to work through some examples.
author during a coffee break at the 2005 Park City Mathe-
matical Institute. Let us explain.
Consider the vector space of all functions Rd ! R. Let V (1)
be the subspace that is generated by indicator functions of
polyhedra:


1 if x 2 P;
½P: x 7!
0 if x 62 P:

We add these functions pointwise. For example, if d = 1,

and P ¼ ½0; 2; Q ¼ ½1; 3; then ½P þ ½Q takes the value 1 The polar of the square … is the diamond.

14 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

(2) + − +
= − + −
+ − +

The polar of a cone K … is the cone K_ :¼

fx j hx; yi  1 for all y 2 Kg: = + + +
(3) Suppose that P is a polytope whose interior contains
the origin and F is a face of P:
− − − − +

If we apply polarity to (14), we get the Brianchon–Gram

Theorem [6, 9].
X
½P ¼ ½Kv 
v vertex
 tangent cones of faces of positive dimension:
ð15Þ
This is essentially the indicator-function version of Theo-
Then the polar of the tangent cone KF … is the convex rem 9, but for general polytopes. If we now apply the
hull of the origin together with the dual face F _ :¼ valuation r, and recall that r evaluates to zero on cones that
fx 2 P _ j hx; yi ¼ 1g; which is a pyramid over F _ : are not strictly convex, we obtain Brion’s Formula.
For this last remark, note that if x 2 F _ and y 2 KF ; Next, suppose that we are given a generic direction
then hx; yi  hF _ ; F i ¼ 1: Conversely, if x 2 K_F ; then vector n. On a face F of P; the dot product with n
hx; :i is maximized over KF at F by example (2), and it achieves its maximum at a vertex vn ðF Þ: For a vertex v of
is at most 1 there. P; we set
In these examples, the polar of the polar is the original [
polyhedron. This happens if and only if the original poly- F _n ðvÞ :¼ relint F _ :
hedron contains the origin. F :vn ðF Þ¼v

(4) The polar of the interval [1, 2] is the interval [0, 1/2], but (The relative interior, relintðPÞ; of a polyhedron P is the
the polar of [0, 1/2] is [0, 2]. topological interior when considered as a subspace of its
affine hull.) In words, we attach the relative interior of a
Now, we come to the main theorem of this section. low-dimensional pyramid convð0; F _ Þ to the full-dimen-
sional pyramid convð0; v _ Þ that we see when we look in
T HEOREM 13 (Lawrence [14]) The assignment ½P 7! ½P _  the n-direction from convð0; F _ Þ: In this way, we obtain
defines a valuation. an honest decomposition
X
½P _  ¼ ½convð0; F _n ðvÞÞ: ð16Þ
This innocent-looking result has powerful conse- v
quences. Suppose that P is a polytope whose interior
contains the origin. Then we can cover P _ by pyramids For the polar of the square, this is
convð0; F _ Þ over the codimension-one faces F _ of P _ . The
indicator functions of P and the cover differ by indicator
functions of pyramids of smaller dimension.
X
½P _  ¼ ½convð0; F _ Þ  lower dimensional pyramids:
F_
ð14Þ

The Euler–Poincaré formula for general polytopes

organizes this inclusion-exclusion, giving the exact
expression
X _
½P _  ¼ ð1Þcodim F þ1
½convð0; F _ Þ:
To compute the polar of the half-open polyhedron
We illustrate this when P is the square. convð0; F _n ðvÞÞ; we have to write its indicator function

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 15

½convð0; F _n ðvÞÞ as a linear combination of indicator func-
tions of (closed) polyhedra. If P is a simple polytope, then
all the dual faces F _ are simplices. It turns out that the
polar of convð0; F _n ðvÞÞ is precisely the forward tangent
cone Kn;v at the vertex v. So the Lawrence–Varchenko
formula is just the polar of (16).
This gives a fairly general principle for constructing
Brion-type formulas: Choose a decomposition of (the
indicator function of) P _ ; and then polarize. We invite the
reader to set up his or her own equations this way.
Although K is the difference of two unimodular cones, it
An Application has a unique decomposition as a sum of four unimodular
Brion’s Formula shows that certain data of a polytope—the cones.
list of its integer points encoded in a generating function—
can be reduced to cones. We have already seen how to
construct the generating function rK ðxÞ for a simple cone
K: General cones can be composed from simple ones via
triangulation and either irrational decomposition or inclu-
sion-exclusion. Given a rational polytope P; Brion’s
Formula allows us to write the possibly huge polynomial
rP ðxÞ as a sum of rational functions, which stem from
(triangulations of) the vertex cones. A priori it is not clear In general the cone ð0; 0Þ þ R  0 ð1; 0Þ þ R  0 ð1; nÞ is the
that this rational-function representation of rP ðxÞ is any difference of two unimodular cones, but it has a unique
shorter than the original polynomial. That this is indeed decomposition into n unimodular cones.
possible is due to the signed decomposition theorem of Arguably the most famous consequence of Barvinok’s
Barvinok [1]. Theorem applies to Ehrhart  quasipolynomials—the

To stateP Barvinok’s Theorem, we call a rational d-cone counting functions LP ðtÞ :¼ # tP \ Zd in the positve-
K ¼ v þ di¼1 R  0 wi unimodular if w1 ; . . .; wd 2 Zd gen- integer variable t for a given rational polytope [4] P: One
erate the integer lattice Zd : The significance of a P
can show that the generating function t  1 LP ðtÞ x t is a
unimodular cone K for us is that its fundamental (half- rational function, and Barvinok’s Theorem implies that this
open) parallelepiped contains precisely one integer point rational function can be computed in polynomial time.
p, and so the generating function of K has a very simple Barvinok’s algorithm has been implemented in the software
and short form packages barvinok [17] and LattE [8]. The method of
xp irrational decomposition has also been implemented in
rK ðxÞ ¼ : LattE; considerably improving its performance [13].
ð1  x w1 Þ


ð 1  x wd Þ
In fact, the description length of this is proportional to the ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
description of the cone K: Research of Beck supported in part by NSF grant DMS-
0810105. Research of Haase supported in part by NSF
T HEOREM 17 (Barvinok) For fixed dimension d, the grant DMS-0200740 and a DFG Emmy Noether fellow-
generating function rK for any rational cone K in Rd ship. Research of Sottile supported in part by the Clay
can be decomposed into generating functions of unimod- Mathematical Institute and NSF CAREER grant DMS-0538734.
ular cones in polynomial time; that is, there is a
polynomial-time algorithm and (polynomially many) uni-
P REFERENCES
modular cones Kj such that rK ðxÞ ¼ j
j rKj ðxÞ; where
1. A.I. Barvinok, A polynomial time algorithm for counting integral

j 2 f1g:
points in polyhedra when the dimension is fixed, Math. Oper. Res.
19 (1994), 769–779.
Here polynomial time refers to the input data of K; that
2. A.I. Barvinok, A course in convexity, Graduate Studies in Mathe-
is, the algorithm runs in time polynomial in the input length
matics, vol. 54, American Mathematical Society, Providence, RI,
of, say, the halfspace description of K:
2002.
Brion’s Formula implies that an identical complexity
statement can be made about the generating function rP ðxÞ 3. P. Baum, Wm. Fulton, and G. Quart, Lefschetz-Riemann-Roch for
for any rational polytope P: From here it is a short step singular varieties. Acta Math. 143 (1979), no. 3–4, 193–211.
(which nevertheless needs some justification) to see that 4. M. Beck and S. Robins, Computing the continuous discretely,
one can count integer points in a rational polytope in Undergraduate Texts in Mathematics, Springer, New York, 2007.
polynomial time. 5. M. Beck and F. Sottile, Irrational proofs of three theorems of
We illustrate Barvinok’s short signed decomposition for Stanley, 2005, European J. Combin. 28 (2007), 403–409.
the cone K :¼ ð0; 0Þ þ R  0 ð1; 0Þ þ R  0 ð1; 4Þ; ignoring 6. C.J. Brianchon, Théorème nouveau sur les polyèdres, J. École
cones of smaller dimension. (Royale) Polytechnique 15 (1837), 317–319.

16 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

 7. M. Brion, Points entiers dans les polyèdres convexes, Ann. Sci.
École Norm. Sup. 21 (1988), no. 4, 653–663.
8. J.A. De Loera, D. Haws, R. Hemmecke, P. Huggins, and R.
Yoshida, A user’s guide for LattE v1.1, software package
LattE (2004), electronically available at http://www.math.
ucdavis.edu/*latte/.
9. J.P. Gram, Om rumvinklerne i et polyeder, Tidsskrift for Math.
(Copenhagen) 4 (1874), no. 3, 161–163.
10. H. Groemer, On the extension of additive functionals on classes of
convex sets, Pacific J. Math. 75 (1978), no. 2, 397–410.
11. M.-N. Ishida, Polyhedral Laurent series and Brion’s equalities,
Internat. J. Math. 1 (1990), no. 3, 251–265.
12. A.G. Khovanskii and A.V. Pukhlikov, The Riemann-Roch theorem
for integrals and sums of quasipolynomials on virtual polytopes,
Algebra i Analiz 4 (1992), 188–216.
13. M. Koeppe, A primal Barvinok algorithm based on irrational
decompositions, SIAM J. Discrete Math. 21 (2007), no. 1, 220–
236.
14. J. Lawrence, Valuations and polarity, Discrete Comput. Geom. 3
(1988), no. 4, 307–324.
15. J. Lawrence, Polytope volume computation, Math. Comp. 57
(1991), no. 195, 259–271.
16. A.N. Varchenko, Combinatorics and topology of the arrangement
of affine hyperplanes in the real space, Funktsional. Anal. i Pri-
lozhen. 21 (1987), no. 1, 11–22.
17. S. Verdoolaege, software package barvinok (2004), electroni-
cally available at http://freshmeat.net/projects/barvinok/.
18. W. Volland, Ein Fortsetzungssatz für additive Eipolyhederfunk-
tionale im euklidischen Raum, Arch. Math. 8 (1957), 144–
149.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 17
Four Poems from When She Was Kissed
by the Mathematician
Sandra M. Gilbert

After He Expounds the Different Infinities

Half the night sleepless, dreaming infinities—

the countable set and the unaccountable—

she listens to his breathing, sometimes

even, placid and perfectly

divisible, the way she imagines

certain numbers are,

sometimes stopped by odd

irregular murmurs, listens and counts

his breaths, his unintelligible words

as if she wrapped a rosary of integers

around her wrists, his wrists, linking them both

in the smaller infinity, the kind you can count

and maybe comprehend,

the one that Zeno scorned.

His chest with its mane of gray

rises and falls as she counts, crawls nearer,

wishing he’d explain again or else

embrace her, silence this abacus

of prayer that ticks in her head:

O God, whatever you are, let this one

be —and the bed swells

in the heat, in the dark, and the single

sheet that holds them close

winds round and round like the great

enfolding spaces through which arrows

fly and breaths and prayers

on their eccentric route

toward Zeno’s black incalculable target.

18 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.

 They Debate Triangles and Medians She Grapples With Operations Research

That they are is obvious to him, ... the by now famous problem of the jeep... concerns
remarkable to her. a jeep which is able to carry enough fuel to travel a
She grants the points, their dark distance d, but is required to cross a desert whose
distance is greater than d (for example 2d). It is to do
necessity, each a moment brimming this by carrying fuel from its home base and estab-
with its own being— lishing fuel depots at various points along its route so
and the lines, well, given points that it can refuel as it moves farther out... [But] in
general, the more jeeps one sends across, the lower
and given time, the fuel consumption per jeep.
no doubt there must be lines,
those fateful journeyings —David Gale, ‘‘The Jeep Once More or Jeeper by the
Dozen’’
from here to there, from this to that.
But the vertices where journeys meet, The mathematician is crossing the desert,
the angles, wide or narrow, yearning for closure his fine high features creased with thought.

and then letting go— One tank of fuel at this depot, another stashed at that.
aren’t these, she asks, unlikely How many caches needed in between?
as the medians that cling together
She worries. It’s all too Zeno for her liking.
at the center of each triangle, And what if he insists on the Sahara?
knotting altitudes and perpendiculars
into a single web of possibility? No, he promises, he’ll only try the kindlier
Mojave this time, with its rainstruck buds and rare
And maybe Euclid got it halfway right:
in luminous sections, intersections, new blossoms rising while his jeep,
everything is joined and rational, his squad of jeeps, moves slowly on the trip

at least for a while, through sand, through quarks and quirks of sand,
as if somebody had suddenly conjectured yes, their particles an endless series
it can make sense—
as she waits and hates his danger.
and the triangles and medians The mathematician crosses, curses, blesses,
of you and me and them
last and glow till one by one the infinite regressions of the desert:
and the desert sun storms down like thunder, like a roar
the fastenings unclasp
and that which must be linear of light against his beard, his temples
sheds the comforts of shape, clenched with calculations

each line going its lonely distance and desire.

to the non-Euclidean place At stated stations
where parallels diverge in darkness.
palms, dates, springs of comfort
will appear. And there he’ll prudently

[Editor’s Note. David Gale of the University of California Berkeley, a long-time Intelligencer collaborator (and my friend for a much longer time) died 7 March 2008. Long-
time readers will remember his lively and inventive columns for this magazine, many of which were collected in Tracking the Automatic Ant (Springer, 1998).
Mathematicians everywhere value his contributions to convexity, combinatorics, and applications (of games, inequalities, etc.) to social sciences. One of the major
landmarks here was his Theory of Linear Economic Models (McGraw-Hill, 1960). The story will be told at length in a tribute to Gale to appear as a special issue of Games
and Economic Behavior. And many of you have followed his admirable venture into a ‘‘math museum‘‘ on the Web, see http://mathsite.math.berkeley.edu/main.html.
Those who have been especially attentive will have noticed an unusual and touching gesture: David Gale dedicated a theorem to his partner, Sandra Gilbert! See The
Intelligencer, vol. 15 (1993), no. 4, 61. After all, he said, this is only reciprocity, for she dedicated poems to me. And here, with a delay, are some of her poems. They
appeared earlier in her Kissing the Bread: New and Selected Poems, 1969–1999, W.W. Norton, 2000, and are reprinted here by permission. —Chandler Davis]

Ó 2008 Sandra M. Gilbert, Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 19

 sequester further energies.
Blank sky and melting gold, keen blade
of lemmas roaring through his engine.
She stands on the sidelines in the shade.
She stirs a pitcher of gin and lemonade.
Astute, her body manufactures
leafy murmurs as she turns herself
into a crystal dish of peaches.
The mathematician is crossing the desert,
crossing, journeying past Zeno, past the infinite.
She wants to be the first
oasis that he reaches.
He Explains the Book Proof
The shadowy clatter of the café
frames the glittering doorway.
A white cup and a blue bowl
inscribe pure shapes on the table.
The mathematician says, Let’s turn the pages
and find the proof in the book of proofs.
He says, It’s as if it’s already there,
somewhere just outside the door.
as if by sitting zazen in a coffee house,
someone could get through or get ‘‘across,"
or as if the theorems had already all
been written down on sheer

sheets of the invisible,

and held quite still,

so that to think hard enough

is simply to read and to recall—

the way the table remembers the tree,

the bowl remembers the kiln.

Department of English, University of California Davis, Davis,

CA 95616, USA.
e-mail: sgilbert@ucdavis.edu

20 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

 Years Ago David E. Rowe, Editor

Jakob Introduction
teiner’s Systematische Ent-
theorems as mere consequences left as
footprints in the development of this

Steiner’s S wickelung of 1832 was a

monumental unification of
classical geometry based on a new
conception of projective geometry and
Systematische a new approach to conic sections. We
shall study this work in some detail. I
one idea. Almost unconsciously, this
led me to the actual genetic viewpoint,
as it must have appeared to the ancient
geometers, although I approached it in
the opposite way. Since I had a wealth
of solved problems and theorems

Entwickelung: shall also claim that Steiner was com-

mitted to the unification and reverence
of classical geometry, and that his
available to me, my task was to focus
not on individual theorems but rather
the general principles of synthetic
The Culmina- work was a remarkable success by
these standards, but that later genera-
construction from which all these
inventions follow, to present them in
this capacity and treat them exhaus-
tion of tions imposed different standards of
success, downplaying historical conti-
nuity and favouring intrinsically
tively according to these principles.’’
(Graf (1897, p. 12–13); for more of

Classical motivated programmatic agendas—in

Geometry
VIKTOR BLÅSJÖ
Send submissions to David E. Rowe,
Fachbereich 08—Institut für Mathematik,
Johannes Gutenberg University,
D55099 Mainz, Germany.
e-mail: rowe@mathematik.uni-mainz.de
the case of projective geometry epito-
mised by von Staudt (1847)—which
caused a lasting and undeserved
depreciation of Steiner’s work.
It ought to be uncontroversial that
the Systematische Entwickelung was
intended as a unification of classical
geometry since, first, it is packed with
classical theorems and references to
classical geometers, and, second, Stei-
ner says so. In his preface, Steiner
explains that the goal of his work is to
‘‘extract a thread of continuity and a
common root’’ from classical geometry
by uncovering ‘‘fundamental proper-
ties that contain the germ of all
theorems, porisms, and problems of
geometry, so generously made avail-
able to us in older and modern times.’’
Classical geometry has thus far pro-
duced ‘‘a collection of separate tricks,
however clever, but no organically
connected whole. This work tries to
uncover the organism by which the
most varied features of the spatial
world are connected. A small number
of very simple fundamental relation-
ships make up the schema by which
the remaining mass of theorems can be
developed consistently and without
difficulty.’’ Elsewhere he said: ‘‘As a
teacher I tried whenever possible to
treat each subject as consisting of a
single idea, and to see the individual
Steiner’s own words on these matters,
see Lange (1899, pp. 19–21, 23–24)).
Finally, I cannot help but perceive as
symbolic an observation made by
Jacobi (1843) in a letter to his wife
written when Jacobi and Steiner were
both in Rome: ‘‘Steiner has an aptitude
for finding walled-in old Doric col-
umns in old stables and worn-down
buildings . . . through which one is
clearly reminded that one is walking
on classical soil.’’
Nevertheless, many commentators
miss this point and consequently fail to
appreciate Steiner’s work. Back in the
old days the Systematische Entwicke-
lung used to be called ‘‘epoch making’’
(Kötter (1901, p. 252)), a ‘‘masterpiece’’
(Zacharias (1912, p. 41)), ‘‘a model of a
complete method and execution for all
other branches of mathematics’’
(Jacobi (1845), quoted in Burckhardt
(1976, p. 18)), and so on. Not so today,
however. As a framework for this dis-
cussion, let us state a principle which
should be a truism but which is in fact
violated in many commentaries on
Steiner. Suppose a mathematician X
writes a work aiming to achieve Y.
Anyone wishing to criticise this work
could reasonably be expected to argue
that either
(i) X does not achieve the objective Y;
or

Ó 2008 SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 21

(ii) the objective Y is not worth
pursuing.
A charge of the type ‘‘X does not deal
with Z’’ is plainly irrelevant. Still, this is
precisely the type of criticism offered
by many commentators.
Leading the crusade is Klein (1979,
p. 118), who writes in his discussion of
the Systematische Entwickelung: ‘‘in
retreating from the ground won by
Möbius and rejecting the principle of
signs from synthetic geometry, [Steiner]
deprived himself of the possibility of
more general formulations. Thus, when
dealing with cross-ratios he was forced
always to fix the order of the elements;
but, above all, he lost the occasion of
mastering the imaginary. He never
really understood it and fell into the use
of such terms as ‘the ghost’ or ‘the sha-
dow land of geometry.’ And of course
his system had to suffer from this self-
imposed restriction. Thus, though there
are two conics x12 þ x22
x32 ¼ 0 and
x12 þ x22 þ x32 ¼ 0 from a projective
point of view, in Steiner’s system there is
no room for the second. Von Staudt was
the first to liberate synthetic geometry
from these and other imperfections.’’
The ‘‘Steiner: bad—von Staudt:
good’’ dichotomy is very prevalent. For
example, Coolidge’s discussion (1934,
pp. 222–223) of the Systematische
Entwickelung is mostly concerned with
finding ‘‘slips’’ and is immediately fol-
lowed by an ecstatic discussion of von
Staudt, ‘‘this deep thinker,’’ who ‘‘per-
ceived two essential weaknesses in the
synthetic geometry of his predeces-
sors. (a) The basis of projective
relations was the cross-ratio. This is
projectively invariant but, as previ-
ously given, was based on distances
and angles which are not in themselves
unalterable. (b) What are imaginary
points anyway? What can be said about
them, except that they are imaginary?’’
Although Klein, as a proud disciple
of Plücker, is certainly biased in this
issue, his point of view has nevertheless
taken hold quite widely. Laptev & Ro-
zenfel’d (1996, p. 37), for example, do
not hesitate to state that Steiner’s dis-
regard for negative and complex
numbers is ‘‘an important defect.’’ Even
the ‘‘Geometry’’ article in the Encyc-
lopædia Britannica (Heilbron (2007)),
supposedly an objective source, takes a
Kleinian stance: ‘‘Poncelet’s followers
22 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
realized that they were hampering
themselves, and disguising the true
fundamentality of projective geometry,
by retaining the concept of length and
congruence in their formulations, since
projections do not usually preserve
them. . . . Efforts were well under way
by the middle of the 19th century, by . . .
von Staudt . . . among others, to purge
projective geometry of the last super-
fluous relics from its Euclidean past.’’
These commentators miss the point.
Steiner achieves exactly what he sets out
to achieve—a systematic unification of
classical geometry—whereas von Sta-
udt of course never comes close to
anything of the sort. The intrinsic theory
point of view naturally makes Steiner’s
work look flawed, but the real issue is
whether the ideas of von Staudt et al.
would have helped Steiner further his
objective. I say that the answer is almost
always no. Steiner is not ‘‘forced’’ to fix
the order of the elements in the cross-
ratio; he chooses to use this classical
notion of the cross-ratio and it serves
him well. It is not that there is ‘‘no room’’
for the conic x12 þ x22 þ x32 ¼ 0; there is
in fact no point in it since Steiner’s only
interest is the classical theory. His work
does not ‘‘suffer’’ from exclusion of
imaginary elements, because they are
not needed, and therefore Steiner could
not care less ‘‘what can be said about
them.’’ As for using metric notions
where purely projective ones are pos-
sible—so what? If our goal is to unify
classical geometry, metric notions are
by no means an ‘‘essential weakness.’’
To insist on purely projective methods is
a ‘‘self-imposed restriction’’ if there ever
was one. What was ‘‘purged’’ by von
Staudt et al. was not ‘‘superfluous rel-
ics’’ but historical continuity.
Klein (1979, p. 118) also claims that
‘‘further imperfections affect the basic
definitions of Steiner’s system, so that
many more theorems have exceptions
than Steiner was aware of.’’ To support
this claim, Klein refers to Baldus
(1923). But this seems to me to be
based on a misunderstanding due to a
too modern reading of Steiner. Baldus
does not so much attack Steiner’s
work, per se, but rather contemporary
authors using his definition of projec-
tivity, his argument being that it cannot
properly handle pencils centred at
infinity (p. 87). But Steiner himself
does not use pencils centred at infinity;
indeed, doing so would have caused
him great difficulty, since, as the above
gentlemen so eagerly remarked, his
definition of the cross-ratio is metrical.
Projective Geometry in the
Systematische Entwickelung
I shall now provide an overview of the
mathematical content of the System-
atische Entwickelung. First, we study
the cross-ratio, which is the foundation
of the entire theory. This immediately
yields swift proofs of the classical the-
orems of Pappus and Desargues. The
real triumph, however, is Steiner’s
theory of conic sections, which we
shall study subsequently.
The Cross-Ratio
We shall now see how Steiner arrived
at the cross-ratio. Consider a line A and
a pencil at B, and let a; b; c; . . . be the
points where the line is intersected by
the lines a; b; c; . . . of the pencil
(Figure 1). The line and the pencil are
said to be in perspective. If we move
the line or the pencil, then a; b; c; . . .
will no longer correspond to a; b; c; . . .,
but there will be some definite relation
between the two entities (i.e., knowing
the lengths ab, bc, etc., means knowing
the angles \ab, \bc, etc.). We find this
relation as follows. Let p be the line of
the pencil perpendicular to A, and
draw the perpendicular d1 a to d. Then
Bpd and ad1 d are similar, giving
Bp ad1
¼ ;
Bd ad
or, since ad1 ¼ Ba  sinð\adÞ,
ad Ba  Bd
¼ :
sinð\adÞ Bp
By the same argument,
ac Ba  Bc
¼ ;
sinð\acÞ Bp
bc Bb  Bc
¼ ;
sinð\bcÞ Bp
bd Bb  Bd
¼ ;
sinð\bdÞ Bp
which combine to give
ad . bd
sinð\adÞ sinð\bdÞ
ac . bc
¼
sinð\acÞ sinð\bcÞ
 a2 , the third Pappus point, located on
A2, as was to be shown.

Desargues’ Theorem (§21)

Steiner’s proof of Desargues’s theorem
begins with the following lemma
(Figure 27). Let A, A1, A2 be three
projectively related lines, i.e., there are
projections
A ! A1 : a;b;c;... ! 7 a1 ;b1 ;c1 ;...;
A ! A2 : a;b;c;... ! 7 a2 ;b2 ;c2 ;...;
A1 ! A2 : a1 ;b1 ;c1 ;... ! 7 a2 ;b2 ;c2 ;...;

and let the lines meet in a point e;e1 ;e2 .

The lemma says that the three points of
Figure 1. projection B;B1 ;B2 are on a line.
Proof: The line BB1 is a projection line
of A ! A1 as well as A ! A2 , so it goes
through three corresponding points
d;d1 ;d2 . But d1 d2 must be a projection
or the triangle efl1 is inscribed in the tri- line of the third projection A1 ! A2 , so
angle BB1 B2 . This means that e, f, and B2 must also be on this line. Thus
ad . ac sinð\adÞ . sinð\acÞ
¼ ; l (the intersection of A and Bl1 ) all B;B1 ;B2 are collinear, and the lemma
bd bc sinð\bdÞ sinð\bcÞ come back onto themselves when sent is proved. Desargues’s theorem may
which no longer depends on the throughout the series of projections now be proved as follows. Let aa1 a2
positions of the line and the pencil, so A ! A1 ! A2 ! A defined by the and bb1 b2 be two triangles in per-
we have found the relation we were projection points B; B2 ; B1 . So, by the spective, i.e., the lines A, A1, A2
looking for. This is the cross-ratio. An three-point determinacy, this cycle of connecting corresponding vertices
immediate consequence ðxx5; 10Þ is the projections is the identity. Following meet in a point e. Let B;B1 ;B2 be the
theorem that for any line cutting a the course of a through these projec- intersections of the extensions of cor-
pencil, the points a; b; c; d of the line tions traces out a triangle aa1 a2 , with responding sides of the triangles, and
corresponding to the lines a, b, c, d of
the pencil always have the same cross-
ratio (since the right-hand side in the
above expression stays the same),
which is a more conventional state-
ment of the projective invariance of the
cross-ratio. In particular, since the
cross-ratio is preserved when a line is
projected onto another line, such a
projection is determined by its effect
on any three points ðxx6; 10Þ.

Pappus’ Theorem (§23)

We are given a hexagon
B1 BB2 a1 eaB1 with vertices alternately
on two lines B1 eB2 and a1 Ba
(Figure 30; I shall reproduce Steiner’s
figures with their original numbering).
We wish to show Pappus’s theorem:
The three points of intersection of
opposite sides are on a line. Draw the
lines ae (A) and BB2 , meeting in f, and
draw the lines a1 e (A1) and BB1 ,
meeting in l1 . The points f and l1 are
the first two Pappus points; we need to
show that the third point, the inter-
section of a1 B2 and aB1 , is on the
same line (A2). To do this, we note that Figure 30.

Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 23


Figure 27.
use these points to project A ! A1 ,
A ! A2 , and A1 ! A2 . Under these
projections, a;b;e, and a1 ;b1 ;e, and
a2 ;b2 ;e correspond by construction, so
by the three-point determinacy of
projections, the three lines are projec-
tively related, so, by the result just
proved B;B1 ;B2 must be on a line,
which is Desargues’s theorem.
Conic Sections in the
Systematische Entwickelung
As promised above, we shall now see
how a remarkably unified and simple
approach to conic sections is made
possible by the basic theory of
projections.
The Fundamental Theorem on
Conic Sections (§§37–39)
Steiner’s fundamental theorem on
conic sections is, according to himself,
‘‘more important than all the previ-
ously known theorems about them, for
it is the true fundamental theorem,
since it is so comprehensive that
almost all other properties of these
figures follow from it in the simplest
and clearest way, and the method by
which they will be deduced surpasses
any known point of view in terms of
simplicity and convenience’’ ðx39Þ.
We shall discuss the theorem first in
terms of circles. It extends to general
conics by projection, of course. Con-
sider a circle with center M and two of
its tangents A, A1 (Figure 38). Any
other tangent a pairs a point of A with
a point of A1. We shall prove that this
correspondence A ! A1 is a projec-
tion. First, let q,r be the two tangents
24 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
parallel to A, A1; thus if we let q be the
point at infinity of A, then q1 will be the
intersection of A1 and q; and similarly,
if we let r1 be the point at infinity of A1,
then r will be the intersection of A and
r. Consider now two other tangents
a, b. To show that the correspondence
is a projection we need to show that
the cross-ratio of a; r; b; q is the same as
the cross-ratio of a1 ; r1 ; b1 ; q1 , i.e.,
ar . aq a1 r1 . a1 q1
¼ :
br bq b1 r1 b1 q1
Since q and r1 are the points at infinity,
this simplifies to
ar . .a q
1 1
1¼1
br b1 q1
or
ar  a1 q1 ¼ br  b1 q1 :
Therefore, to show that the corre-
spondence is a projection, we need to
show that the quantity ar  a1 q1 is
independent of the choice of a. To do
this, we note first that rq1 cuts the circle
Figure 38.
in half, making an equilateral triangle
drq1 with base angles a = a1. Connect-
ing a to M obviously bisects the angle
at a, and, similarly, a1 M bisects the
angle at a1 . Also, by comparing the
angle sums of the triangle aMa1 and
the quadrilateral arq1 a1 , we see that
the angle \aMa1 is equal to a. There-
fore, the triangles aMa1 , arM, Mq1 a1
are similar, giving ar=rM ¼ Mq1 =q1 a1 ,
or ar  a1 q1 ¼ Mr  Mq1 , so ar  a1 q1
is indeed independent of a, as we
needed to show.
Thus we have proved the following
theorem ðx38:IVÞ: Any two projectively
related lines define a conic section to
which they and all their projection
lines are tangents (Figure A(i)). Or,
dually, any two projectively related
pencils define a conic section through
the centers of the pencils as the locus
of intersections of corresponding lines
(Figure A(ii)).
The two dual forms of the funda-
mental theorem subsume, as we shall
prove below, two of the most promi-
nent earlier attempts at systematic
approaches to conic sections, namely
those of Pascal and Newton.
Pascal (1640) envisioned a unifica-
tion of the theory of conic sections
based on his ‘‘hexagrammum mysti-
cum.’’ Immediately after having
introduced his theorem he says: ‘‘[W]e
propose to give a complete text on the
elements of conics, that is to say, all the
properties of diameters and other
straight lines, of tangents, etc., to con-
struction of the cone from substantially
these data, the description of conic
sections by points, etc.’’ (Pascal (1640),
quoted from Struik (1969, p. 165)).
This program saw a revival with the
discovery of Brianchon’s theorem.

Figure A. The two dual ways of generating conic sections
by the fundamental theorem (From Courant & Robbins
(1941, pp. 208, 205)).
Newton (1667/68) unified much
conic section theory by the following
construction (Figure B): Given two
rules HFG and RKS with fixed angles
\HFG and \RKS, and fixed points F
and K, if we make one intersection, S,
move along a line, then the other
intersection, R, traces out a conic. This
is a very efficient tool, not least for
solving construction problems involv-
ing conics. Newton later put some of
this theory in the Principia (1687,
Book I, Section V), although it does
Figure B. Newton’s organic construction of conic
sections. (From Newton (1967–1981, Vol. 2, p. 118).)
not do much good there, appearing, as
it does, in a section having ‘‘but little
connection with the rest of the Prin-
cipia’’ (Ball (1893, p. 81)). A more
systematic account was later provided
by Maclaurin (1720).
The fundamental theorem also has
several interesting immediate corollar-
ies ðxx40
41Þ. If, for instance, the two
generating lines are similar, then the
line at infinity is a projection line and
thus a tangent to the conic, so there-
fore the conic must be a parabola. The
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
fundamental theorem also shows that a
conic is determined by five tangents
(or, dually, five points): Two tangents
are taken as the generating lines and
the other three determine the projec-
tive relation between them, by the
three-point determinacy of projective
transformations.
Furthermore, the fundamental con-
struction of conic sections extended to
space becomes a construction of one-
sheeted hyperboloids: For any two
projectively related lines in space,
their projection lines generate a one-
sheeted hyperboloid ðx51:IVÞ.
I should also mention that Steiner’s
fundamental theorem is commonly
called ‘‘Steiner’s definition’’ of conic
sections, and is sometimes criticised as
such; e.g., ‘‘Steiner’s definition assigns
a special role to two points on the
conic, obscuring its essential symme-
try’’ (Coxeter (1993, p. ix)). Also, Kline
(1972, pp. 847–848), in his discussion
of the Systematische Entwickelung,
speaks of Steiner’s ‘‘now standard
projective method of defining the
conic sections’’ and claims that ‘‘he did
not identify his conics with sections of
a cone,’’ which is false (they are pro-
jective images of circles, as we have
seen), and, I might add, fundamentally
inconsistent with Steiner’s commitment
to classical geometry. The freedom to
define the objects of study as one
pleases comes only when a theory
matures into the stage of intrinsic
motivation.
Pascal’s and Brianchon’s
Theorems (§42)
We shall prove Brianchon’s theorem.
Pascal’s theorem, of course, follows
dually. Consider a hexagon B1 B2 kaa1
l1 B1 circumscribing a conic (Figure 31;
the conic is not shown). Take the two
sides ak (A) and a1 l1 (A1) as the two
generating tangents of the fundamental
theorem. Then the fundamental theo-
rem says that these two sides A and A1
are projectively related and that the
other four sides are projection lines
connecting corresponding points of A
and A1. Now project A onto kl1 (A2)
from B1 , and project A1 onto A2 from
B2 . These two projections agree on
three points—the images of b and b1 , k
and k1 , and l and l1 —so, by the three-
point determinacy, they must also
agree on the image of a and a1 , i.e.,
25

Figure 31.
B1 a and B2 a1 intersect A2 at the same
point. So the three diagonals
B1 a; B2 a1 ; A2 meet at a point (a2 ),
which is Brianchon’s theorem.
Newton’s Organic Construction
of Conic Sections (§46)
Newton’s organic construction of con-
ics follows immediately from the
fundamental theorem. Recall from
Section 3.1 that we have two rules with
fixed angle, and we wish to show that
as one intersection moves along a line
the other traces out a conic. The fact
that the first intersection moves along a
line means in our language that we
have two projective pencils, B and B1
(Figure 50). The second intersection is
the intersection of two other pencils,
B2 and B3 , which, since the angles of
the rules are fixed, are in fact just
rotated copies of the previous pencils.
So, by the fundamental theorem, these
two projectively related pencils define
a conic section.
Pole and Polar Theory (§44–45)
In this section, we shall see how the
theory of poles and polars may be
approached through Steiner’s funda-
mental theorem on conic sections. This
is particularly interesting since this
theory was a precursor of the modern
notion of duality, which, although it
had been recognised before, Steiner
was the first to give a prominent place
at the very foundation of projective
geometry ðx1Þ.
26 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
Figure 50.
Poles and Polars Before Steiner
Polar reciprocation with respect to a
circle associates a line with every point
and a point with every line, as follows.
Consider a line that cuts through the
circle. It meets the circle in two points.
Draw the tangents to the circle through
these points. The two tangents meet in
a point. This point is the pole of the
line. Conversely, the line is the polar of
the point. Thus, we can deal with lines
that cut through the circle and, equiv-
alently, points outside the circle. But
what about a line outside the circle (or,
equivalently, a point inside the circle)?
Let l be such a line. For every point on
l, there is a polar line through the cir-
cle, as above. We claim that all these
polar lines have one point in common,
so that this point is the natural pole of
l. Monge ð1799; x39Þ proves this by
cleverly bringing in the third dimen-
sion. Imagine a sphere that has the
circle as its equator. Every point on l is
the vertex of a tangent cone to this
sphere, where the two tangents to the
equator are part of this cone and the
polar line is the perpendicular projec-
tion of the circle of intersection of the
sphere and the cone. Now consider a
plane through l tangent to the sphere.
It touches the sphere at one point
P. Every cone contains this point
(because the line from any point on l
to P is a tangent to the sphere and so is
part of the tangent cone). Thus, for
every cone, the perpendicular projec-
tion of the intersection with the sphere
goes through the point perpendicu-
larly below P, and this is the pole of l,
and l is the polar of this point.
Polar Theory and Duality
Polar reciprocation thus suggests a
duality between points and lines. Bri-
anchon (1806) was perhaps the first to
use this idea in his proof of ‘‘Brianchon’s
theorem,’’ the dual of Pascal’s theorem.
The polar reciprocation approach to
duality was systematised by Poncelet
(1822). In this tradition, Brianchon’s
theorem can be derived as follows. We
start with Pascal’s theorem, i.e., we have
a hexagon inscribed in a conic. When
we apply polar reciprocation, the conic
goes to a conic, because through any
point off the conic there are two tan-
gents to it, and they go to two collinear
points on the new curve, so the new
curve has degree two, so it is a conic.
And the vertices of the hexagon, being
points of the conic, go to tangents to the
new conic, and thus the hexagon goes
to a circumscribed hexagon, and the
sides of the original hexagon go to the
vertices of the new, and the line where
extensions of opposite sides meet goes
to the point where lines connecting
opposite vertices meet.
It is, however, not necessary to
approach duality through polar recip-
rocation. Gergonne (1825/26) argued
that the same effect is achieved ‘‘by
merely exchanging the two words
points and lines with one another.’’
This suggests itself from an extension
of the above ideas beyond the domain
of conics: Any curve can be assigned a
dual curve, namely the curve envel-
oped by the polars of all its points.
These two contrasting views led to
a dispute between Poncelet and
Gergonne; see, e.g., Gray (2007,
Chapter 5). Steiner notes in his preface
that this dispute is put in perspective by
his work, concluding that while ‘‘Ger-
gonne’s principle proves, in retrospect,
to be more primitive, closer to the
source, Poncelet has made an equally
valuable contribution, in his develop-
ment and furthering of synthetic
geometry, so that this field may no
longer be disregarded, as it has been all
too often and all too frivolously in
modern times.’’
Steiner’s Approach to Polar
Reciprocation
Steiner’s approach to polar reciproca-
tion may be illustrated by his proof of
the theorem of Monge studied above.
The proof uses the harmonic property
of the complete quadrilateral, so we
shall prove that first. A harmonic set
of points is four points with cross-
ratio 1,
ad . ac
¼1
bd bc
(or -1 according to many other
authors, since, in the typical case, bd is
‘‘negative’’). A complete quadrilateral
is a figure determined by four lines.
Figure 26 shows a complete quadrilat-
eral with sides a,b,a1,b1 and diagonals
AE; a1 E; aC. We wish to show that
each diagonal is divided harmonically
by the other two, i.e., aDb1 C and
a1 DbE and ACBE are all harmonic
sets. Consider the three lines a,b,c
through a, and consider the fourth line
d that makes a, d, b, c harmonic. In the
same way, consider the line d1 that
makes a1, d1, b1, c harmonic. When
the four lines a, d, b, c or the four lines
a1, d1, b1, c are intersected by the
diagonal aC, the result is then a har-
monic set of points. It must be the same
set in both cases, by the three-point
determinacy, since the two sets have
three points in common: a and a1 meet
at a, and b and b1 meet at b1 , and c is
shared. Therefore, d and d1 must meet
at some point D0 that makes aD0 b1 C
harmonic. Applying the same argument
Figure 26.
with a1 C in place of aC shows that d
and d1 must also meet at some point D00
that makes a1 D00 bE harmonic. But by
construction, D0 must be on the diag-
onal aC, and D00 must be on the
diagonal a1 E, so both D0 and D00 must
in fact be D, the intersection of these
two diagonals. Thus aDb1 C and a1 DbE
are harmonic sets, as was to be shown.
Now we are ready for Steiner’s proof
of Monge’s theorem above. Consider
Figure 43. We wish to show that as the
intersection f of the two tangents A1, A3
at the points a1 ; a3 moves in a line y,
then the line a1 a3 turns around the point
y. Draw two other tangents A, A2 to
make a complete quadrilateral. By the
harmonic property of the complete
quadrilateral, e; y; d; z is a harmonic set
of points. Projecting from f, we see that
a1 ; y; a3 ; v is a harmonic set of points.
Projecting from z, we see that a; y; a2 ; u
is a harmonic set of points. But as f
moves, a; a2 ; u stay the same. Therefore,
y must stay the same also, as was to be
shown.
Conclusion
Let me now revisit my thesis that Stei-
ner was committed to historical
continuity. We have seen that there is
good reason to interpret the System-
atische Entwickelung in this way. We
have also seen that some remarks of
Steiner himself point in this direction.
This is the sum of my evidence.
Biographical accounts of Steiner—of
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
which there are very few, and none of
full length—do not offer direct support
for the thesis. On the contrary, the
thesis appears to contradict a standard
characterisation of Steiner.
Criticism of Steiner goes hand in
hand with biographical accounts of
him as intuitively gifted but unschol-
arly and somewhat flimsy. Lampe
(1900, p. 138), for example, says that
‘‘it is very probable that he never
studied the writings of other mathe-
maticians, but merely looked through
them to compare his results with those
of his predecessors.’’ How, then, is one
to explain that the Systematische Ent-
wickelung reads like a monumental
unification of classical geometry? The
biographers propose an easy solution:
They simply maintain that the whole
work was more or less ghostwritten by
Jacobi, ‘‘who, unlike Steiner, read an
extraordinary amount and was well
versed in the mathematical literature’’
(Graf (1897, p. 13–14)). Despite never
reading any books, Steiner still pro-
vides frequent historical references in
the Systematische Entwickelung,
including, on one occasion, references
to 15 mathematicians on a single page
(Werke, I, p. 340). Geiser (1874, p. 249)
thinks that ‘‘one may assume’’ that it
was Jacobi who ‘‘made the careful lit-
erary references possible,’’ an opinion
shared by Obenrauch (1897, p. 253).
Lampe (1900, pp. 138–139) and
Biermann (1963, p. 40) also emphasise
27

Figure 43.
Jacobi’s role in teaching the ignorant
Steiner about the literature.
I believe Jacobi’s role is overstated by
these authors. Surely Steiner would
have discussed such matters with
Jacobi, and indeed there are such indi-
cations in the the excerpts from their
correspondence published by Jahnke
(1903b, e.g., p. 271). But in the same
letters Steiner also brings up many ref-
erences himself. Also, the references in
the Systematische Entwickelung are not
very careful at all (not up to Jacobian
standards); most of the time, Steiner just
gives a name with an occasional ‘‘bek-
anntlich’’ thrown in here and there. And
if the references were primarily sup-
plied by Jacobi, then it would perhaps
seem strange for Steiner to write
28 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
explicitly in his preface that ‘‘all impor-
tant theorems already discovered by
others I have, to the extent of my
knowledge, credited to their original
discoverers.’’
The fact that Steiner gives more fre-
quent references in the Systematische
Entwickelung than elsewhere could
easily be accounted for without assum-
ing the interference of Jacobi by the fact
that the Systematische Entwickelung is
fundamentally a unification of classical
geometry, so references are highly rele-
vant, whereas many of his other works
are, in essence, self-contained, so refer-
ences would not contribute to the
purpose of the work. This is also con-
sistent with the common claim that
Steiner did not always give proper
references when he borrowed ideas
from others—e.g., Klein (1979, p. 116);
apparently Jacobi also had reservations,
see Steiner (1833) in Jahnke (1903b, p.
272)—but that he did do so when it lent
credibility to his work. For example, as I
have noted elsewhere (Blåsjö (2005,
x1)), in his work on the isoperimetric
problem, Steiner (1842b, xx13
14)
solves a particular subproblem treated
unsuccessfully by the Greeks, where-
upon he promptly refers to Pappus and
others; see also the preface to Steiner
(1842a).
Furthermore, although some of the
references may be considered cosmetic
(e.g., pointing out origins of terminol-
ogy) and could easily have been added
by Jacobi, almost all of them are very
naturally linked to the mathematical
content. Since the standard view is that
Steiner ‘‘did not care much for literature
study [and] book knowledge’’ and that
‘‘he created ‘his’ geometry from himself,
from his exceptional intuition’’ (Bier-
mann (1963, p. 31)), it must be a
remarkable coincidence then that his
work happens to contain a slew of
classical theorems in every section, all
set for Jacobi to go over and pen in the
references.
To sum up, the caricature of Steiner
as unscholarly is often propagated but
rarely, if ever, backed up by evidence.
In fact, this view is so plainly incon-
sistent with Steiner’s work that its
proponents need an elaborate and
unsubstantiated ghostwriter theory to
protect it. Thus, I feel justified in not
regarding this biographical material as
disproof of my thesis.
Finally, if I may venture a generalisa-
tion, I think the factor of adherence to
historical continuity is important for
understanding 19th-century mathemat-
ics beyond Steiner. I feel that the notion
of what constitutes legitimate research
underwent a quite radical transformation
in the late 19th-century, to some extent
motivated mathematically but perhaps
most of all institutionally, prompted
by a great increase in the number of
mathematicians, doctoral students, and
publication quantity and pace, a process
in which historical continuity was largely
sacrificed. Indeed, nowadays popular
mathematicians such as Riemann and
Cantor are celebrated for the revolu-
tionary character of their work, whereas
the likes of Steiner are very much
depreciated. Perhaps this is due to a
failure to recognise the proper historical
setting for these works and, in par-
ticular, a lack of appreciation of their
vision of mathematics. I, for one, do not
believe that the demise of Steiner and
that of historical continuity coincide by
accident.
REFERENCES
Ahrens, W. (1907). Briefwechsel zwischen C.
G. J. Jacobi und M. H. Jacobi. No. 22 in
Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der
Mathematischen Wissenschaften mit
Einschluss ihrer Anwendungen. B. G.
Teubner, Leipzig.
Baldus, R. (1923). Zur Steinerschen Definition
der Projektivität. Math. Ann., 90(1–2), 86–
102.
Ball, W. W. R. (1893). An essay on Newton’s
‘‘Principia’’. Macmillan and Co., London.
Biermann, K.-R. (1963). Jakob Steiner: Eine
biographische Skizze. Nova acta Leopol-
dina, 27, 31–45.
Blåsjö, V. (2005). The isoperimetric problem.
Amer. Math. Monthly, 112(6), 526–566.
Brianchon, C. J. (1806). Sur les surfaces
courbes du second degreé. Journal de
l’école Polytechnique, 17, 297–302. Eng-
lish excerpt in Smith (1959, pp. 331–336).
Burckhardt, J. J. (1976). Jakob Steiner. Dic-
tionary of Scientific Biography, 13, pp.
12–22.
Coolidge, J. L. (1934). The Rise and Fall of
Projective Geometry. Amer. Math.
Monthly, 41(4), 217–228.
Courant, R. & Robbins, H. (1941). What Is
Mathematics?. Oxford University Press,
New York.
Coxeter, H. S. M. (1993). The Real Projective
Plane. Springer-Verlag, New York, third
edition.
Geiser, C. F. (1874). Zur Erinnerung an Jakob
Steiner. Verhandlungen der Schweizeris-
chen Naturforschenden Gesellschaft, 56,
215–251.
Gergonne, J. (1825/26). Considerations philo-
sophiques sur les éléments de la science
de l’étendue. Annales de mathématiques
pures et appliquées, 16, 209–231.
Graf, J. H. (1897). Der Mathematiker Jakob
Steiner von Utzenstorf. K. J. Wyss, Bern.
Gray, J. (2007). Worlds Out of Nothing: A
Course in the History of Geometry in the
19th Century. Springer Undergraduate
Mathematics Series. Springer-Verlag,
London.
Heilbron, J. L. (2007). ‘‘Geometry’’ in Encyc-
lopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved
August 1, 2007.
Jacobi, C. G. J. (1843). Letter to his wife, 14
December 1843. Excerpts in Ahrens
(1907, p. 107).
Jacobi, C. G. J. (1845). Letter to Staatsminister
v. Eichhorn, 8 July 1845. In Jahnke
(1903a).
Jahnke, E. (1903a). Schreiben Jacobis an den
Staatsminister v. Eichhorn betreffend
Jakob Steiner. Archiv der Mathematik
und Physik, 4, 277–280.
Jahnke, E. (1903b). Auszüge aus drei Briefen
Steiners an Jacobi. Archiv der Mathema-
tik und Physik, 4, 268–277.
Klein, F. (1928). Vorlesungen über die Ent-
wicklung der Mathematik im 19. Jahr-
hundert. Teil I. Springer-Verlag, Berlin.
Klein, F. (1979). Development of Mathematics in
the 19th Century. Math Sci Press, Brook-
line, Mass. Translation of Klein (1928).
Kline, M. (1972). Mathematical Thought from
Ancient to Modern Times. Oxford Univer-
sity Press, New York.
Kolmogorov, A. N. & Yushkevich, A.-A. P.,
eds. (1996). Mathematics of the 19th
Century, Vol. II: Geometry, Analytic Func-
tion Theory. Birkhäuser, Basel.
Kötter, E. (1901). Die Entwickelung der syn-
thetischen Geometrie von Monge bis auf
Staudt (1847). Jahresbericht der Deuts-
chen Mathematiker-Vereinigung, 5(2),
1–476.
Lampe, E. (1900). Zur Biographie von Jacob
Steiner. Bibliotheca mathematica, 1, pp.
129–141.
Lange, J. (1899). Jacob Steiners Lebensjahre
in Berlin 1821–1863 nach seinen Per-
sonalakten dargestellt. Gaertner, Berlin.
Laptev, B. L. & Rozenfel’d, B. A. (1996).
Geometry. In Kolmogorov & Yushkevich
(1996, pp. 1–118).
Maclaurin, C. (1720). Géométrica Organica.
London.
Monge, G. (1799). Géométrie descriptive.
Paris.
Newton, I. (1667/68). Notes on the organic
construction of curves. In Newton (1967–
1981, volume II, pp. 106–159).
Newton, I. (1687). Philosophiae Naturalis Prin-
cipia Mathematica. London.
Newton, I. (1967–1981). The mathematical
papers of Isaac Newton. Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge. 8 vols.
Obenrauch, F. J. (1897). Geschichte der
darstellenden und projectiven Geometrie
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
mit besonderer Berücksichtigung ihrer
Begründung in Frankreich und Deutsch-
land und ihrer wissenschaftlichen Pflege
in Österreich. Carl Winiker, Brünn.
Pascal, B. (1640). Essay pour les coniques.
Paris. English excerpts in Struik (1969, pp.
163–167) and Smith (1959, pp. 326–330).
Poncelet, J. V. (1822). Traité des propriétés
projectives des figures. Gauthier-Villars,
Paris.
Smith, D. E., ed. (1959). A Source Book in
Mathematics. Dover Publications, New
York.
Steiner, J. (1832). Systematische Entwicke-
lung der Abhängigkeit geometrischer
Gestalten von einander, mit Berücksichti-
gung der Arbeiten alter und neuer
Geometer über Porismen, Projections-
Methoden, Geometrie der Lage, Trans-
versalen, Dualität und Reciprocität, etc..
G. Fincke, Berlin. In Steiner (1881, pp.
229–460) and Ostwald’s Klassiker der
exakten Wissenschaften, nos. 82–83.
Steiner, J. (1833). Letter to Jacobi, 31 Decem-
ber 1833. In Jahnke (1903b).
Steiner, J. (1842a). Sur le maximum et le
minimum des figures dans le plan, sur la
sphère et dans l’espace en général.
Premier mémoire. Journal für die reine
und angewandete Mathematik, 24, 93–
162. Original German text in Steiner
(1882, pp. 177–240).
Steiner, J. (1842b). Sur le maximum et le
minimum des figures dans le plan, sur la
sphère et dans l’espace en général.
Second mémoire. Journal für die reine
und angewandete Mathematik, 24, 189–
250. Original German text in Steiner
(1882, pp. 243–308).
Steiner, J. (1881). Jacob Steiner’s Gesam-
melte Werke, vol. 1. Berlin.
Steiner, J. (1882). Jacob Steiner’s Gesam-
melte Werke, vol. 2. Berlin.
Struik, D. J., ed. (1969). A source book in
mathematics, 1200–1800. Harvard Uni-
versity Press, Cambridge, Mass.
von Staudt, K. G. C. (1847). Geometrie der
Lage. Bauer und Raspe, Nürnberg.
Zacharias, M. (1912). Einführung in die projektive
Geometrie. B. G. Teubner, Leipzig.
Department of Philosophy,
Logic and Scientific Method
London School of Economics
London
United Kingdom
e-mail: viktor.blasjo@gmail.com
29
 Mathematical Entertainments Michael Kleber and Ravi Vakil, Editors

The World’s T
all, isn’t it?’’
‘‘It tries to be. Choose your entries
right, and you can head up as high

Tallest as you want.’’

‘‘But then I’ll never reach a final
answer!’’
Cryptic ‘‘Well, that you have to do in the
altogether different way described.’’

KEVIN WALD

...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
139 140 141 142 143 144

This column is a place for those bits 2 133 134 135 136 137 138

131 132

of contagious mathematics that travel 128 129 130

124 125 126 127

from person to person in the 123

community, because they are so 121 122

115 116 117 118 119 120

elegant, surprising, or appealing that 110 111 112 113 114

107 108 109

one has an urge to pass them on. 105 106

Contributions are most welcome. 103 104

100 101 102

94 95 96 97 98 99

1 88 89 90 91 92 93

86 87

83 84 85

79 80 81 82

78

76 77

70 71 72 73 74 75

65 66 67 68 69

62 63 64

60 61

58 59

55 56 57

49 50 51 52 53 54

43 44 45 46 47 48
0 41 42

38 39 40

34 35 36 37

33

31 32

25 26 27 28 29 30

19 20 21 22 23 24

16 17 18

14 15

11 12 13

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Please send all submissions to the Across 11:

Mathematical Entertainments Editor,
Ravi Vakil, Stanford University,
Department of Mathematics, Bldg, 380,
Stanford, CA 94305-2125, USA
e-mail: vakil@math.stanford.edu
Emotionless jerk comes after mug and
2: ring (7)
Lord Vader comprehends horrible woe, 13:
not the correct way to read the final Note about comedienne Margaret’s
answer to this puzzle (4, 2, 5) academic organization (6)

30 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2007 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.

 38 + 45n:
Entertainment Editors’ Note Lunatic erases things for relaxation
To the right sort of puzzle fan, January means one thing: the MIT (6)
Mystery Hunt. This annual event challenges teams of MIT students and Lets Ed hurt the presumptive heir (6)
enthusiasts from around the world to solve a succession of puzzles of all Trees filled with, um, a kind of glue
shapes, sizes, and styles, some never before seen. Answers to individual (6)
puzzles somehow fit together to reveal the higher-order metapuzzles a 39 + 45n:
team must solve to win—earning them the right to run the hunt the Metal shirts and shades (5)
following year. Ultimately, not suspicious of the Lone
This puzzle is a cryptic crossword which appeared in the 2008 Mystery Ranger’s sidekick (5)
Hunt, reproduced here with the kind permission of its constructor, Kevin 41 + 45n:
Wald. The ‘‘final answer’’ to this puzzle is a single word, which may not Fabrics of the first of seven types
be obvious even if you have solved the crossword part of the puzzle: (5)
Kevin‘s directions and clues contain the only hints you’ll get. Each bird that sings a Weird Al parody
Readers not familiar with cryptic-style (also called British-style) (3, 2)
crossword clues are invited to peruse the National Puzzler’s League’s
42 + 45n:
online guide,1but it is an acquired skill. As an alternative, on page
Evacuated Ferrara with one Italian’s
following Clues of this issue you can find a list of the Answers to each of the
animals (5)
sets of Across and Up clues. Even with these answers in hand, filling in the
Eye part of over-trimmed veal (5)
grid and discovering the final answer poses a challenge. If all else fails, the
Perform numbers with one actress
puzzles, solutions, and explanations for the entire 2008 MIT Mystery
named Reed (5)
Hunt can be found at http://web.mit.edu/puzzle/www/08/.
The Entertainments Editors welcome submissions of crosswords and 43 + 45n:
other puzzles with similar appeal at all levels of accessibility. Humongous nude actor named McK-
ellen (3)
Attention: This is a serving of corn (3)
14: 28 + 45n: Californian airport is negligent (3)
Our lady, in shackles, reveals the exact Change caused by an effect of the
45 + 45n:
length of the final answer to this puzzle moon spinning (4)
A mass of ice secondarily absorbs a
(4, 7) Norse God in love with noise (4)
ten-millionth of a joule (4)
16: Behead cod; otherwise, it stinks (4)
Is in the wrong English train, son (4)
Revolutionary obtains submachine 31 + 45n: Shamuses mentioned in issues of an
gun (4) Network showing Cavemen, a cartoon MIT paper (4)
18: about cavemen (3)
47 + 45n:
Celebrated getting the German area Do I fill the role of Pierre’s friend? (3)
One unbelievably long time (3)
united into a larger political entity (9) In Arles, you mostly work (3)
Stimpy’s pal is almost torn apart (3)
19: 32 + 45n: Where you permanently store data for
At last, that weirdo barber Sweeney (4) One who is in love, dear — or crazy a Gypsy (3)
(6)
21: 49 + 45n:
One who positions things in real con-
Ripe to tangle with a supernatural Set is little help (4)
fusion (6, var. spelling)
being (4) I run around, becoming a wreck (4)
Druggie starting to snort printer ink
22: Ashen after getting red alert (4)
(6)
A bunch of stitches look sound (4) 52 + 45n:
33 + 45n:
25 + 45n: Some bread, left out for a dullard (3)
Fired after getting old, misguided Dan
Semitic language lacks masculine word A cur’s remark is far inferior (3)
bombed (10)
meaning ‘‘beer’’ (4) Hauled around a nob that’s tossed 54 + 45n:
Look and sound of resentment (4) back bubbly (10) 1,101 here in Quebec (3)
Noisily drops horseriding equipment Vehicles containing Mr. Weasley, fruit Electronic chips is complicated [sic]
(4) drink, and guns (10) (3, abbr.)
26 + 45n: 34 + 45n: 55 + 45n:
The French gutlessly honor the Cow- Spots headless boys (3) Stare with disgust, essentially, at a
ardly Lion’s portrayer (4) Desire for the riches of the East (3) scripting language (4)
Fifty-one-foot elevator (4) Exhibit surprise by staring at the tail-
37 + 45n:
Knocks box over (4) biting snake (4)
He’d misread an Old English letter (3)
Upset Playboy’s founder with expres- 56 + 45n:
sion of disdain (3) Heard about Damon’s pad (3)
1
http://www.puzzlers.org/guide/index.php?expand= The ultimate in hyacinths (3) Needlefish found in hangars (3)
cryptics1

Ó 2007 Kevin Wald, Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 31

57 + 45n:
Not-quite-subdued Scotsman’s cap (3)
Leg Maxim perhaps flipped over
(3)
Lass is to delay heading back (3)
58 + 45n:
Tail wild female singers (4)
Legendary king of the Huns, at Long
Island (4)
Each hurt! (4)
Shaft put MDMA into beer (4)
59 + 45n:
Prefix on ‘‘form,’’ ‘‘phyll,’’ or ‘‘loch,’’
oddly (6)
Dance in a medical facility, wearing a
string tie (6)
60 + 45n:
Variant lyre modified to serve the
purposes of a bard (11)
Disturbed rest isn’t his motivation for
drinking (11)
That senior’s remarkably husky vocal
quality (11)
63 + 45n:
Made certain act involving $5 pasta
perverse (11)
Petey and Gertie Minuit will get drunk
in cheap bars (11)
Zeroes in Met damaged coins again
(11)
65 + 45n:
Bed in a small house (3)
Mr. Serling’s punishment (3)
Posed as madcap Tesla (3)
67 + 45n:
Author and she almost get engaged (4)
Metro Goldwyn Meyer initially thinks
they run things (4, abbr.)
Pat’s failing a high school exam (4, abbr.)
68 + 45n:
Weapon in a room (3)
Seldom ignoring every odd character
with a teaching degree (3, abbr.)
Despot exhibits psychic power (3,
abbr.)
Up
1:
Cold, reddish outer layer (5)
3:
Wind ought to exist, with oxygen in it
(4)
4:
Twisted and hurt (5)
5:
Scrabble piece shows * but not D (4)
32 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
6:
Organic compound a biblical book
discussed (5)
7:
Hears about flightless birds (5)
8:
Reason for a suit to reflect at both ends
(4)
9:
Socks a biblical prophet (5)
10:
Lump of uranium extracted from mass
of condensed vapor (4)
12:
As announced, bishopric had to yield (4)
15:
Three or four centers from the local
football team (4)
17, 62 + 45n:
Italian wines damage dateless veggie
dishes (8)
Surveillance agents capturing one
criminal with dead body parts (8)
Lab I rave about is not always the same
(8)
18, 64 + 45n:
Spilled dirt from large books (6)
Former Philippine president’s manu-
script about an oil company (6)
Mistakenly put Roman ‘‘I’’ in John
Wayne’s first name (6)
20, 66 + 45n:
Naiad frolicking with goddess (5)
Weeping leaves Rory disheartened (5)
Cooked tater and fish (5)
21, 67 + 45n:
Men’s sad, pathetic, irrationality (7)
Ms. Zadora left fashionable street
musician (7)
Shamus turned down pierced Carya
glabra seeds (7)
23, 68 + 45n:
Top-notch text from Mao, nevertheless
(1–3)
Cry of rage in Dublin and environs (4)
24, 69 + 45n:
Ares, keep gripping a grim, tawdry
Caltha palustris (5, 8)
This part has no misdirected arrows
fired while retreating (8, 5)
25 + 45n:
Wild rice I got can be created by pro-
karyotes (13)
Cause excitment in Paris’s summer
with 999 (about a thousand) spacecraft
components (6, 7)
One who pledges has abused coke,
tritium, and a Bic, say (6, 7)
27 + 45n:
Immoderate iron magnate John Jacob,
by reputation, has pull (5, 2, 6)
The Riga banker is corrupt? Very sad
(13)
Oy, Cain’s plants adapted proteins
used in photosynthesis (13)
29 + 45n:
Legendary queen of Carthage finally
uttered wedding vow (4)
A bird rendered extinct by party after
party (4)
Deer takes small amount of drugs (4)
30 + 45n:
Embarrassed after mostly unnecessary
vehicle is frequently punctured (6–7)
Philosopher and seer can’t see Dr.
Awkward (4, 9)
Crusading group and mad doctor
reunite (8, 5)
32 + 45n:
Allows a bit of discussion of this school
(6)
Powerful ditty about Roosevelt (6)
35 + 45n:
Mentioned eatery in an Indian city (5)
Discourage retrospective about Sena-
tor Kennedy (5)
One who catches long fish U.S. Grant’s
opponent tossed back (5)
36 + 45n:
Poorly written ‘‘if’’ ran further down
the page (5)
Ruled by German and British Queen
(5)
40 + 45n:
The Way Grain Spills (3)
Using your tongue, draw a digit
(3)
Also shouted at (3)
44 + 45n:
In the style of Somerville’s leadership,
unfortunately (4)
A tavern turned Egyptian, perhaps (4)
That’s cute—a youngster’s heading out
(4)
46 + 45n:
Six-legged critter infesting them Mets
(5)
Send money found in clock back (5)
Nonsense about (for example) somer-
saulting thesaurus writer (5)
48 + 45n:
No, I’m (gevalt!) the guy who played
Spock (5)
Bloom and Minderbinder’s Greek
island (5)
Caroming truck follows Monsieur
Marcel Marceau et al. (5)
50 + 45n:
Prize is a reversible tie (5)
‘‘Flying Ur’’ is a former name for a
flying company (5)
51 + 45n:
Morse code symbol had rotated (3)
That item following ‘‘D’’ is a Morse
code symbol (3)
Name the Venetian ‘‘Zilch’’ (3)
52 + 45n: Leave unfinished number with Faust’s
Dramatic sequence within farce author (6)
(3) Band featuring Matt Johnson and
Turned to codeine, originally not wildly het twins (3, 3)
requiring a prescription (3, abbr.)
Sphere a male sib spun (3) 61 + 45n:
Poetically superior to ‘‘Titania’’ or
53 + 45n:
‘‘cinnabar’’ in sound (1’2)
Assemble like soldiers entirely
Rabbi and former actor Harrison (3)
enthralled by Flipper (4, 2)
Criticize inscription on a tombstone
Leaf is folded up to form a bra pad (6)
(3)
57 + 45n:
Reportedly obtain water from the
French Quarter of a city (6) (Answers on next page)
Ó 2007 Kevin Wald, Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 33
Tallest Cryptic 37 + 45n ana ‘‘in’’ DIVES), REMONETIZES
EDH (HE’D ana), FEH (HEF rev), NTH (ZEROES IN MET ana)
Clue Answers and (‘‘in’’ hyaciNTHs) 65 + 45n
Brief Explanations 38 + 45n COT (double def), ROD (double def),
In the explanations, ‘‘ana’’ = anagram, EASERS (ERASES ana), ELDEST (LETS SAT (AS ana + T)
‘‘rev’’ = reversal, ‘‘hom’’ = homophone, ED ana), ELMERS (ELMS ‘‘filled with’’ 67 + 45n
and ‘‘double def’’ = double denfinition. ER) MESH (ME + SH[e]), MGMT (MGM +
39 + 45n T[hinks]), PSAT (PAT’S ana)
Across TINTS (TIN + TS), TONTO ([no]T + 68 + 45n
ONTO) ARM (A + RM), EDM ([s]E[l]D[o]M),
2
DOWN TO EARTH (DARTH ‘‘compre- 41 + 45n ESP (what dESPot ‘‘exhibits’’)
hends’’ WOE NOT ana) SILKS (S[even] + ILKS), EAT IT (EA +
TIT)
11
ROBOTIC (TIC ‘‘comes’’ after ROB + 42 + 45n Up
O) FAUNA (F[errar]A + UNA), FOVEA (OF
rev + VEA[l]), DONNA (DO + NN + A) 1
13 CRUST (C + RUST)
SCHOOL (SOL ‘‘about’’ CHO) 43 + 45n
IAN ([g]IAN[t]), EAR (double def), LAX 3
14 OBOE (O + BE, ‘‘with’’ O ‘‘in it’’)
(double def)
FOUR LETTERS (OUR + L ‘‘in’’
45 + 45n 4
FETTERS)
BERG ([a]B[sorbs] + ERG), ERRS (E + WOUND (double def)
16
RR + S), TECS (TECHS hom) 5
STEN (NETS rev)
47 + 45n TILE (TILDE - D)
18
EON (ONE ana), REN (REN[t]), ROM 6
FEDERATED (FETED ‘‘getting’’ DER + A)
(double def) ESTER (ESTHER hom)
19 49 + 45n 7
TODD ([tha]T + ODD) LAID (L + AID), RUIN (I RUN ana), RHEAS (HEARS ana)
21 WARN (WAN ‘‘after getting’’ R) 8
PERI (RIPE ana) 52 + 45n TORT (TO + R[eflec]T)
22 OAF (LOAF - L), ARF (FAR ana) 9
SEAM (SEEM hom) 54 + 45n HOSEA (HOSE + A)
25 + 45n ICI (I + CI), ICS (SIC ana) 10
BREW (HEBREW - HE), PEEK (PIQUE 55 + 45n CLOD (CLOUD - U)
hom), REIN (RAIN hom) GAWK ([dis]G[ust] + AWK), GASP 12
26 + 45n ([starin]G + ASP) CEDE (SEE’D hom)
LAHR (LA + H[ono]R), LIFT (LI + FT), 56 + 45n 15
RAPS (SPAR rev) MAT (MATT hom), GAR (‘‘found in’’ TRIO ([pa]TRIO[ts])
28 + 45n hanGARs) 17, 62 + 45n
EDIT (TIDE rev), ODIN (O + DIN), 57 + 45n MARSALAS (MAR + SALADS - D),
ODOR ([c]OD + OR) TAM (TAM[e]), GAM (MAG rev), GAL TOENAILS (TAILS ‘‘capturing’’ ONE
31 + 45n (LAG rev) ana), VARIABLE (LAB I RAVE ana)
ABC (A + BC), AMI (AM I), TOI 58 + 45n 18, 64 + 45n
(TOI[l]) ALTI (TAIL ana), ATLI (AT + LI), ACHE FOLIOS (SOIL + OF rev), MARCOS
32 + 45n (EACH ana, & lit), AXLE (‘‘put’’ X ‘‘into’’ (MS ‘‘about’’ ARCO), MARION
ADORER (DEAR OR ana), ALINER (IN ALE) (ROMAN I ana)
REAL ana), STONER (S[nort] + 59 + 45n 20, 66 + 45n
TONER) CHLORO (OR LOCH ana), BOLERO DIANA (NAIAD ana), TEARY (TEA +
33 + 45n (ER ‘‘wearing’’ BOLO) R[or]Y), TETRA (TATER ana)
CANNONADED (CANNED ‘‘after get- 60 + 45n 21, 67 + 45n
ting’’ O + DAN rev), CARBONATED NARRATIVELY (VARIANT LYRE ana), MADNESS (MEN’S SAD ana), PIANIST
(CARTED ‘‘around’’ A + NOB rev), THIRSTINESS (REST ISN’T HIS ana), (PIA + IN rev + ST), PIGNUTS (PI +
CARRONADES (CARS ‘‘containing’’ THROATINESS (THAT SENIOR’S ana) STUNG rev)
RON + ADE) 63 + 45n 23, 68 + 45n
34 + 45n DEFINITIZED (DEED ‘‘involving’’ FIN A-ONE (‘‘from’’ mAO NEvertheless),
ADS ([l]ADS), YEN (double def) + ZITI rev), DIMINUTIVES (MINUIT EIRE (IRE hom)

34 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

24, 69 + 45n 32 + 45n 50 + 45n
MARSH MARIGOLD (MARS + HOLD ADMITS (A + D[iscussion] + MIT’S), AWARD (A + DRAW rev), USAIR (UR
‘‘gripping’’ A GRIM ana), PARTHIAN STRONG (SONG ‘‘about’’ TR) IS A ana)
SHOTS (THIS PART HAS NO ana) 51 + 45n
35 + 45n
25 + 45n DELHI (DELI hom), DETER (RE TED DAH (HAD rev), DIT (IT ‘‘following’’
BACTERIOGENIC (RICE I GOT CAN rev), EELER (R. E. LEE rev) D), NIL (N + IL)
BE ana), ROCKET ENGINES (ROCK + 36 + 45n 52 + 45n
ETE + NINES ‘‘about’’ G), POCKET INFRA (IF RAN ana), UNDER (UND + ARC (‘‘within’’ fARCe), OTC (TO rev +
LIGHTER (PLIGHTER ‘‘has’’ COKE ana ER) C[odeine]), ORB (BRO rev)
+ T) 53 + 45n
40 + 45n
FALL IN (ALL ‘‘enthralled by’’ FIN),
27 + 45n TAO (OAT rev), TOE (TOW hom),
FALSIE (LEAF IS ana)
FEAST OR FAMINE (FE + ASTOR + TOO (TO hom)
FAME ‘‘has’’ IN), HEARTBREAKING 57 + 45n
44 + 45n GHETTO (GET EAU hom), GOETHE
(THE RIGA BANKER ana), PLASTO-
ALAS (ALA + S[omerville]), ARAB (A + (GO + ETHE[r]), THE THE
CYANINS (OY CAIN’S PLANTS ana)
BAR rev), AWAY (AW + A + (HET ana + HET ana)
29 + 45n Y[oungster])
61 + 45n
DIDO ([uttere]D + I DO), DODO (DO 46 + 45n O’ER (ORE hom), REX (R + EX), RIP
‘‘after’’ DO), DOSE (DOE ‘‘takes’’ S) EMMET (‘‘infesting’’ thEM METs), (double def)
30 + 45n REMIT (TIMER rev), ROGET (ROT
NEEDLE-SCARRED (RED ‘‘after’’NEE- ‘‘about’’ E.G. rev)
Ab Initio Software
DLES[s] + CAR), 48 + 45n 201 Spring Street
RENE DESCARTES(SEER CAN’T SEE NIMOY (N + I’M + OY), MILOS Lexington, MA 02421
DR ana), TEUTONIC ORDER (DOC- (double USA
TOR REUNITE ana) def), MIMES (SEMI rev ‘‘follows’’ M) e-mail: wald@math.uchicago.edu

Ó 2007 Kevin Wald, Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 35

 The Search
for Quasi-Periodicity
in Islamic 5-fold
Ornament
PETER R. CROMWELL
Introduction
he Penrose tilings are remarkable in that they are
T non-periodic (have no translational symmetry) but
are clearly organised. Their structure, called quasi-
periodicity, can be described in several ways, including
via self-similar subdivision, tiles with matching rules, and
projection of a slice of a cubic lattice in R5 . The tilings are
also unusual for their many centres of local 5-fold and 10-
fold rotational symmetry, features shared by some Islamic
geometric patterns. This resemblance has prompted
comparison, and has led some to see precursors of the
Penrose tilings and even evidence of quasi-periodicity in
traditional Islamic designs. Bonner [2] identified three
styles of self-similarity; Makovicky [20] was inspired to
develop new variants of the Penrose tiles and later, with
colleagues [24], overlaid Penrose-type tilings on traditional
Moorish designs; more recently, Lu and Steinhardt [17]
observed the use of subdivision in traditional Islamic
design systems and overlaid Penrose kites and darts on
Iranian designs. The latter article received widespread
exposure in the world’s press, although some of the
coverage overstated and misrepresented the actual
findings.
The desire to search for examples of quasi-periodicity in
traditional Islamic patterns is understandable, but we must
take care not to project modern motivations and abstrac-
tions into the past. An intuitive knowledge of group theory
is sometimes attributed to any culture that has produced
repeating patterns displaying a wide range of symmetry
types, even though they had no abstract notion of a group.
There are two fallacies to avoid:
36 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
• abstraction: P knew about X and X is an example of Y
therefore P knew Y.
• deduction: P knew X and X implies Y therefore P knew
Y.
In both cases, it is likely that P never thought of Y at all, and
even if he had, he need not have connected it with X.
In this article I shall describe a tiling-based method for
constructing Islamic geometric designs. With skill and
ingenuity, the basic technique can be varied and elaborated
in many ways, leading to a wide variety of complex and
intricate designs. I shall also examine some traditional
designs that exhibit features comparable with quasi-periodic
tilings, use the underlying geometry to highlight similarities
and differences, and assess the evidence for the presence of
quasi-periodicity in Islamic art.
A few comments on terminology. Many of the con-
structions are based on tilings of the plane. A patch is a
subset of a tiling that contains a finite number of tiles and is
homeomorphic to a disc. I use repeat unit as a generic term
for a template that is repeated using isometries to create a
pattern; it is not so specific as period parallelogram or
fundamental domain. A design or tiling with radial sym-
metry has a single centre of finite rotational symmetry. The
other terminology follows [8] for tilings, supplemented by
[33] for substitution tilings.
Islamic Methods of Construction
Although the principles of Islamic geometric design are not
complicated, they are not well-known. Trying to recover
the principles from finished artwork is difficult, as the most
conspicuous elements in a design are often not the
compositional elements used by the designer. Fortunately
medieval documents that reveal some of the trade secrets
have survived. The best of these documents is manuscript
scroll MS.H.1956 in the library of the Topkapi Palace,
Istanbul. The scroll itself is a series of geometric figures
drawn on individual pages, glued end to end to form a
continuous sheet about 33 cm high and almost 30 m long.
It is not a ‘how to’ manual, as there is no text, but it is more
than a pattern book as it shows construction lines. A half-
size colour reproduction can be found in [25], which also
includes annotations to show the construction lines and
marks scored into the paper with a stylus, which are not
visible in the photographs. References in this article to
numbered panels of the Topkapi Scroll use the numbering
in [25].
Islamic designs often include star motifs. These come in
a variety of forms but, in this article, we need only a few
simple shapes that correspond to the regular star polygons
of plane geometry. Taking n points equally spaced around
a circle and connecting points d intervals apart by straight
lines produces the star polygon denoted by {n/d}. This,
however, is the star of the mathematician; it is rare for an
artist to use the whole figure as an ornamental motif. More
often, the middle segments of the sides are discarded.
Many of the early Islamic designs are created by
arranging 6-, 8- or 12-point stars at the vertices of the
standard grids of squares or equilateral triangles. The more
general rhombic lattice allows other stars to be used. An
example based on {10/3} is shown in Figure 1(a). The
angles in the rhombus are 72 and 108, both being mul-
tiples of 36—the angle between adjacent spikes of the star.
Draw a set of circles of equal radius centred on the vertices
of the lattice and of maximal size so that there are points of
tangency. Place copies of the star motif in the circles so that
spikes fall on the edges of the lattice. This controls the
spacing and orientation of the principal motifs, but the
.........................................................................
PETER CROMWELL may be known to
AUTHOR
readers through his contributions to the
Intelligencer on Celtic art (vol. 15, no. 1)
and the Borromean rings (vol. 20, no. 1), or
his books on polyhedra and knot theory,
both published by CUP. He is interested in
anything 3-dimensional with a strong visual
element, and also combinatorial and algo-
rithmic problems. He was recently awarded
a research fellowship by the Leverhulme
Trust to work on the mathematical analysis
of interlaced patterns.
Pure Mathematics Division,
Mathematical Sciences Building
University of Liverpool, Peach Street
Liverpool L69 7ZL
England
e-mail: spmr02@liverpool.ac.uk
design is not yet complete. There are some spikes of each
motif that are not connected to a neighbouring motif but
are free and point into the residual spaces between the
circles. The lines bounding these free spikes are extended
beyond the circumcircle until they meet similarly produced
lines from nearby stars. This simple procedure bridges the
residual spaces and increases the connectivity of the star
motifs. The same pattern of interstitial filling should be
applied uniformly to all the residual spaces and the sym-
metry of the design as a whole should be preserved as far
as possible. The result is shown in Figure 1(c). In this case
the kites in the interstitial filling are congruent to those in
the star. This pattern is one of the most common decagonal
designs, and we shall name it the ‘stars and kites’ pattern for
reference.
This basic approach produces a limited range of peri-
odic designs with small repeat units and it only works for
stars with an even number of points. A more general
method that can be used with all stars, and also enables
combinations of different stars to be used in a single design,
is based on edge-to-edge tilings containing regular convex
polygons with more than four sides. Figure 1(b) shows a
tiling formed by packing decagons together, leaving non-
convex hexagonal tiles between them. After placing {10/3}
stars in each decagon tile, we use the same kind of inter-
stitial filling procedure as before to develop the pattern in
the hexagons.
This change from circle to polygon may seem minor, but
it gives rise to a range of generalisations. We are no longer
restricted to a lattice arrangement of the stars—any tiling
will suffice. The tiling may contain regular polygons of
different kinds allowing different star motifs to be com-
bined in the same design; the tiling naturally determines the
relative sizes of the different stars. We can even discard the
regular star motifs that initiate the interstitial filling and seed
the pattern generation process from the tiling itself. In this
last case, we place a pair of short lines in an X configuration
at the midpoint of each edge, then extend them until they
encounter other such lines—this is similar to applying
interstitial filling to every tile. The angle that the lines make
with the edges of the tiling, the incidence angle, is a
parameter to be set by the artist and it usually takes the
same value at all edges. There is no requirement to termi-
nate the line extensions at the first point of intersection; if
there are still large empty regions in the design, or it is
otherwise unattractive, the lines can be continued until new
intersections arise.
This technique, known as ‘polygons in contact’ (PIC),
was first described in the West by Hankin [9–13], who
observed the polygonal networks scratched into the plaster
of some designs, while working in India. Many panels in
the Topkapi Scroll also show a design superimposed on its
underlying polygonal network. Although the purpose of
the networks is not documented, it does not seem unrea-
sonable to interpret them as construction lines. Bonner [2,
3] argues that PIC is the only system for which there is
evidence of historical use by designers throughout the
Islamic world. The method is versatile and can account for
a wide range of traditional patterns, but it is not universally
applicable. An alternative approach is used by Castéra [5],

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 37
 (a)
(c)
Figure 1. The ‘stars and kites’ pattern.
who arranges the shapes seen in the final design without
using a hidden grid.
The PIC method is illustrated in the next four figures.
Figure 2 shows two designs produced from a tiling by
regular decagons, regular pentagons, and irregular convex
hexagons. In part (b), a star motif based on {10/4} is placed
in the decagon tiles, which gives an incidence angle of 72
for the other edges; the completed design is one of the
most widespread and frequently used of all star patterns.
Part (c) shows a design that is common in Central Asia and
based on {10/3} with an incidence angle of 54. A {10/2} star
and an incidence angle of 36 reproduces the stars and
kites pattern. The design in Figure 3 is from [14] and con-
tains star motifs based on {7/3}; in the tiling the 7-gons are
regular but the pentagons are not. Figure 4 is based on a
38 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
(b)
tiling containing regular 9-gons and 12-gons. I have chosen
an incidence angle of 55 to make the convex 12-gon ele-
ments in the design into regular polygons and some line
segments inside the non-convex hexagonal tiles join up
without creating a corner, but, as a consequence, neither
star motif is geometrically regular. Plates 120–122 in [4] are
traditional designs based on the same tiling. Figure 5 shows
a design with 10-fold rotational symmetry based on panel
90a of the Topkapi Scroll, which Necipoğlu labels as a
design for a dome [25]. The original panel shows a template
for the figure containing one-tenth of the pattern with the
design in solid black lines superimposed on the tiling
drawn in red dotted lines. Notice that some of the tiles are
two-tenths and three-tenths sectors of a decagon. Domes
were also decorated by applying PIC to polyhedral
 (a) Underlying polygonal network

(b) Incidence angle 72° (c) Incidence angle 54°

Figure 2. A tiling and two star patterns derived from it. The petals of a rose motif
in each pattern are highlighted.

networks. Patterns with a lower concentration of stars were
produced by applying PIC to k-uniform tilings composed of
regular 3-, 4-, 6-, and 12-sided polygons—see plates 77, 97,
and 142 in [4] for some unusual examples.
The two designs of Figure 2 display another common
Islamic motif. In each design, a set of hexagons sur-
rounding a star has been highlighted in grey. The
enlarged star motif is called a rose and the additional
hexagons are its petals. In this case, the rose arises
because the decagon in the underlying tiling is sur-
rounded by equilateral polygons, but they can also be
constructed using a set of tangent circles around the cir-
cumcircle of the star [16] and used as compositional
elements in their own right.
You can see the PIC method in action and design your
own star patterns using Kaplan’s online Java applet [34]—
you select a tiling and the incidence angles of the star
motifs, then inference logic supplies the interstitial pattern.
The tilings used as the underlying networks for the PIC
method of construction often have a high degree of sym-
metry, and they induce orderly designs. Islamic artists also
produced designs that appear to have a more chaotic
arrangement of elements with local order on a small scale
but little long-range structure visible in the piece shown.
Panels in the Topkapi Scroll reveal that these designs, too,
have an underlying polygonal network assembled from
copies of a small set of equilateral tiles (see Figure 6)
whose angles are multiples of 36:

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 39

 (a) (b)

Figure 3. Design containing regular 7-point stars.

(a) (b)

Figure 4. Design containing 9- and 12-point stars.

• a rhombus with angles 72 and 108
• a regular pentagon (angles 108)
• a convex hexagon with angles 72 and 144—the bobbin
• a convex hexagon with angles 108 and 144—the
barrel
• a non-convex hexagon with angles 72 and 216—the
bow-tie
• a convex octagon with angles 108 and 144
• a regular decagon (angles 144).
The motifs on the tiles are generated using the PIC method
with an incidence angle of 54. The barrel hexagon and the
decagon have two forms of decoration. One decagon motif
is just the star {10/3} and its constituent kites are congruent
to those on the bow-tie; the other decagon motif is more
complex and the symmetry is reduced from 10-fold to
5-fold rotation.
The shapes of the tiles arise naturally when one tries to
tile with decagons and pentagons. The bow-tie and barrel
hexagons are familiar from the previous figures. The
octagon and the remaining hexagon are shapes that can be
obtained as the intersection of two overlapping decagons.
The motif on the hexagon resembles a spindle or bobbin
wound with yarn. This distinctive motif is easy to locate in a

40 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER


Figure 5. Design from panel 90a of the Topkapi Scroll.
design, and its presence is a good indication that the design
could be constructed from these tiles.
The promotion of irregular tiles from supplementary
shapes to compositional elements in their own right
marked a significant development in Islamic design.
Regarding the tiles as the pieces of a jigsaw allows a less
formal approach to composition. A design can be grown
organically in an unplanned manner by continually
attaching tiles to the boundary of a patch with a free choice
among the possible extensions at each step. This new
approach gave artists freedom and flexibility to assemble
the tiles in novel ways and led to a new category of designs.
It seems to have been a Seljuk innovation as examples
started to appear in Turkey and Iran in the 12th–13th
centuries. The widespread and consistent use of these
decorated tiles as a design system was recognised by Lu
and Steinhardt [17]; similar remarks appear in Bonner [2]
and the tiles are also used by Hankin [10].
Figure 7 shows small patches of tiles. There are often
multiple solutions to fill a given area. Even in the simple
Rhombus Pentagon Barrel (1)
Bow-tie Bobbin Decagon (1)
Figure 6. An Islamic set of prototiles.
combination of a bobbin with a bow-tie shown in part (a),
the positions of the tiles can be reflected in a vertical line so
that the bow-tie sits top-right instead of top-left. The patch
in part (d) can replace any decagonal tile with a conse-
quent loss of symmetry, as the bow-tie can point in any of
ten directions. Patches (b) and (c) are another pair of
interchangeable fillings with a difference in symmetry.
Figure 8 shows some traditional designs made from the
tiles. Parts (a) and (b) are from panels 50 and 62 of the
Topkapi Scroll, respectively; in both cases the original
panel shows a template with the design in solid black lines
superimposed on the tiling drawn in red dots. The designs
in parts (b), (c), and (d) are plates 173, 176, and 178 of [4].
The designs of (e) and (f) are Figures 33 and 34 from
[16]. The edges of the tilings are included in the figures to
show the underlying structure of the designs, but in the
finished product these construction lines would be erased
to leave only the interlaced ribbons. This conceals the
underlying framework and helps to protect the artist’s
method. The viewer sees the polygons of the background
outlined by the ribbons, but these are artifacts of the con-
struction, not the principal motifs used for composition.
The internal angles in the corners of the tiles are all
multiples of 36 so all the edges in a tiling will point in one
of five directions—they will all lie parallel to the sides of a
pentagon. Fitting the tiles together spontaneously produces
regular pentagons in the background of the interlacing, and
centres of local 5-fold or 10-fold rotational symmetry in the
design. This symmetry can be seen in some of the config-
urations of Figure 7. However, in patterns generated by
translation of a template, this symmetry must break down
and cannot hold for the design as a whole. This is a con-
sequence of the crystallographic restriction: the rotation
centres in a periodic pattern can only be 2-, 3-, 4- or 6-fold.
This was not proved rigorously until the 19th century but it
must surely have been understood on an intuitive level by
the Islamic pattern makers. Perhaps these tilings were
appealing precisely because they contain so many forbid-
den centres; they give the illusion that one can break free
from this law of nature. Unfortunately, when a large
enough section of a tiling is shown for the periodicity to be
apparent, any (global) rotation centres are only 2-fold, and
Barrel (2) Octagon
Decagon (2)

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 41
 (a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
Figure 7. Small patches of tiles.
the symmetry type of the (undecorated) tiling is usually one
of pgg, pmm or, more commonly, cmm.
Figure 9(b) shows the design on one wall of the
Gunbad-i Kabud (Blue Tower) in Maragha, north-west
Iran; similar designs decorate the other sides of the tower.
At first sight the design appears to lack an overall
organising principle but it fits easily into the framework
shown in Figure 9(a). Centred at the bottom-right corner
of the panel is the patch of Figure 7(g) surrounded by a
ring of decagons. A similar arrangement placed at the top-
left corner abuts the first, leaving star-shaped gaps. The
rings of decagons are filled with the patch of Figure 7(d)
with the bow-ties facing outwards, except for the one on
the bottom edge of the panel, which is filled with a
42 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
(f)
(g)
decagonal tile. The star-shaped gaps are filled with the
five rhombi of Figure 7(b). The design does contain
irregularities and deviations from this basic plan, particu-
larly in the bottom-left corner of the panel. Also the
decagon in the top-left corner is filled with Figure 7(d)
rather than a decagonal tile.
Figure 9(a) can also be taken as the foundation of the
design shown in Figure 10. The centres of the rose motifs in
the centre of the figure and in the top-left corner are diag-
onally opposite corners of a rectangle that is a repeat unit for
the design. The underlying framework in this rectangle is
the same as that of the Maragha panel. The full design is
generated from this cell by reflection in the sides of the
rectangle. Note that it is the arrangement of the tiles that is
 (a) (b) (c) (d)

(e) (f) (g) (h)

Figure 8. Periodic designs.

(a) (b)

Figure 9. Design from the Gunbad-i Kabud, Maragha, Iran.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 43

 Figure 10. Design from the Karatay Madrasa, Konya, Turkey.
reflected, not the tiles with their decorative motifs; the
interlacing of the full design remains alternating. The
boundaries of the unit rectangle are mostly covered by the
sides of tiles or mirror lines of tiles, both of which ensure
continuity of the tiling across the joins. However, in the top-
right and bottom-left corners (the cell has 2-fold rotational
symmetry about its centre), the tiles do not fit in the rect-
angle but overhang the edges. This is not a problem with
this method of generating designs: the overhanging tiles are
simply cut to fit and the reflections take care of the conti-
nuity of the ribbons. In Figure 10 this is most obvious in the
middle near the bottom where pairs of bow-ties and bob-
bins merge. The centre of the tiling can be filled with the
44 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
patch shown in Figure 7(g) but this has been discarded in
favour of a large rose motif. A different construction for this
pattern is presented by Rigby in [26].
When experimenting with the tiles of Figure 6, one soon
learns that those in the top row are more awkward to use
than the others—the 108 angles must occur in pairs
around a vertex and this limits the options. Indeed many
designs avoid these tiles altogether and are based solely
on the three shapes in the bottom row. The design in
Figure 11 is unusual in that it is largely composed of
awkward tiles (rhombi, pentagons, and octagons) together
with a few bobbins. The large star-shaped regions in the
tiling can be filled with the patch shown in Figure 7(f),
 Figure 11. Design from the Sultan Han, Kayseri, Turkey.
(a) (b)
Figure 12. Subdivisions
 ofpthree
ffiffiffi tiles into smaller copies of the same three tiles.
1
The scale factor is 2 7þ 5
4:618.
continuing the use of the same set of tiles, but instead this
motif is replaced by the star {10/4}.
Once a design has been constructed, it can be finished
in different ways according to context and the materials
used. In some of the accompanying figures, the regions
have been given a proper 2-colouring (chessboard shad-
ing), in others the lines have been made into interlaced
ribbons. The basic line drawing can also be used by itself as
when it is inscribed in plaster.
What is Quasi-Periodicity?
The discovery of crystalline metal alloys with 5-fold sym-
metry in their diffraction patterns caused great excitement
in the 1980s. Sharp spots in a diffraction pattern are evi-
dence of long-range order which, at that time, was
synonymous with periodicity, but 5-fold rotations are
incompatible with the crystallographic restriction so a new
kind of phenomenon had been observed. The novel solids
(c)
became known as quasi-crystals and the underlying order
as quasi-periodicity. For crystallographers, the production
of sharply defined points in a diffraction pattern is a
defining characteristic of quasi-periodicity. In the study of
the decorative arts, however, the term ‘quasi-periodic’ is
used somewhat informally and does not have an agreed
definition. Readers should be aware of this potential source
of confusion when comparing papers. For the tilings and
the related geometric designs discussed in this article, one
option is to impose a homogeneity condition on the dis-
tribution of local configurations of tiles (this is weaker than
the crystallographic definition). This and other properties
will be illustrated through the following example.
The example is constructed from the patches shown in
Figure 12. The patches are chosen only to demonstrate the
technique and not for any artistic merit—the unbalanced
distribution of bow-ties leads to poor designs. Any patch
tiled by bow-ties, bobbins, and decagons can be converted

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 45
 Figure 13. A step in the construction of a quasi-periodic tiling.
into a larger such patch by subdividing each tile as shown
in the figure and then scaling the result to enlarge the small
tiles to the size of the originals. This process of ‘subdivide
and enlarge’ is called inflation. Each side of each com-
posite tile is formed from two sides of small tiles and the
major diagonal of a small bobbin; in the inflated tiling the
half-bobbins pair up to form complete tiles.
Let P0 be a single decagon and let Pi+1 be the patch
obtained by inflating Pi for all i 2 N . Figure 12(b) shows P1
and Figure 13 shows P2. We can iterate the inflation process
to tile arbitrarily large regions of the plane. Furthermore,
because P1 contains a decagon in the centre, Pi+1 contains a
copy of Pi in the middle. Therefore Pi+1 is an extension of Pi,
and by letting i go to infinity we can extend the patch to a
tiling, P?, of the whole plane. Notice that the symmetry of
the initial patch is preserved during inflation so P? will have
a global centre of 10-fold symmetry and hence cannot be
periodic.
In general, inflation only provides the ability to create
arbitrarily large patches that need not be concentric, so
some work is required to show that the limit exists and it is
a tiling of the plane [19]. Two tilings are said to be locally
indistinguishable if a copy of any patch from one tiling
occurs in the other tiling, and vice versa. The family of
substitution tilings defined by the prototiles and subdivi-
sions shown in Figure 12 is the set of all tilings that are
locally indistinguishable from P?. There are, in fact, an
46 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
uncountable number of tilings in the family but any patch
in any one of them will be contained in some Pn.
The basic combinatorial properties of a substitution til-
ing based on a finite set of n prototiles T1,...,Tn can be
encoded in an n 9 n matrix: the entry in column j of row i
is the number of small Ti in a composite Tj. For the example
here with the tiles in the order bow-tie, bobbin, decagon,
this substitution matrix is
!
10 5 20
7 11 25 :
0 2 11
A matrix is said to be primitive if some power of it has only
positive non-zero entries. If a substitution matrix is primi-
tive then the patch of tiles produced by repeated inflation
of any tile will eventually contain copies of all the proto-
tiles. Properties of the tiling can be derived from the
algebraic properties of a primitive matrix. For example,
the largest eigenvalue is the square of the scale factor of the
inflation and the corresponding eigenvector contains
the relative frequencies of the prototiles in a full tiling of the
plane; the corresponding eigenvector of the transposed
matrix contains the relative areas of the three proto-
tiles.
 pInffiffiffi our p
example
ffiffiffi  the frequency eigenvector is
5 þ 5 5; 5 þ 7 5; 4 . Since some of the ratios between
the entries are irrational, any substitution tiling made from
these subdivisions is non-periodic [30, 31].
 Although our substitution tilings have no translational
symmetry, they do share some properties with periodic
tilings. First each tiling is edge-to-edge; it is constructed
from a finite number of shapes of tile, each of which occurs
in a finite number of orientations; there are finitely many
ways to surround a vertex. The tiling is said to have finite
local complexity. For primitive substitution tilings this has an
important consequence: given any patch X in the tiling there
is some number R such that a disc of radius R placed any-
where on the tiling will contain a copy of X. A tiling with this
property is called repetitive. This means that copies of any
finite portion of the tiling can be found evenly distributed
throughout the tiling. You cannot determine which part of
the tiling is shown in any finite diagram of it.
For the purposes of this article, a tiling is called quasi-
periodic if it is non-periodic, has finite local complexity,
and is repetitive. By extension we can call an Islamic design
constructed using the PIC method quasi-periodic if its
underlying polygonal network is a quasi-periodic tiling.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to tell from any finite subset
of a tiling whether it is quasi-periodic or not. So, in order to
assert that a tiling could be quasi-periodic, we need to
identify a process such as inflation that could have been
used to generate the piece shown and can also be used to
generate a complete quasi-periodic tiling.
Multi-level Designs
Some panels of the Topkapi Scroll show designs of differ-
ent scales superimposed on one another. This interplay of
designs on multiple scales is a feature of some large Islamic
designs found on buildings where viewers experience a
succession of patterns as they approach. From a distance,
(a) Panel 28
(c) Panel 32
Figure 14. Underlying 2-level polygonal networks of panels from the Topkapi
Scroll.
large-scale forms with high contrast dominate but, closer in,
these become too large to perceive and smaller forms take
over. Early methods to achieve this transition from big and
bold through medium range to fine and delicate were
simple, often just a matter of progressively filling voids in
the background to leave a design with no vacant spaces.
(There is a secondary pattern of this form on the Gunbad-i
Kabud.) Differences in size and level of detail were
expressed using variation in density, depth of carving,
colour and texture. Later designs are more ambitious and
use the same style on more than one scale. It is even
possible to re-use the same pattern.
Designs that can be read on several scales are often
referred to as self-similar but this term itself has multiple
levels of meaning. In its strictest sense it means scale
invariant: there is a similarity transformation (an isometry
followed by an enlargement) that maps the design onto
itself. The transformation can be weakened to a topological
equivalence—for example the homeomorphisms in iter-
ated function systems leading to fractals. In a weaker sense
still, it means only that motifs of different scales resemble
each other in style or composition but are not replicas. We
shall use the term hierarchical for multi-level designs of
this latter form.
In panel 28 of the Topkapi Scroll three drawings are
superimposed on the same figure: a small-scale polygonal
network is drawn in red dots, the corresponding small-
scale design is drawn in a solid black line, and a large-scale
design is added in a solid red line. The polygonal network
corresponding to the large-scale design is not shown but
can be deduced—the two polygonal networks are shown
superimposed in Figure 14(a). The other parts of the figure
(b) Panel 31
(d) Panel 34

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 47
 (a)
(b)
(c)
pffiffiffi15. Subdivisions derived from the Topkapi Scroll. The scale factor is
Figure
3þ 5
5:236.
show the polygonal networks underlying three more 2-
level designs from the scroll, but neither of the networks is
shown in these panels, only the finished 2-level designs in
black and red.
Superimposing the large- and small-scale polygonal
networks of these panels reveals subdivisions of some of
the tiles: a rhombus in panel 28, two pentagons in panel 32,
and a bobbin in panel 34. In all cases, the side of a com-
posite tile is formed from the sides of two small tiles and
the diagonal of a small decagon. We can also identify the
fragments of the large-scale polygons cropped by the
boundaries of the panels. These panels are not arbitrarily
chosen parts of a design—they are templates to be repe-
ated by reflection in the sides of the boundary rectangle.
Although a superficial glance at Figure 14(d) might suggest
that the large-scale network is a bobbin surrounded by six
pentagons, a configuration that can be seen in the small-
scale network, reflection in the sides generates rhombi,
pentagons, and barrels. The large-scale design generated
by panel 31 is shown in Figure 8(g). Panel 28 appears to be
truncated on the right and is perhaps limited by the avail-
able space. If it had 2-fold rotational symmetry about the
centre of the large rhombus, the large-scale design would
be that of Figure 8(h). A consistent choice of subdivision
emerges in all four panels and the subdivisions of the five
48 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
(d)
(e)
tiles used are shown in Figure 15. I believe this has not
been reported before.
Figure 16 shows my 2-level design based on panel 32.
The composite tiles generate the large-scale design (shown
in grey) and the small tiles generate a small-scale design
(black and white) that fills its background regions. The
barrel tile has two forms of decoration: I have used the
simple motif for the large-scale design and the other motif
on the small-scale design. Completing the small-scale
design in the centre of a composite pentagon is problem-
atic. For a pentagon of this scale, only a partial subdivision
is possible: once the half-decagons have been placed,
one is forced to put pentagons at the corners; only a
pentagon or a barrel can be adjacent to the corner penta-
gons, and both cases lead to small areas that cannot be
tiled. The grey area in Figure 15(b) indicates one such
essential hole. I have chosen a slightly different filling from
the one in the Topkapi Scroll. The large-scale design is that
of Figure 2(c).
Figure 17 gives a similar treatment to panel 34. It con-
tains four copies of the template rectangle shown in
Figure 14(d), two direct and two mirror images. In this
case, the large-scale pattern is expressed using shading of
the regions. Examples of both styles can be found on
buildings in Isfahan, Iran.
 Figure 16. A 2-level design based on panel 32 of the Topkapi Scroll.
The bow-tie is notable by its absence from Figure 15. It
suffers the same fate as the pentagon: the tiles at its two
ends are forced and its waist cannot be tiled. (The large-
scale polygonal network underlying panel 29 of the scroll
has a quarter of a bow-tie in the top right corner sur-
rounded by pieces of decagons, but it is not based on
subdivision in the same way as the others.)
In Figure 16 the visible section of the large-scale design
can also be found as a configuration in the small-scale
design. However, larger sections reveal that the pattern is
not scale invariant. This is a general limitation of these
subdivisions. It is not possible to use the subdivisions of
Figure 15 as the basis of a substitution tiling because,
without subdivisions of the pentagon and bow-tie, the
inflation process cannot be iterated.
A Design from the Alhambra
The design illustrated in Figure 18 forms the major part of a
large panel in the Museum of the Alhambra—see [24] for a
photograph. The panel has been assembled from fragments
uncovered in 1958, but the original would have been from
the 14th century. The lower part of the figure shows the
finished design and the upper part shows a polygonal
network that I propose as the underlying framework. The
principal compositional element of the framework is a
decagon surrounded by ten pentagons, which gives rise to

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 49
 Figure 17. A 2-level design based on panel 34 of the Topkapi Scroll.
the 10-fold rose recurring as a leitmotif in the final design.
Copies of this element are placed in two rings, visible in the
top left of the figure—an inner ring of ten and an outer ring
of twenty; adjacent elements share two pentagons. The
connections between the inner and outer rings are of two
kinds. The shaded rhombi contain the translation unit from
the familiar periodic design of Figure 2(b). The construc-
tion of the design in the remaining spaces is shown in
Figure 19: in part (b) the design is seen to be a subset of the
configuration of pentagonal motifs of part (a), whereas (c)
shows the same design over a network that includes half-
barrels and one-tenth decagons—the polygons used in
Figure 18. The edges in the resulting polygonal network
are of two lengths, which are related as the side and
diagonal of a pentagonal tile. The final design can be
generated from this network using a generalisation of the
PIC method: the short edges have incidence angle 72 and
the long edges have incidence angle 36. A 20-fold rose is
placed in the centre; the tips of alternate petals meet 10-
fold roses, and lines forming the tips of the intermediate
petals are extended until they meet other lines in the pat-
tern. The reconstructed rectangular panel also has
quadrants of 20-fold roses placed in the four corners, a
common feature of such panels that reflects the fact that
most are subsets of periodic patterns. However, the quad-
rants are misaligned and are also the most heavily restored
areas of the panel. I have omitted them from the figure.
50 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
This design is unusual in the large number of straight
lines it contains that run across the figure almost uninter-
rupted. The marks in the bottom right corner of Figure 18
indicate the heights of horizontal lines; there are five fam-
ilies of parallels separated by angles of 36. In some quasi-
periodic tilings it is possible to decorate the prototiles with
line segments that join up across the edges of the tiling to
produce a grid of continuous straight lines that extend over
the whole plane. These lines are called Ammann bars. The
intervals between consecutive parallel Ammann bars come
in two sizes, traditionally denoted by S and L (short and
long). They form an irregular sequence that does not
repeat itself and never contains two adjacent Ss or three
adjacent Ls.
The lines in Figure 18 are not genuine Amman bars.
Those marked with an asterisk do not align properly across
the full width of the piece shown but deviate so that the S
and L intervals switch sides. (Structural defects of this kind
have been observed in quasicrystals, where they are
known as phasons). The periodic design in Figure 2(b) has
similar lines but its sequences repeat: the vertical ‘Ammann
bars’ give sequence SLSL, the lines 36 from vertical
give SLLSLL, and those 72 from vertical are not properly
aligned.
Makovicky et al [24] propose Figure 18 as an example
of a quasi-periodic design. They try to find a structural
connection between it and the cartwheel element of the
 Figure 18. Construction of panel 4584 in the Museum of the Alhambra.

[20] as he studied the Maragha pattern shown in

Figure 9(b). Their boldest assertion is Conclusion 6
[24, p. 125]:
The non-periodic cartwheel decagonal pattern from the
excavations in the Alhambra and from the Moroccan
localities is based on a modified Penrose non-periodic
tiling derived recently as ‘PM1 tiling’ by Makovicky…
We conclude that a symmetrized PM1-like variety of
Penrose tiling must have been known to the Merinid and
Nasrid artesans (mathematicians) and was undoubtedly
(a) (b) (c) contained in their more advanced pattern collections.
Figure 19. Elsewhere in the paper, the authors are more cautious and
realistic about the nature of their speculation. They offer an
Penrose tiling. After acknowledging that attempts to match alternative construction based on an underlying radially
kites and darts are problematic, they try to match it with a symmetric network of rhombi whose vertices lie in the
variant of the Penrose tiles, one discovered by Makovicky centres of the decagonal tiles [24, Fig. 23].

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 51

 In order to classify a pattern as periodic or radially
symmetric, we must have a large enough sample to be able
to identify a template and the rules for its repetition. Sim-
ilarly, to classify a pattern as quasi-periodic, we must
describe a constructive process that allows us to see the
given patch as part of a quasi-periodic structure covering
the whole plane. It is not sufficient that geometric features
of a design, such as rotation centres, can be shown to align
with those of a familiar quasi-periodic tiling within a finite
fragment. We need to find a procedure built on elements of
the design. The set of tiles underlying Figure 18 and the set
P2 shown in Figure 13 are both large patches with 10-fold
symmetry, but only in the second case do we know how to
extend it quasi-periodically.
In my opinion, the design strategy underlying the
Alhambra pattern does not require an understanding of
Penrose-type tilings, and is based on little more than the
desire to place large symmetric motifs (roses) in a radially
symmetric pattern and fill the gaps. The construction out-
lined at the start of this section produces the complete
design using methods and motifs believed to have been
used by Islamic artists. The general structure has the same
feel as Figure 5. The ‘Ammann bars’ are an artifact of the
construction, although the structure of the design may have
evolved and been selected to enhance their effect. They
would also have helped to maintain accurate alignment of
elements during its construction.
Designs from Isfahan
Figure 20 shows a 2-level design that, like the Topkapi
Scroll examples above, is based on subdivision. The large-
scale design is the stars and kites pattern derived from the
bow-tie and decagon tiling of Figure 1(b). The subdivisions
of the bow-tie and decagon used to generate the small-
scale design are shown in Figures 21(a) and (c) with
Figure 20. A 2-level design modelled on the Darb-i Imam, Isfahan.
52 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
the large-scale pattern added in grey. The side of a
composite tile is formed from the diagonals of two bob-
bins and one decagon. The pattern cannot be scale
invariant: the polygonal network for the large-scale design
contains a bow-tie surrounded by four decagons but this
local arrangement does not occur in the small-scale
network.
These subdivisions were derived by Lu and Steinhardt
[17] from three hierarchical designs found on buildings in
Isfahan. The grey areas in Figure 22 mark out the sections
of the large-scale polygonal network underlying these
designs: the rectangular strip runs around the inside of a
portal in the Friday Mosque, the triangular section is one of
a pair of mirror-image spandrels from the Darb-i Imam
(shrine of the Imams), and the arch is a tympanum from a
portal, also from the Darb-i Imam—see [17, 35] for photo-
graphs. Bonner [2] gives an alternative subdivision scheme
for the Darb-i Imam arch using the tiling of Figure 2(a) as
the basis for the large-scale design.
The mosaic in the Darb-i Imam tympanum differs from
the symmetrically perfect construction of Figure 20 in sev-
eral places. For example a bow-tie/bobbin combination
like Figure 7(a) in the top right corner of the central com-
posite bow-tie is flipped; bow-tie/bobbin combinations in
the corners of the upper composite decagon are also flip-
ped; a decagon at the lower end of the curved section of
the boundary on each side is replaced by Figure 7(d). The
modifications to the composite decagon appear to be
deliberate as the same change is applied uniformly in all
corners. Replacing the small decagons may make it easier
to fit the mosaic into its alcove. The bow-tie anomaly is
possibly a mistake by the craftsman.
If we want to use the Isfahan subdivisions as the basis of
a substitution tiling, we need to construct a companion
subdivision of the bobbin tile. In doing so we should

(a)
(c)
Figure 21. Subdivisions (a) and (c) are
pffiffiffi derived from designs on buildings in
Isfahan [17]. The scale factor is 4 þ 2 5
8:472.
emulate the characteristics of the two samples—properties
such as the mirror symmetry of the subdivisions, and the
positions of the tiles in relation to the grey lines. Notice that
focal points such as corners or intersections of the grey
lines are always located in the centres of decagons, and the
interconnecting paths pass lengthwise through bow-ties.
Figure 21(b) shows my solution: it satisfies some of these
criteria, but it is spoilt by the fact that some of the corners of
the grey lines are so close together that decagons centred
on them overlap, and there is a conflict between running
the path through a bow-tie and achieving mirror symmetry
(b)
at the two extremes. This extra subdivision enables the
inflation process to be performed, but the resulting tilings
are probably of mathematical interest only. The large scale
factor for the subdivisions yields a correspondingly large
growth rate for the inflation. After two inflations of a
decagon the patch would contain about 15000 tiles; for
comparison, the patch shown in Figure 13 contains about
1500 tiles.
Lu and Steinhardt use the Isfahan patterns in their dis-
cussion of quasi-periodicity. Commenting on the spandrel,
they say [17, p. 1108]:

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 53

Figure 22. Sections of the bow-tie and decagon tiling
used in the Isfahan patterns.
The Darb-i Imam tessellation is not embedded in a
periodic framework and can, in principle, be extended
into an infinite quasiperiodic pattern.
By this they mean that the visible fragment of the large-
scale design is small enough that no translational symmetry
is immediately apparent and so the patch could be part of a
non-periodic tiling. If we only have access to a finite piece
of any tiling, it is impossible to decide whether it is periodic
without further information on its local or global structure.
Although the lack of conspicuous periodicity in the Darb-i
Imam design could be interpreted as a calculated display of
ambiguity on the part of the artist, to me it seems more
likely to be the result of choices influenced by aesthetic
qualities of the design, and the relative sizes of the tesserae
in the small-scale pattern and the area to be filled. The fact
that the same periodic tiling is a basis for all three Isfahan
designs makes it a good candidate for the underlying
organising principle. Translation in one direction is visible
in the Friday Mosque pattern.
Lu and Steinhardt also observe that the medieval artists
did not subdivide a single large tile but instead used a patch
containing a few large tiles arranged in a configuration that
does not appear in the small-scale network. They then
remark [17, p. 1108]:
This arbitrary and unnecessary choice means that,
strictly speaking, the tiling is not self-similar, although
repeated application of the subdivision rule would
nonetheless lead to [a non-periodic tiling].
This gives the impression that, if the medieval craftsmen
had wanted to, they could have started with a single tile
and inflated it until it covered the available space. But we
must beware of seeing modern abstractions in earlier work.
There is no evidence that medieval craftsmen understood
the process of inflation. The mosaics require only one level
of subdivision, and they do not contain a subdivision of the
bobbin that would be needed to iterate the inflation.
In my opinion the Isfahan patterns, like the 2-level
designs in the Topkapi Scroll, are best explained as an
application of subdivision to generate a small-scale filling
of a periodic large-scale design. Furthermore, the choice of
the large-scale design seems far from arbitrary: it is one of
the oldest and most ubiquitous decagonal star patterns, and
54 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
as such it would have been very familiar to medieval
viewers and recognised even from a small section.
Connections with Penrose Tilings
The use of subdivision and inflation to produce quasi-
periodic tilings with forbidden rotation centres came to
prominence in the 1970s with investigations following the
discovery of small aperiodic sets of tiles, the Penrose kite
and dart being the most famous example. Penrose tilings
have local 5-fold and 10-fold rotation centres and the fact
that some Islamic designs share these unusual symmetry
properties has prompted several people to explore the
connections between the two [1, 17, 20, 24, 27].
Figure 23 shows subdivisions of the kite and dart into
the bow-tie, bobbin, and decagon tiles. As in earlier
examples, the sides of the kite and dart lie on mirror lines
of the tiles. Using this substitution, any Penrose tiling can
be converted into a design in the Islamic style [27]. Fur-
thermore, because the kite and dart are an aperiodic set,
such a design will be non-periodic.
The transition can also proceed in the other direction.
Figure 24 shows subdivisions of the three Islamic tiles into
kites and darts. Two of the patches are familiar to students
of Penrose tilings: (a) is the long bow-tie component of
Conway worms and (b) is the hub of the cartwheel tiling.
Notice also that (b) is assembled from (a) and (c) in the
manner of Figure 7(d).
Kites and darts come with matching rules to prohibit the
construction of periodic tilings when the tiles are assem-
bled like a jigsaw. In Figure 24 the two corners at the
‘wings’ of each dart and the two corners on the mirror line
of each kite are decorated with grey sectors; the matching
rule is that grey corners may only be placed next to other
grey corners. This prevents, for example, the bow-tie and
the decagon in the figure from being assembled in the stars
and kites pattern: it is not possible to place two bow-ties on
opposite corners of a decagon.
The markings on the kites and darts in Figure 24 endow
the composite tiles with a matching rule of their own. Each
side of a composite tile has a single grey spot that divides
its length in the golden ratio; we decorate each side with an
arrow pointing towards the short section. Instead of
defining the matching rule at the vertices of the tiling, as
Figure 23. Subdivisions of the Penrose kite and dart.

(a) (b) (c)
Figure 24. Patches of Penrose kites and darts.
(a) (b)
Figure 25. Subdivisions of marked tilespthat
ffiffiffi preserve
the markings. The scale factor is 1
3þ 5
2:618.
2
with the Penrose example previously described, we place
constraints on the edges of the tiling: the arrows on the two
sides forming an edge of the tiling must point in the same
direction. With these markings and matching rule, the bow-
tie and bobbin are an aperiodic set. To prove this note that
the subdivisions in Figure 25 show that we can tile the
plane by inflation, and that any periodic tiling by bow-ties
and bobbins could be converted into a periodic tiling by
kites and darts but this is impossible. The substitution
matrix for these marked tiles is associated with the Fibo-
nacci sequence and the ratio of bobbins to bow-ties in a
substitution tiling is the golden ratio. Notice that a hori-
zontal line running through the centre of a composite
bow-tie passes lengthwise through the small bow-ties and
short-ways across the small bobbins. Inflation produces a
longer line with the same properties, and a substitution
tiling will contain arbitrarily long such lines. Any infinite
lines must be parallel as they cannot cross each other.
These lines inherit their own 1-dimensional substitution
rule.
Conclusions
In the preceding sections I have described methods for
constructing Islamic geometric patterns, given a brief
introduction to the modern mathematics of substitution
tilings, and analysed some traditional Islamic designs. The
conclusions I reached during the course of the discussion
are isolated and summarised here:
1. It is possible to construct quasi-periodic tilings from the
set of prototiles used by Islamic artists (Figure 6).
Examples can be generated as substitution tilings based
on inflation or using a matching rule with marked
versions of the tiles.
2. Islamic artists did use subdivision to produce hierarchi-
cal designs. There are examples illustrating the method
in the Topkapi Scroll, and three designs on buildings in
Isfahan can be explained using this technique. Indeed,
their prototiles are remarkable in their capacity to form
subdivisions of themselves in so many ways.
3. There is no evidence that the Islamic artists iterated the
subdivision process—all the designs I am aware of have
only two levels. This is to some degree a practical
issue: the scale factor between the small-scale and
large-scale designs is usually large and the area of the
design comparatively small. With the subdivisions used
in the Topkapi Scroll, iteration is impossible as composite
versions of the pentagon and bow-tie do not exist.
4. There is no evidence that the Islamic artists used matching
rules. Ammann bars are the nearest thing to a form of
decoration that could have been used to enforce non-
periodicity. Similar lines that appear on some designs are
a by-product of the construction, not an input to the
design process, although the designs may have been
selected because this feature was found attractive.
5. The designs analysed in this article do not provide
evidence that Islamic artists were aware of a process that
can produce quasi-periodic designs. They are periodic,
generated by reflections in the sides of a rectangle, or
are large designs with radial symmetry. The multi-level
designs are hierarchical, not scale invariant.
In this article I have concentrated on designs with local
5-fold symmetry. In Spain and Morocco there are analo-
gous designs with local 8-fold symmetry, including some
fine 2-level designs in the Patio de las Doncellas in the
Alcazar, Seville—see [22] for photographs. The geometry of
the polygonal networks underlying these designs is
pffiffiffi
grounded on the 2 system of proportions rather than the
golden ratio. Plans of muqarnas (corbelled ceilings built by
stacking units in tiers and progressively reducing the size of
the central hole to produce a stalactite-like dome) some-
times display similar features. These networks have a
strong resemblance to the Ammann–Beenker quasi-
periodic tiling composed of squares and 45–135 rhombi
[33]. This tiling is another substitution tiling that can be
generated by subdivision and inflation; the tiles can also be
decorated with line segments to produce Ammann bars.
Similar claims to those assessed in this article have been
made for some of the Islamic 8-fold designs [2, 6, 22, 23].
To me, it seems most likely that the Islamic interest in
subdivision was for the production of multi-level designs.
Islamic artists were certainly familiar with generating
designs by applying reflection, rotation and translation to
repeat a template. They probably had an intuitive under-
standing of the crystallographic restriction and a feeling
that global 5-fold and 10-fold rotation centres are somehow
incompatible with periodicity. They did have the tools
available to construct quasi-periodic designs but not the
theoretical framework to appreciate the possibility or sig-
nificance of doing so.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 55
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank Paul Steinhardt for clarifying some
statements in [17] and Peter Saltzman for sharing a draft of
his article [29]. I am also very grateful to the following
people for their critical reading of an early draft of this
article and for suggesting improvements: Helmer Aslaksen,
Elisabetta Beltrami, Jean-Marc Castéra, Dirk Frettlöh,
Chaim Goodman-Strauss, Emil Makovicky, John Rigby,
Joshua Socolar, and John Sullivan.
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24. E. Makovicky, F. Rull Pérez and P. Fenoll Hach-Alı́, ‘Decagonal
patterns in the Islamic ornamental art of Spain and Morocco’,
Boletı́n Sociedad Española Mineralogı́a 21 (1998) 107–127.
25. G. Necipoğlu, The Topkapi Scroll: Geometry and Ornament in
Islamic Architecture, Getty Center Publication, 1995.
26. J. Rigby, ‘A Turkish interlacing pattern and the golden ratio’,
Mathematics in School 34 no 1 (2005) 16–24.
27. J. Rigby, ‘Creating Penrose-type Islamic interlacing patterns’,
Proc. Bridges: Mathematical Connections in Art, Music and
Science, (London, 2006), eds. R. Sarhangi and J. Sharp, 2006,
pp. 41–48.
28. F. Rull Pérez, ‘La noción de cuasi-cristal a través de los mosaicos
árabes’, Boletı́n Sociedad Española Mineralogı́a 10 (1987) 291–
298.
29. P. W. Saltzman, ‘Quasi-periodicity in Islamic ornamental design’,
Nexus VII: Architecture and Mathematics, ed. K. Williams, 2008,
pp. 153–168.
30. M. Senechal, Quasicrystals and Geometry, Cambridge Univ.
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31. M. Senechal and J. Taylor, ‘Quasicrystals: The view from Les
Houches’, Math. Intelligencer 12 no 2 (1990) 54–64.
INTERNET RESOURCES
32. ArchNet. Library of digital images of Islamic architecture,
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http://www.patterninislamicart.com/
 Geometric
Constructions with
Ellipses
ALISKA GIBBINS AND LAWRENCE SMOLINSKY
he geometric problems of trisecting a general angle
T and doubling the cube cannot be solved by the use
of a straightedge and compass alone. These
beautiful results were a triumph of modern algebra, first
published by Pierre Laurent Wantzel [1]. The constructible
points are those that are in iterated quadratic extensions of
the base field. A consequence, the Gauss-Wantzel Theo-
rem, states that a regular n-gon is classically constructible if
and only if /(n) is a power of 2; here / is the Euler /
function, which counts how many integers are less than
and relatively prime to n.
To the modern reader the question of what are the
possible numerical magnitudes (lengths) is answered by
the process of the topological completion of the rational
numbers, i.e., the real numbers. The ancient Greeks
showed the existence of numerical magnitudes by affir-
mative use of the axioms—proving existence is a plausible
motive for why the Ancients engaged in constructions [2,
3]. Straightedge-and-compass constructions are a rigorous
application of Euclid’s first three postulates. However,
there are other procedures the Greeks used for con-
structions. For example, a procedure not grounded in the
postulates is the rotation of a plane figure to produce
a solid, or the intersection of a plane with a solid figure
(p. 29 [4]).
Pappus of Alexandria described a classification of
methodology for geometric problems—one which he
attributed to those he called Ancients. A construction is
called planar if it is done with straightedge and compass
alone, solid if it uses conic sections, and linear if it uses
higher order curves [2]. Solid solutions do exist to the
classical problems. Pappus gave two trisection construc-
tions with hyperbolas that are possibly due to Apollonius.
Menaechmus, the discoverer of conic sections, is supposed
to have made his discovery while working on the problem
of doubling the cube, and he gave a construction using
parabolas. Those constructions have been described in The
Intelligencer [5].
In 1895 James Pierpont essentially gives the analysis of
which numbers are constructible using conic sections. In
two pages at the end of a Bulletin paper, Pierpont
remarks that ‘‘Greek geometers frequently allowed the use
of the conic sections in a geometric construction,’’ and he
determines that a regular n-gon allows a solid construc-
tion if and only if /(n) has only factors of 2 and 3 [6, 7].
Recent work by Carlos R. Videla explores solid construc-
tions, and Videla gives a complete and more modern
version of Pierpont’s result [5]. Videla allows the con-
struction of a conic when the focus, directrix, and
eccentricity are constructible. The conically-constructible
numbers may be obtained by circles, parabolas, and
hyperbolas alone.
We will consider construction with ellipses. The
elliptic constructions in this paper are from an under-
graduate project by the first author and directed by
the second. Patrick Hummel also gives a treatment of
elliptic constructions in a paper from his undergraduate
project [8]. While the abstract theory is similar, the con-
structions are different. The authors are grateful to the
referee for directing them to Hummel’s paper and other
sources.
We will primarily be concerned with solid constructions,
but it is worthwhile to note that ancient Greek construc-
tions were extremely rich and varied. A beautiful
demonstration of this variety is a construction to double the
cube by Archytas of Taras, who came out of Plato’s
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009 57
 1 If P is a point of intersection of the cylinder, cone, pand
2
B
O A
1 1 3
4 2 4
1
2
Figure 1. Example with b = 1/2.
Academy. We now give a version of this construction [9].
Let O be the origin of the xy-plane, and consider the circle
with center (1/2, 0) and radius 1/2, i.e.,
x 2 þ y 2 ¼ x:
Take a point B on the circle and let b be the length of the
segment OB. Let A = (1, 0), so OA is a diameter. See
Figure 1. Archytas can find the cube root of b.
The construction requires three dimensions. Start with
the right circular cylinder with axis parallel to the z-axis
containing our circle, which is given by equation (1).
Take the cone with vertex O obtained by rotating the
line containing OB about the x-axis. This cone is given
by
b2 ðx 2 þ y2 þ z 2 Þ ¼ x 2 :
The third and surprising construction is to take the circle
in the xz-plane of radius 1/2 and diameter OA and rotate it
about the z-axis. The result is a degenerate torus—a circle
rotated about a tangent line. See Figure 2. The equation of
the degenerate torus is
ðx 2 þ y2 þ z 2 Þ2 ¼ x 2 þ y2 :
.........................................................................................................................................................
ALISKA GIBBINS is a graduate student at
AUTHORS
Ohio State, studying geometric group the-
ory with Mike Davis. She spent a year
teaching literacy in New Orleans, and is an
accomplished Cajun cook. She got her B.S.
from Tulane University in New Orleans,
except for moving to Louisiana State for a
semester while Tulane was recovering from
Hurricane Katrina. This paper grew from a
collaboration during that semester.
Department of Mathematics,
Ohio State University,
Columbus, OH 43210, USA
e-mail: gibbins@math.ohio-state.edu
58 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
ffiffiffi
degenerate torus, then the distance of P to the origin is 3 b:
ðx 2 þ y 2 þ z 2 Þ2 ¼ x 2 þ y2 by equation ð3Þ
¼ x by equation ð1Þ
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
¼ b x 2 þ y2 þ z 2 by equation ð2Þ:
The planar and solid constructions can be built from a
limited number of well-defined constructions with lines,
circles, and other conics, and so can be analyzed by
modern algebra à la Gauss, Wantzel, and Pierpont. In
general, the rich variety of constructions introduced by the
ancient Greeks requires more analysis before allowing
algebra to come to bear. Some constructions allow neusis
(sliding a straightedge on which a line segment is marked).
An analysis allowing neusis on lines is discussed by Martin
[7]. Constructions using neusis between a circle and a line
are discussed by Arthur Baragar [10].
Wilbur Richard Knorr, in his discussion of angle-trisec-
tion methods by ancient geometers in [11] (page 216),
comes up with about a dozen solutions and writes, ‘‘In view
of the massive extinction of documentation from antiquity,
we can hardly presume that this list would exhaust the
ð1Þ entire range of ancient solutions.’’ There are a lot of inter-
esting constructions and questions to explore.
In the modern treatment of construction problems, one
first translates a geometric question into an algebraic
question by use of the Cartesian or Gaussian plane, and
then analyzes the question using the power of algebra and
number theory. This first step was already started—as it
were—in the beginning with Descartes’s analytic geometry.
René Descartes gave a trisection construction in his 1637 La
Ge´ome´trie, the monograph in which he introduced analytic
geometry. This construction uses a parabola and a circle,
ð2Þ and relies on the the triple-angle formula [12].
A version of Descartes’s trisection for the angle h = p/3 is
shown in Figure 3. The construction uses the parabola
defined by y = 2x2 and the circle through the origin
with center (1/2 cos (h),1). The x-coordinates of the points
of intersection satisfy the equation x(4x3 - 3x -cos (h))
=0 or x(x - cos (h/3))(x - cos (h/3 + 2p/3))
ð3Þ (x - cos (h/3 + 4p/3)) = 0, by the triple-angle formula
LAWRENCE SMOLINSKY started in topol-
ogy, getting his doctorate at Brandeis under
the late Jerry Levine. More recently he has
worked in integrable systems and represen-
tation theory. While at LSU (as Chair since
2004), he has worked with students in many
activities. For one, the LSU Mathematics
Contest for high school students, which
annually draws about 200–300 contestants.
For another instance, the present article!
Department of Mathematics,
Louisiana State University,
Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA
e-mail: smolinsk@math.lsu.edu
 Figure 2. Archytas construction with b = 1/2.
2 structible points derived from P. The set of all numbers
1 Hungerford [13]. It is one of the founding observations that
1 1 1 1
2 2
Figure 3. Descartes’s trisection of h ¼ p3 .
cos (3h) = 4 cos3(h) - 3cos (h). In Figure 3, there are four
distinct points of intersection although two are very close
together.
Classical Constructions
Start with an initial set of points P in the plane. The
initial set of points should include (0, 0) and (1, 0) (and
may include additional points, e.g., to form a general
angle). The set of points one may derive using only a
straightedge and compass will be called classically con-
that arise as the ordinate or abscissa of classically con-
structible points is the set of classically constructible
numbers.
We recall some of the facts about classically constructible
numbers, taking some of the background notions from
starting with an initial set of points P the classically con-
structible numbers form a field, i.e., using straightedge and
compass constructions one may start with two numbers and
construct the sum, difference, product, and quotient. Fur-
thermore, if (x, y) is a classically constructible point, it is a
simple exercise to show that (y, x) is a classically construc-
tible point.
It is useful to introduce the notion of the plane of a field.
If F is a subfield of the real numbers R; then the plane of F
is the subset F
F  R2 : Suppose P and Q are distinct
points in the plane of F. Then the line determined by P and
Q is a line in F. Similarly, the circle with center P and
containing Q is a circle in F. It is a straightforward calcu-
lation that the intersection points of two lines in F are
points in the plane of F. Furthermore, if a circle in F is
intersected with either a line in F or a circle in F, then the
intersection points are in the plane of F(r), where r is the
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 59
square root of an element of F and F(r) is the field formed
by adjoining r to F [13].
Elliptic Constructions
We mention three approaches for constructing ellipses that
were known to the Ancients and can be used to extend
straightedge-and-compass constructions to constructions
with ellipses.
The first approach is to use the fact that an ellipse is the
locus of points whose distance from the two foci is a
constant sum. This property was known at least as far back
as Apollonius [2].
The second approach is to use the interpretation of an
ellipse as the motion of a point on a line segment whose
endpoints slide along perpendicular lines. This construc-
tion was reported by Proclus, who was a head of the
Academy [2]. This construction could be accomplished with
knowledge of the line containing the foci and the lengths of
the major and semimajor axis.
The third approach is to allow the construction of an
ellipse given its directrix, focus, and eccentricity.
Each of the ellipse construction techniques ostensively
would determine a different set of constructible points in
the plane, but these three sets all turn out to be the same.
This fact follows from part (2) of Proposition 3 below. We
use the first method, which may be accomplished with pins
and string. Our fundamental constructions are:
(C1) Given three points, one may insert pins in the three
points, tighten the string around the pins, and remove
one pin. Keep the string taut, and use a pen to draw the
ellipse around the two pins as foci and passing through the
third.
(C2) Given two points, one may insert pins in the two
points, tighten the string around the pins, remove one pin,
and use a pen to draw the circle with center one point and
the other on the circle.
(C3) Given two points, one may draw the line through
the two points.
Which points can be reached by constructions with a
straightedge and pins and string? Start with a set of points P,
which include (0, 0) and (1, 0). The elliptically constructible
points derived from P are all the points of intersection
obtained from the ellipses and lines constructed by the
operations above. We call the obtained coordinates the field
of elliptically constructible numbers.
Analogous to the previous definitions for classical con-
structions is the following definition. Suppose F is a
subfield of the real numbers R: If O, P, and Q are distinct
points in the plane of F, then the ellipse containing O with
foci P and Q is an ellipse in F.
R EMARK 1 If an ellipse is in standard position then its
equation can be given as
Ax 2 þ Cy 2  F ¼ 0;
qffiffiffi qffiffiffi pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
where C [ A [ 0. Let a ¼ AF ; b ¼ CF and c ¼ : a2  b2 .
Then the foci of the ellipse are at (± c, 0), and (a, 0) is a
point on the ellipse. This ellipse is constructible by pins
and string, if and only if a and c are elliptically
60 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
constructible numbers. To construct this ellipse with the
the sliding-line-segment approach, the segment will have
length a + b, and the distinguished point will separate the
segment into parts of length a and b. The ellipse is
constructible with a sliding segment if and only if a and b
are constructible. Next note that the directrix is the line
2
x ¼ ac and the eccentricity is e ¼ ac : The ellipse is
constructible by the focus-and-directrix approach if and
2
only if ac and ac are constructible.
L EMMA 2 Suppose that F is a subfield of R in which every
positive number has a square root. If cos (h) [ F, then
rotation of the plane by h induces a bijection on the plane
of F. If (r, s) is in the plane of F, then translation of
the Cartesian plane by (r, s) induces a bijection on the
plane of F.
P ROOF . Note that if cos (h) is in F, then sin (h) is in F
since sin2h = 1 - cos2h. The formulas for rotation of the
plane by ±h and translation of the plane by ± (r, s) show
that they are bijections of the plane of F.
The main lemma is the following.
P ROPOSITION 3 Suppose that F is a subfield of R in which
every positive number has a square root.
(1) Consider an ellipse E described by the equation
ax2 + bxy + y2 + dx + ey + f = 0. The ellipse E is in
F if and only if a, b, d, e, and f are in F.
(2) An ellipse E is in F if and only if its eccentricity,
directrix, and foci are in F. An ellipse E is in F if and
only if the lengths of its semi-major and semi-minor
axes are in F and the line containing the foci is in F.
(3) If E1 and E2 are ellipses in F, then the coordinates of the
points of intersection of E1 and E2 are in a field F(R),
where R is the set of real roots of a quartic polynomial
with coefficients in F. If E is an ellipse in F and L is a
line in F, then the coordinates of the points of
intersection of E and L are in the field F.
P ROOF . Part 1. If E is in F, then the foci and center are in
the plane of F. The sine and cosine of h are also in F,
where h is the angle formed by the x-axis and the line
containing the foci. The ellipse E 0 in standard position
obtained by rotation by h and translation of E is again in F
(Lemma 2). By Remark 1, the coefficients of the equation
of E0 are in F. Undoing the translation and rotation shows
the coefficients of E are in F (consult the formula for the
transformation of the coefficients of a conic). The con-
verse is similar, but rotate E into standard position using h,
where cot ðhÞ ¼ acb unless b = 0. (If b = 0 then h = 0 or
p.) By use of trigonometric identities, sin (h) and cos (h)
are seen to be in F.
Part 3. First consider the intersection of two ellipses. Any
two constructible ellipses E1 and E2 have equations of the
form:
 a1 x 2 þ b1 xy þ y 2 þ d1 x þ e1 y þ f1 ¼ 0 ð4Þ 1

a2 x 2 þ b2 xy þ y2 þ d2 x þ e2 y þ f2 ¼ 0: ð5Þ
Solving for y,
f1  f2 þ ðd1  d2 Þx þ ða1  a2 Þx 2 1 1
y¼ : ð6Þ
ðb1  b2 Þx þ ðe1  e2 Þ
Putting this expression back into equation (4) we get
Ax 4 þ Bx 3 þ Cx 2 þ Dx þ G ¼ 0; ð7Þ 1
where the coefficients are

A ¼ e1 f2 þ f22 þ e2 f1  2f2 f1 þ f12

B ¼ d1 e2  d2 e1  b1 f2 þ 2d2 f2  2d1 f2 þ b2 f1  2d2 f1 þ 2d1 f1 2

C ¼ b1 d2 þ d22 þ b2 d1  2d2 d1 þ d12 þ a1 e2  a2 e1 þ 2a2 f2

 2a1 f2  2a2 f1 þ 2a1 f1
D ¼ a1 b2  a2 b1 þ 2a2 d2  2a1 d2  2a2 d1 þ 2a1 d1
1.25
G ¼ a22  2a2 a1 þ a21 :

Let R be the real roots of Equation (7). The proof of the

other claim is similar.
Part 2 is similar in spirit to Parts 1 and 3.
Note that Part 2 implies that the three methods of con-
struction given in the beginning of this section yield the 1.3
same constructible numbers.
0.95 1

Trisection of the General Angle Figure 4. Trisection of h ¼ p3 .

Suppose we start with an angle of measure h. Translate it to
the congruent central angle \ABC with A = (cos (h),
which factors as (4x3 - 3x - q)(x - 1) = 0. One of the
sin (h)), B = (0, 0), and C = (1, 0). To trisect this angle, we
solutions is cos (h/3).
must construct the point A0 = (cos (h/3), sin (h/3)), and
The example of the trisection of h ¼ p3 is shown in
\A0 BC trisects the angle. Constructing A0 is equivalent to
Figure 4. In equations (8), q ¼ 12 : There are four distinct
constructing the number cos (h/3), because sin (h/3) can
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi points of intersection, although two are very close together.
then be produced as 1  cos2 ðh=3Þ:
Let q = cos (h). By a triple-angle formula, cos (h/3) is a Cube roots and Doubling the Cube
real solution to the equation The ability to construct a cube whose volume is double a
3
4x  3x  q ¼ 0: given cubepffiffiis
ffi the same as the ability to multiply a side
length by 3 2.
The other roots are cos (h/3 + 2p/3) and cos (h/3 + 4p/3).
T HEOREMpffiffiffi5 If a is an elliptically constructible number,
T HEOREM 4 The general angle can be trisected. then so is 3
a.

P ROOF . Let F be the field of constructible numbers P ROOF . Let F be the field of constructible numbers
derived from (0, 0), (1, 0), and (cos (h), 0). Let q = cos (h) derived from (0, 0), (1, 0), and (a, 0). Consider the fol-
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
and p ¼ 17  4q : Consider the following ellipses with lowing equations of ellipses with coefficients in F:
coefficients in F: pffiffiffi
2x 2 þ y2  ax þ 2 2y þ 1 ¼ 0
pffiffiffi pffiffiffi ð9Þ
2x 2 þ 4y 2  qx þ 2py þ 2 ¼ 0 3x 2 þ y2  ax þ ð1 þ 2 2Þy þ 2 ¼ 0:
ð8Þ
6x 2 þ 4y2 þ ð2p  4Þy  ð2 þ qÞx  p  1 ¼ 0:
These ellipses are in the plane of F by Proposition 3 part
These ellipses are in the plane of F by Proposition 3 part (1). Solving the system of equations (9) for the x-
(1). Solving the system of equations (8) for the x- coordinates of the points of intersection, we obtain that
coordinates of the points of intersection, we obtain that they are the real roots of the equation
they are the real roots of the equation x 4  ax ¼ 0:
pffiffiffi
4x 4  4x 3  3x 2 þ ð3  qÞx þ q ¼ 0; The real roots are 0 and 3 a:

Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 61

 1
1 gons that are elliptically constructible were determined by
2
3 are not required for constructions in the proofs of
p
3
ffiffiffi
Figure 5. Constructing 2.
To double the cube, we need to let a = 2 in equations
(9). This gives the two ellipses shown in Figure 5.
Concluding Remarks
We can determine which numbers are elliptically con-
structible. Suppose P is a set of points and F  R is the field
of elliptically constructible numbers determined by P. Let
F ¼ F þ iF : Then F is a subfield of the complex numbers
and the constructible points in the Gaussian plane. Let F0
be the field generated by the rationals and the coordinates
of the points in P.
T HEOREM 6
(1) F is the smallest field containing F0, i, and the square
roots, cube roots, and conjugate of each element.
(2) F is the smallest field which contains F0 and the real
roots of every fourth-degree polynomial with coefficients
in F.
P ROOF . Part (1) is shown in [5]. To see part (2), note that
F ¼ Re F: By Cardano’s and Ferrari’s formulas, F contains
the real roots of fourth-degree polynomials with coeffi-
cients in F. Conversely, by part (3) of Proposition 3, F is
obtained from F0 by repeated iteration of adjoining real
roots of polynomial of at most fourth degree.
The main observation in the proof of part (1) is
that taking a cube root of a complex number is trisecting
an angle and taking the cube root of a real number, i.e.,
p ffiffiffi hi
3
R e 3 is a cube root of Rehi. Combining this observation
with Cardano’s and Ferrari’s formulas shows that
62 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
trisections and real cube roots are exactly the construc-
tions required to obtain all of F:
The fields of elliptically constructible numbers and con-
ically constructible numbers are the same. So the regular n-
Pierpont [5, 6]. A regular n-gon is elliptically constructible if
and only if /(n) = 2s3t for some s and t. For example, the 7-
and 9-sided regular polygons are elliptically constructible
but not classically constructible.
Note also that one only has to allow the construction of
translations of ellipses in standard position to do elliptic
constructions. Oblique ellipses are not required to obtain
the field of elliptically constructible numbers, for they
Theorems 4 and 5. The type of ellipses may be further
restricted: the ratio of the lengths
pffiffiffi pffiffiof
ffi the major
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffi to the minor
axis may be restricted to 1; 2; 3; and : 3=2. Can this be
improved?
REFERENCES
[1] Wantzel, L. ‘‘Recherches sur les moyens de reconnaı̂tre si un
problème de Géométrie peut se résoudre avec la règle et le
compas,’’ Journal de mathématiques pures et appliquées Sér. I 2
(1837), 366–372. Available free online through the gallica library
(Bibliothèque Nationale de France).
[2] Knorr, Wilbur Richard, The Ancient Tradition of Geometric Prob-
lems, Dover Publications, New York, 1993.
[3] Zeuthen, H.G., ‘‘Die geometrische Construction als ‘Existenz-
beweis’ in der antiken Geometrie,’’ Math. Ann. 47 (1896), 222–
228.
[4] Mueller, Ian, Philosophy of Mathematics and Deductive Structure
in Euclid’s Elements, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts
and London, England, 1981.
[5] Videla, Carlos R., ‘‘On Points Constructible from Conics,’’ The
Mathematical Intelligencer, 19 (1997), no. 2, 53–57.
[6] Pierpont, James, ‘‘On an Undemonstrated Theorem of the Dis-
quisitiones Arithmeticae,’’ Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 2 (1895), 77–
83.
[7] Martin, George E., Geometric Constructions, Springer-Verlag,
New York, 1997.
[8] Hummel, Patrick, ‘‘Solid Constructions Using Ellipses,’’ PME
Journal 11 (2003), 429–435.
[9] Heath, Thomas, Greek Mathematics Vol. 1, Oxford University
Press, London, 1921.
[10] Baragar, Arthur, ‘‘Constructions Using a Compass and Twice-
Notched Straightedge,’’ Amer. Mathematical Monthy 109 (2002),
151–164.
[11] Knorr, Wilbur Richard, Textual Studies in Ancient and Medieval
Geometry, Birkhãuser, Boston, Inc., Boston, 1989.
[12] Yates, Robert C., ‘‘The Trisection Problem’’ National Mathemat-
ics Magazine (continued as Mathematics Magazine) 15 (1941),
191–202.
[13] Hungerford, Thomas W., Algebra, New York: Springer 1997.
 The Mathematical Tourist Dirk Huylebrouck, Editor
Abstract Does your hometown have any
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KYUNG-SUN LEE natural inheritance of Mexico, signify-
ing a new residential dwelling
predicated on modernity and indige-
nously rooted in the symbol of
Mexican living. The manner in which
his buildings are integrated within their
given ‘‘place’’ is perhaps the key factor
in his significance and renown. While
drawing from cultural and regional
references of Mexico, Barragan offered
Please send all submissions to a utopian vision of the unification of
Mathematical Tourist Editor, the vernacular Mexican style with
Dirk Huylebrouck, Aartshertogstraat 42, architectural purity and simplicity.
8400 Oostende, Belgium Stucco walls with bricks, intense satu-
e-mail: dirk.huylebrouck@gmail.com rated colors, and natural illumination
1
A Californian architect, Mark Mack, belongs to this group. In an interview with the author, Mack expressed, ‘‘Barragan for me was a very interesting character because
he used very modern spatial articulation in his buildings. But when you look at the interior and the way the details are done, they are very traditional. However, the
shapes overwhelm the tradition, becoming a new shape and a new form.’’ See Jin-Ho Park, ‘‘An Interview with Mark Mack,’’ in the Architectural Magazine POAR,
Seoul: Ganhyang [13]. See Burri, R. (2000) Luis Barragán, London: Phaidon Press; Eggener, K, (2001) Luis Barragán’s Gardens of El Pedregal, New York: Princeton
Architectural Press; Federica Zanco, F. (2001) Luis Barragán: The Quiet Revolution, Skira Editore; Julbez, J. and Palomar, J. (1997) The life and work of luis barragan,
New York: Rizzoli; Pauly, D. and Habersetzer, J. (2002) Barragan: Space and Shadow, Walls and Colour, Basel: Birkhäuser.
2
‘‘Luis Barragan,’’ Arts and Architecture, August [2], pp.24–25.

2008 SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
possessing a spiritual quality defined
Barragan’s designs. Barragan continues
to exert a profound influence on con-
temporary architecture. (See [4], [6], [7]
and [8].) His vision has inspired some
of the best-known contemporary
Mexican architects including Ricardo
Legorreta, Andrea Casillas, and Enri-
que Norton of TEN (Taller Enrique
Norton) Arquitectos, among others.
1
Ricardo Legorreta is among the disci-
ples of Barragan who make use of his
sense of color, spatial composition,
and design vocabulary.
Among Barragan’s work, his own
house and studio stands out for its
interplay of abstract planes and bold
masses. Its colorful walls provide
internal rooms and patios with pleas-
ant filtered light. Barragan writes, ‘‘I
have left large plane walls without
window openings, both for plastic
beauty… . By the use of large wall
surfaces one can also obtain spaces
with varying luminosity, which creates
an ambience more comfortable and
intimate.’’2 Barragan’s architecture is
associated with two primary connec-
tions. The abstract neo-plasticity of De
Stijl and Bauhaus strongly inspired the
geometry of the house, whereas Bar-
ragan’s association with avant garde
artistic circles, which included Diego
Rivera, Frida Kahlo, and Jos Clemente
Orozco, infused him with indigenous
culture and regional principles.
Mathematical Intelligencer readers
may wonder why this house is the
subject of an article. Although much
has been written about the Luis Barr-
ragan house/studio, most studies of
the house are descriptive presentations
lacking formal and mathematical
63
study. The present article reviews his
architectural thought in an effort to
grasp the abstract nature of Barragan’s
achievement, and also explores the
underlying logic applied to the house
through an in-depth analysis and
interpretation of the house. Among
other aspects, Barragan’s works
prominently feature the transformation
of rigorous combinations of simple but
timeless geometry into unique spatial
compositions. The simple geometry
not only serves as a key principle for
the consistent and systematic quality
underlying his work, but also provides
an order for the formal elements that
encompass the spatial composition. It
expresses the clarity of his thought and
insight, and achieves overly formal and
unique architectonic space forms, thus
providing a source of Barragan’s
expression. Therefore, central to this
article is the notion that Barragan’s
house is characterized by a powerful
commitment to the spirit of abstraction
coupled with a strong geometrical
basis. Above all, we would encourage
interested Mathematical Intelligencer
readers to visit the house to experience
its unique formal quality and gain new
architectonic insights.
The Barragan House
The house and studio of Luis Barragan
is located within Mexico City. Adjacent
to an earlier home he designed, it
was completed in 1947.3 The lot for
the house is 100 feet across its front
(about 30 m) and 140 feet (about
42 m) deep.4 The house was the point
of departure for his subsequent
works. Barragan’s work from this per-
iod focuses on colors and forms and
the light that defines his buildings. The
focus may also be on the emotional
quality of the form and light in their
abstract manifestations. Barragan lived
and worked in the house alone until
his death in 1988 from Parkinson’s
disease.
The Barragan house is known for its
unique characteristics and the serene
form of both the house and garden. The
property is completely hidden from the
Figure 1. A view of the Barragan house, 1947, from General
Francisco Ramirez Street.
outside neighborhood by a plain façade
on a small narrow street.5 The entire
house is screened and turned inwards to
allow for greater privacy, creating col-
orful interior spaces and shaded
courtyards. An exterior view is pre-
sented in Figures 1–5.
Upon entering the house, a dark
entrance hall with indirect lighting and
volcanic lava floors extends to a vesti-
bule facing a pink wall. In the
vestibule, stairs link the volcanic lava
floor stairway to the mezzanine
above.6 To the right, one is led to the
main living area. The main room
includes the living room and a library
that is a double-height space with dark
exposed wooden girders. These style
girders are typical in Barragan’s
houses, one example being in the Lo-
pez house of 1948. Here one finds a
serene enclosed garden. High walls
surround the garden with bastions set
at intervals. These walls serve as a
protective barrier to the outside world,
bringing tranquility and comfort. Water
and lush vegetation are utilized to
regulate the temperature of both the
garden and the building.
The entire layout of the procession
to the interior space and the garden
vividly reflects the elaborate image
of the Lahambra Moorish garden:
‘‘… [W]hile walking along the lava cre-
vices, under the shadow of imposing
ramparts of living stocks, I suddenly
discovered, to my astonishment, a small
secret green valley—
the shepherds call them ‘‘jewels’’ —
surrounded and enclosed by the
most fantastic, capricious rock forma-
tions … .’’7
The living room is partitioned by
folded screens and lowered walls,
which are movable according to func-
tional needs. These elements create an
uninterrupted flow of rooms. The
exposed pine ceiling structure visibly
extends beyond the boundaries of
the individual partitioned rooms, so
that, while remaining private, they
are not completely isolated from
one another. Reinforcing the dynamic
quality of the high open space is
its element, the stairs. The wooden
stairs of the library lead to the mezza-
nine. The stairway without a handrail
becomes a dynamic element through
its expression of flowing movement.
The doorway found at the top of the
stairs seems a part of the stairway,
because it is the same width and is
made out of the same material.
Barragan’s studio is located next to
his house with one wall in common.
The studio, with various offices, has
direct access from the street through a
vestibule. A typical patio is located on
the west side of the studio, yet originally
it overlooked an enclosed patio with a
large window. The patio was enclosed
with high walls on three sides, offering a

3
This house is currently known as the Ortega house realized in 1940.
4
‘‘Luis Barragan,’’ Arts and Architecture, August [2], pp.24–25.
5
Clive Bamford Smith, Five Mexican Architects, Architectural Book Publishing Co., Inc. New York, [16], p.74.
6
Barragan Foundation, Casa Luis Barragan Guide [3], Mexico.
7
In his official address, 1980 Pritzker Architecture Prize, see Paul Rispa, ed., Barragan, the Complete Work, New York: Princeton Architectural Press, [15], pp. 204–207.

64 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

 Figure 2. Floor Plans of the Barragan House, 1947. This drawing was reconstructed based on
drawings from Casa Luis Barragan Guide, published by the Barragan Foundation in 2004.

Figure 3. One-quarter scale reconstructed model by Byung-in Yu.

Figure 4. Left: Mathias Goeritz’s sketch hung on the living room of the Barragan house. Right:
Mathias Goeritz’s sculpture, ‘‘The Doors to Nowhere.’’

visual barrier to lend the serene quality
of an enclosed space, decorated with
traditional ceramic vases. Between the
offices and the studio lies an outdoor
space for cleaning.
The second-floor plan includes two
bedrooms, a guest room, a dressing
room, a mezzanine for the house, and
two offices above the studio. The
house and the studio are not linked on
the second floor. Interestingly, these
rooms rely on natural light.
The high enclosed walls on the roof
terrace provide the space with a sense
of privacy and serenity. The terraced
garden is blocked off from the street.
The walls help focus attention on the
discontinuity between the roof terrace
and the outside environment. The ter-
race becomes a totally isolated part of
the house and offers no vista. Exposed
only to the sky, the bold roof terrace
brings to mind the light sculptures of
James Turrell.8

8
Refer to The Life and Work of Luis Barragan, by Jose M. Buendia Julbez, Juan Palomar, and Guillermo Eguiarte. For example, James Turrell’s Skyspace is a
freestanding enclosed chamber where one sits on a bench and views the sky and atmospheric changes through an opening in the roof.

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 65

 Figure 5. Similar paintings hung on the walls of the Luis Barragan house (reconstructed by the
authors).
Sources of Barragan’s Abstract
Neo-Plasticity
From the construction of this house
onward, Barragan begins to resolve his
planar surfaces. Horizontal and vertical
planes begin to link, trapping rectan-
gular planes within. Barragan’s
rectilinear designs fuse abstract neo-
plasticity with the Mexican landscape
tradition. He promoted a rich vocabu-
lary of local materials and a wide range
of colors within formal plasticity inno-
vations. Early on, while traveling in
Europe in the 1920s, Barragan was
inspired by the work of architects such
as Gropius, Mies van der Rohe, and Le
Corbusier. When he started his practice
in 1927, his early designs reflected the
Spanish-Mexican vernacular tradition.
The year 1947 was generally regarded
as the beginning of Barragan’s system-
atic development, a period that
continued until his death in 1988.
Unlike his early work, his later designs
exhibit simple geometric forms.
Barragan was particularly associated
with European immigrants within the
United States and Mexico. Among oth-
ers, his association with Mathias
Goeritz was of primary influence on his
abstract and plastic work. Goeritz car-
ried pure plastic forms to their most
extreme limits in his designs. Filtering
through Goeritz’s abstraction and
influences of minimal art, Barragan
incorporated Euro-American Modernist
9
See Josef Albers’s 1963 book, Interaction of Color, New Haven: Yale University Press.
66 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
design into the Mexican landscape and
his color schemes, creating a unique
and exhilarating new design style.
Torres de Sate´lite, designed by Mathias
Goeritz and Luis Barragan in 1957 and
built in 1958, is an example of their
collaboration. It is located in Ciudad
Satélite, a middle-class zone, in the
northern part of Naucalpan, Mexico.
Josef Albers’s paintings also pay
attention particularly to simple com-
positions and contrasting color.
Barragan collected a few of Josef
Albers’s paintings, and the series
Homage to the Square was displayed
on the walls of the Barragan house. A
formal analogy between Albers’s
paintings and Barragan’s architecture
can be readily drawn.
Albers’s series Homage to the Square
are based on a grid system, drawn on
both horizontal and vertical divisions of
20 units each. The first series of Albers’s
paintings consists of four squares with
four shades of one color. The squares
within each painting are nested pro-
portionally, according to their sizes. In
basic composition (Figure 6a), the
units to either side of the nested
squares are twice as large as the units
on the top and bottom. The propor-
tional relationship between the squares
is based on simple whole numbers
such as 1, 2, 3, etc. Accordingly, their
arrangement is bilaterally symmetrical
along a vertical axis, but not strictly
concentric, providing a dynamic result.
Three more basic types are added later
on in his series. Their composition
relies on the same divisional technique
but an individual square is removed
from the four-square composition
(Figures 6b–d).
With this mathematically plotted
framework, Albers experimented with
the retinal effects of color within a
series of nested squares.9 The squares
are used to investigate color interaction
with the adjoining colors where they
contrast, recede, or pop out. The con-
secutive squares of color turn out to be
perfectly harmonious and purely
abstract, unlike anything in nature.
There is no evidence that Barragan
held a particular regard for mathemat-
ics. However, through the use of
simple geometry associated with
whole-number ratios and the chro-
matic colors of the paintings, it is
evident that Barragan was influenced
by Albers’s approaches. Perhaps Bar-
ragan takes Albers’s system to achieve
harmony and proportion within his
works. Barragan clearly appreciated
Albers’s approach to exploring the
potential of abstract values, shape,
color, and texture. At the Bauhaus,
Albers dealt principally with abstract,
formal issues. He also stressed com-
mon materials and their inherent
properties. For Albers, a deep knowl-
edge of abstract composition enhanced
 Figure 6. Albers’s different square compositions and their proportions (reconstructed by the
authors).

the comprehension of materialistic qual-
ity and social suitability. Barragan’s
approach was also along these lines.
Barragan’s form, defined by planar
walls of different heights and colors,
involves explorations of three-dimen-
sional depth using light and space.10
His work has been praised as having
attained a degree of mystical and
spiritual abstraction. An example is
the color palette used within the
Barragan house, which includes yel-
low, purple, pink, red, and an earthy-
brown, coupled with neutral grays
and whites. Barragan did not follow
any systematic color theory such as
Johannes Itten’s color circle. Also,
Barragan’s use of color is not based
on material properties; instead, he
sought to articulate color to influ-
ence and reinforce desired spatial
effects.
Within the Barragan house, most
walls are colored white, which acts as
a foreground element that defines the
spatial extension outwards. Key walls
in certain rooms are meanwhile col-
ored. The vestibule best reveals the
use of pink to reinforce the spatial
intent of the house. The reflected light
landing on the pink surface leads
visitors from the entrance hall to the
vestibule, thereby reinforcing linear
movement between spaces via transi-
tional zones. In the living room,
Barragan applied yellow to the floor.
Counterbalancing the yellow floor is a
dark brown wooden ceiling that con-
tinues to the adjacent rooms. In the
dining room, Barragan applies red to
the walls. Three-dimensional space
combined with color is reminiscent of
Gerrit Thomas Rietveld’s Schroder
house, as well as the color drawings
of Cornelis van Eesteren and Theo
van Doesburg (see Figure 7).
Typically, abstract expressionist
painters intended to move beyond
representation to pure form. In reality,
these painters were inspired to create
from patterns, shapes, and colors they
found within the natural landscape.
Van Doesburg’s early window design
illustrates a series of abstract pro-
cesses that begin with a naturalistic
image that is transformed, step-by-
step, into an abstract composition of
geometric shapes. This is a classic
example of abstract expressionism.11
The abstract expressionist movement
is described as being inclined heavily
towards conceptualization, surpassing
all that is to be perceived in material
reality. This exponent of conceptual-
ized abstraction influenced Barragan
in terms of his abstraction of nature
and his feelings about Mexican archi-
tecture. Denouncing the traditional
image, Barragan searched for a new
vision of Mexican architecture through
abstraction. Barragan conceptualized
the traditional image of the Mexican
house and manifested it in a new
plastic volumetric morphology that
surpassed the traditional model,
shedding all formal connotations and
structural organization to trace inner
force.

Figure 7. Left: Cornelis van Eesteren and Theo van Doesburg, ‘‘Contra-Construction’’ of 1923;
middle: Cornelis van Eesteren and Theo van Doesburg, ‘‘Maison Particulière’’ of 1922; right:
Barragan house color scheme (computer reconstructed).

10
Barragan also used ‘‘two-sided walls:’’ ‘‘One side of his walls, facing the viewer frontally, reveals the sun’s colors; the other side is always shrouded in shadows,
suggesting absent presences who seem to await their call to enter the stage.’’ Emilio Ambasz, ‘‘Luis Barragan House and Atelier for Barragan, Tacubaya, Mexico, [1],’’
GA Houses, Tokyo, ADA EDITA.
11
See Allan Doig, Theo Van Doesburg, London: Cambridge University Press, [5].

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 67

Geometrical Analysis
of the House
While Barragan was respectful of local
and regional conditions, he aggres-
sively pursued the abstraction of form,
as in the abstract expressionists’
paintings. Barragan abstracted the
naturalistic image of the Mexican
landscape and then translated it into
abstract geometric space and form,
thus introducing a new sense of order,
space, and form: Not that of organic
nature but of simple geometry.
Barragan’s entire house appears to
be an experiment in simple geometry;
there is no evidence that Barragan
used a formal system. Nevertheless,
when the ground plan or façade is
examined, one first recognizes that
spatial division is based on a rectangle.
The floor plan is analyzed in an
attempt to find a basic grid that will
establish an underlying geometry for
the design as a whole.12 Upon analysis,
a 4.25 square meter unit module (M)
best explains the house plan. Figure 8
shows the plan overlaid on the deter-
mined grid. This grid is essential in
determining the proportional layout of
the house. The spatial division might Figure 8. Analysis of the floor plan: The diagram shows
be explained by more functional rea- how the unit grid (1 M = 4.25 m) is carried through the floor
sons, however, it may also be due to plan (reconstructed by the author).
the influence of abstract paintings,
which go beyond functional form.
For Barragan, the relation between
the house and the garden is integral.
He wrote, ‘‘In designing and planning
these functional gardens it is of pri-
mary importance to invest effort in
character and atmosphere, as well as in
plastic beauty.’’ He continued, ‘‘We
found that… if we were to create
beautiful architectural forms that were
in harmony with [the landscape], we
would have to opt for extreme sim-
plicity: Abstract quality, preferably
straight lines, flat surfaces and primary Figure 9. Plot plan analysis. Left: Three major spaces. Right:
geometric shapes.’’13 These ideas are Three squares rearranged according to Albers’s painting.
clearly reflected within the house.
When Barragan planned the house, he
considered the garden as an empty shape, ignoring some minor areas, each approximately measures 5 M 9 5 M,
volume related to the house in terms of zone forms a square and double square while the residential area is 4 M 9 4 M.
its shape and design. representing a spatial territory (Fig- The basic square of the studio is
The house is composed of three ure 9a). While the parti of the 2.5 M 9 2.5 M. When the three squares
major zones: The residence, studio, and residential area and the garden relies on are rearranged to the proportions of
garden. When these zones are dia- the square, the studio is on the double one of Albers’s paintings, the composi-
grammed with the primary geometric square. The size of the square garden tions turn out to be similar, as shown in

12
The analysis of the floor plan and elevation is based on the drawings from the book Casa Luis Barragan Guide, by the Barragan Foundation.
13
Paul Rispa, ed. Barragan, the Complete Work, New York: Princeton Architectural Press, [15], pp. 34–35.

68 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER

 Figure 10. Window articulation of the street façade.
Figure 9b. Is this too speculative or
accidental? What we can presume is that
Barragan intuitively planned three
major spaces according to their size
relationships using the idea of Albers’s
painting to manifest plastic form.
Facade Analysis
The Spanish-Mexican traditional house
face cannot be found in the Barragan
house. In contrast with the plastered
planar surfaces of the street and garden
façade are various windows that
appear to be randomly arranged and
are far from being symmetrical. The
alignment of the windows has little or
no virtue on first impression.
An examination of the window
frames is significant, because their
size, profile, and proportion are
strongly related to the character and
appearance of the Barragan house.
Although collectively the windows are
disorganized and of different sizes,
each window is ordered using similar
proportions with regard to a square.
Upon closer examination, it is seen
that this square element also domi-
nates the street and garden façade. All
window gratings and framings are
formed according to the addition and
subdivision of the square. Neverthe-
less, this square unit is not related to
that of the floor plans. That is, the
square unit of the plan (4.6 m) is not
carried through to the elevations.
Barragan apparently sought freedom
from a single unit constraint.
14
Lionel March, Architectonics of proportion: a shape grammatical depiction of classical theory Environmental and Planning B: Planning and Design, 1999, Vol. 26, pp.
91–100.
The imposing façade of the house
faces General Francisco Ramirez Street.
In the façade, the window openings
are all different and are not aligned
repeatedly, as shown in Figure 10.
Various shapes of window openings as
well as gratings are created. These
shapes are formed according to a
square and a rectangle. That is, win-
dows for the guestroom, dressing
room, library, ventilation openings,
garage opening, and bathroom are
based on a square, but the other two
windows for the studio offices are in a
rectangular form: Approximately, one
window is 7:6 and the other is 6:5 in
proportion (Figure 11).
In the garden façade, two separate
planar walls are formed according to a
square. One creates the living room
and the other the sleeping and kitchen
areas. When extended to chimney
height, the dotted line of the living
room plane forms a square (abce in
Figure 12). The other planar wall
forms a square as well (defg) as shown
in Figure 12.
Window shapes also appear on the
garden façade in two forms: Square
and rectangular. Square windows are
further subdivided with simple ratios
such as 1:1 and 2:1. The living room
window looking out onto the garden
relies on a half division (Figure 13a),
and the window of Barragan’s own
bedroom is divided into a tripartite
form (Figure 13b).
Rectangular windows form three
types of ratios: A square and a third for

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
4:3, a square and a fifth for 6:5, and a
square and a seventh for 8:7. They may
be generated by either a square that is
deducted from the rectangle, or a
module square that is added to form
rectangular windows (Figures 13c–f).
For example, the 4:3 rectangle is
composed by either assembling 108
square modules or subtracting a square
from a rectangle, where the remainder
is an undivided rectangle. This
remainder can be further subdivided
into square modules.
It is remarkable that this procedure
of making a window is very much like
the classical ‘‘anthyphairesis.’’14 Fol-
lowing Fowler (1987), Lionel March
[10, 11] provides a pictorial approach
to the anthyphairetic procedures of
Platonic mathematics. Fowler
explained the approach as ‘‘a process
of repeated and reciprocal subtraction
which is then to generate a definition
of ratio as a sequence of repetition
numbers.’’ Here, March elaborated the
notion by depicting a repetitive sub-
tractive and additive composition. For
example, an 11 9 4 rectangle is sub-
tracted, thus leaving a 1 9 1 square as
a unit remainder (Figure 14a). Also,
based on a 1 9 1 square unit, various
modules are added and concatenated
(Figure 14b). This generates ‘‘a defini-
tion of ratio as a sequence of
repetitions numbers, namely, the
anthyphairesis.’’
Most of the windows are approxi-
mately measured in whole numbers in
proportion. Unlike the complexity of
69
 Figure 11. Proportional design of window framing and grating.
Figure 12. The geometric design of the garden façade.
Figure 13. Window design derived from the addition and
subdivision of a square.
the space forms, there involves sur-
prisingly few room dimensions and
corresponding ratios. In the house, six
different ratios, 1:1, 2:1, 4:3, 6:5, 7:6,
and 8:7, are collected. The noticeable
character of the ratio is that most of the
fractions advance by adding one to
both the numerator and denominator.
The ratio is equivalent to the classical
sequence of superparticular numbers
(March, [9]). All window proportions
used in the Barragan house are
obtained using this procedure. In
addition, related window designs with
different ratios can be further gener-
ated with the same method as a family
group (Figure 15).
The subdivision of the window
frame is a unique practice of Barragan.
In Barragan’s other houses, there lie a
70 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
variety of subdivisions. The window
acts as a picture frame that shows a
given view of the natural landscape
without. Albers’s and Piet Mondrian’s
paintings come to mind in terms of
their simple proportional divisions
(Figure 16).
In addition, each interior window
shutter in the Barragan house is
unique. The white wood panel shut-
ters are carefully designed according to
their purpose. Several different types
of panel configurations are observed
throughout the house. They include: A
single panel system, a three panel
system with one side containing a
single panel and the other side two
panels, and four panel systems where
each is divided in different propor-
tions. These panels are double hung
using hinges. The shutters in the pri-
vate rooms operate in a unique way.
For example, when the shutter is divi-
ded into four panels, the upper portion
of the shutters is meant to be opened
first; only then can the lower shutters
be opened. Central to this idea is pri-
vacy: The upper portion is meant only
to allow daylight without losing pri-
vacy. In other instances, two shutter
panels are hinged together. Like win-
dows, each shutter is proportionally
divided (Figure 17). These divisions
are derived from simple whole number
ratios such as 1:1, 2:1, 3:2, 4:3, 7:6, etc.
Barragan did not leave us detailed
descriptions of how he designed, nor
did he outline his strategy for control-
ling building geometry. In addition,
specific geometric practices of the
house do not appear among Barragan’s
sketches or original working drawings.
Due to the relative lack of documentary
evidence, one can hardly delineate an
exact geometrical principle within the
Barragan house. Nevertheless, through
studying and modeling of plans, ele-
vations, sections and construction
details, the author believes that Barra-
gan, consciously and subconsciously,
 Figure 14. The anthyphairesis for an 11 9 4 rectangle: A repetitive subtractive (above) and
additive composition (below). (After Lionel March.)

the beginning of the Barragan style that

culminated in the highly interpretative
work reflecting abstract artists such as
Mathias Goeritz and Josef Albers.
It appears that Barragan did not use
a systematic computational method in
designing the house but very much an
intuitive procedure of addition and
subtraction of the square. Superficially,
the window layout of the street façade
Figure 15. Barragan’s rectangular window ratios, which looks disorganized, devoid of any
correspond to the anthyphairetic procedure. (After Lionel regularity. Closer observation, how-
March.) ever, reveals that the manner in which
they are designed is similar to the
classical ‘‘anthyphairesis,’’ which
involves a repetitive subtractive and
additive composition. Therefore, it can
be speculated that instead of mathe-
matically computed harmony, the
house is a manifestation of abstract
neo-plasticity, where the design is a
search towards a glimpsed sub-
Figure 16. Barragan’s window frame designs in terms of conscious conception.
their proportional divisions. a: Living room window frame of In Barragan’s oeuvre, the house was
the Barragan house; b: Living room window frame of the a turning point, establishing a new
Lopez house; c: Water fountain entrance of the Galvez style in his architecture. The abstract
house; d. Living room window frame of the Galvez house. form of geometry used in the Barragan
house formed the groundwork of his
future career and established the
strives towards an abstract neo-plastic- interwoven themes that influence the foundations of his developing ideas.
ity incorporating the use of the square development of the house clearly Barragan continued to develop similar
to design the proportions of the façades reflect Barragan’s approach. There is vocabularies and design elements in
and floor plans. Furthermore, various little argument that the house is part of his later projects, most notably the

2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009 71

 Figure 17. Interior wooden window shutters. a: four subdivided panels are hinged for the
mezzanine floor; b: three subdivided panels are hinged for the guest bedroom; c: four
subdivided panels are hinged for the bedroom; d: a single panel for a small window.
Lopez house, Galvez house, and Gi-
lardi house.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work was supported by an INHA
University research grant.
REFERENCES
[1] Ambasz, E. Luis Barragan House and
Atelier for Barragan, Tacubaya, Mexico,
1947, GA Houses, Tokyo: ADA EDITA.
[2] Barragan, L. (1951) Luis Barragan, Arts
and Architecture, August 1951.
[3] Barragan, L. (2004) Casa Luis Barragan
Guide, Mexico: Barragan Foundation.
[4] Burri, R. (2000) Luis Barragán, London:
Phaidon Press.
[5] Doig, A. (1986) Theo Van Doesburg,
London: Cambridge University Press.
[6] Eggener, K. (2001) Luis Barragán’s Gar-
dens of El Pedregal, New York: Princeton
Architectural Press.
72 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
[7] Federica Zanco, F. (2001) Luis Barragán: [15] Rispa, P. (ed.) (1995) Barragan, the
The Quiet Revolution, Milano: Skira Editore. Complete Work, New York: Princeton
[8] Julbez, J., Palomar, J., and Eguiarte, G. Architectural Press.
(1997) The Life and Work of Luis Barra- [16] Smith, C.B. (1967) Five Mexican Archi-
gan, New York: Rizzoli. tects, New York: Architectural Book
[9] March, L. (1998) Architectonics of Publishing Co., Inc.
Humanism, London: Academy Editions.
[10] March, L. (1999a) Architectonics of pro- Department of Architecture
portion: a shape grammatical depiction of Inha University
classical theory, Environmental and Plan- 253 Yonghyun-dong, Nam-gu
ning B: Planning and Design, 26: 91–100. Incheon 402-751
[11] March, L. (1999b) Architectonics of pro- Korea
portion: historical and mathematical e-mail: jinhopark@inha.ac.kr
grounds, Environment and Planning B:
Department of Architecture
Planning and Design, 26: 447–454.
Daelim College
[12] Martin, I. (1997) Luis Barragan: The
526-7 Bisan-dong, Dongan-gu
Phoenix Papers, Tempe, Arizona: Center
Anyang 431-715
for Latin American Studies Press.
Korea
[13] Park, J. (1996) An Interview with Mark
Mack, POAR, Seoul: Ganhyang.
College of Architecture
[14] Pauly, D. and Habersetzer, J. (2002) Hongik University
Barragan: Space and Shadow, Walls and 72-1 Sangsu-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul 121-791
Colour, Basel: Birkhäuser. Korea
 Reviews Osmo Pekonen, Editor
Feel like writing a review for The
Mathematical Intelligencer? You are
welcome to submit an unsolicited
review of a book of your choice; or,
if you would welcome being assigned
a book to review, please write us,
telling us your expertise and your
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Column Editor: Osmo Pekonen,
Agora Centre, 40014
University of Jyväskylä, Finland
e-mail: osmo.pekonen@jyu.fi
Introduction to
Bayesian
Scientific
Computing: Ten
Lectures on
Subjective
Computing
by Daniela Calvetti and Erkki
Somersalo
HEIDELBERG, SPRINGER SCIENCE + BUSINESS
MEDIA, 2007, 202 PP., EUR32.95 ISBN 978-0-
387-73393-7
REVIEWED BY URI ASCHER
he application of scientific com-
T puting as a tool for understand-
ing and gaining quantitative
knowledge of physical processes typi-
cally has two phases. In the first phase,
a mathematical model is generated,
and in the second, the model is simu-
lated on a computer using appropriate
numerical methods. Now, assuming
that the mathematical model is not so
incredibly complex that it must be
simplified, should these two phases be
independent of each other?
There is a lot to be said for such a
phase separation. Many useful numeri-
cal methods for differential equations,
for instance, have been derived, ana-
lyzed, and programmed without a
specific application in mind. Thus, once
a researcher in biological evolution has
succeeded in formulating the propaga-
tion and control of a measles epidemic
as a time-dependent system of ordinary
differential equations (ODE), there are
canned routines available that may be
used for the subsequent simulation of
the ODE system. These routines are
typically both more efficient and more
reliable than what the mathematical
Ó 2008 SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
biologist would write for a special-pur-
pose end, even though the specific
application was not taken into account
during the design and implementation
of the general-purpose software. Prob-
ably the extreme in this regard are the
excellent general packages available for
numerical linear algebra tasks such as
solving a linear system of equations or
finding the eigenvalues of a matrix [2, 5].
Under normal circumstances, such
packages, and general numerical
methods, should certainly be used
rather than reproduced.
The rationale for a full-phase sepa-
ration breaks down, however, when the
mathematical model to be simulated is
significantly incomplete or in doubt.
Such is often the case with ill-posed
inverse problems, where an orthodox
solution of the mathematical model
initially presented is neither possible
nor desirable. Note the difference
between the objective notion of solv-
ability of an ill-posed problem,
considered by Hadamard more than
100 years ago, and the subjective notion
of desirability. For example, the prob-
lem of deblurring a noisy image (say a
police snapshot of one’s license plate
when caught speeding) can be modeled
as a singular or highly ill-conditioned
linear system. The latter can be subse-
quently solved approximately, using
some form of regularization [3, 4]. But
the desirability of such a solution may
well depend on the manner by which
the unknown measurement noise has
been handled or accounted for! A nat-
ural, although by no means only, way to
account for lack of knowledge in mod-
eling and for subjectivity, is the
Bayesian probability framework. This
establishes the connection between
three separate areas that this book
explores.
Introduction to Bayesian Scientific
Computing is a 200-page, easily
accessible, pleasant introduction fusing
Bayesian approaches with numerical
linear algebra methods for inverse
problems: A tutorial that one does not
have to believe in all its details to
enjoy. To make it so accessible, the
73
authors often use informal language, a
lot of motivation, and an excellent set
of examples. They essentially avoid
formal mathematics (e.g., no theorems
and no proofs, although they do use
formulae, and their underlying mathe-
matics is carefully thought out). There
is no attempt at completeness, nor of
comprehensive referencing. The
authors also avoid explicit mention of
machine learning [1]. Having had some
limited previous exposure to all three
components of this mixture, namely
Bayesian probability, numerical linear
algebra and inverse problems, this
book’s approach has worked for me.
There are 10 chapters, each covering
a ‘‘lecture’’ in a graduate course that the
authors have given at universities in
Italy, Finland, and the USA. An uniniti-
ated graduate student probably
would need a week or two to absorb
the material in each of these lectures, so
there is a blueprint here for a graduate
course of a normal trimester length.
However, as the authors acknowledge,
this is not a self-contained textbook,
and it must be supported by a reading
list of other texts, which they supply.
The first three chapters introduce
the necessary essentials for Bayesian
inference. In an inverse problem, we
want to estimate an unknown quantity
x from a set of indirect measurements
y. The corresponding problem of sta-
tistical inference is to infer properties
of an unknown probability density
distribution given the data which have
been generated from that distribution.
Following essential definitions and a
few basic theorems, one arrives at
the Bayes formula that says that the
posterior probability density of x given
y is proportional to the likelihood,
which is the density of y given x
74 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
(corresponding to the forward prob-
lem in inverse problem parlance)
times the density of the prior (corre-
sponding to introducing a priori
information such as past experience
or image smoothness). A maximum
a posteriori (MAP) estimator can sub-
sequently be obtained for x.
Chapter 4 then introduces the third
link, numerical methods for linear sys-
tems of algebraic equations, with an eye
towards ill-conditioned problems and
the smoothing properties of truncated
conjugate gradient-type iterations. This
is followed in Chapter 6 with the prob-
abilistic design of preconditioners,
called here priorconditioners, which
allow a few iterations towards the
solution of an ill-conditioned linear
system to capture more features of a
desired solution. There is also a quick
section on designing a prior based on a
training set and on model reduction
using principal component analysis.
Chapters 7 and 8 are concerned with
conditional Gaussian densities and
yield some rather important formulae
for noisy linear systems of algebraic
equations. The basic task is to obtain the
probability distribution of some com-
ponents of a multivariate, normally
distributed random variable with the
values of the other components fixed.
Here, there is a good emphasis and
exploitation through examples of the
additional information that the Bayes-
ian probability framework yields,
namely, not only a point solution (or a
single output), but also means for
assessing its worth and trustworthiness
in terms of credibility envelopes. There
usually are, after all, other, often simpler
ways to incorporate prior information
into a regularization method, if that
were the only thing at stake.
Chapters 5 and 9 address the
important issue of sampling from a
given distribution in order to verify that
the distribution is what we think it is
(or to approximate integrals in many
dimensions). This exposition culmi-
nates in the Markov Chain Monte Carlo
(MCMC) sampling and the classical
Metropolis-Hastings algorithm.
Finally, Chapter 10 wraps it up by
using concepts and methods from dif-
ferent previous chapters, introducing
hypermodels and solving an example
of deblurring a one-dimensional sur-
face with discontinuities.
What I like most about this book is
the apparent enthusiasm of the authors
and their genuine interest in explain-
ing rather than showing off. This
enthusiasm is contagious, and the
result is very readable.
REFERENCES
[1] C. M. Bishop. Pattern Recognition and
Machine Learning. New York: Springer
Science + Business Media, 2006.
[2] T. A. Davis, Direct Methods for Sparse
Linear Systems. SIAM, 2006.
[3] H. W. Engl, M. Hanke, and A. Neubauer,
Regularization of Inverse Problems. Kluwer
Academic, 1996.
[4] J. Kaipo and E. Somersalo, Statistical and
Computational Inverse Problems. New
York, Springer Science + Business Media,
2005.
[5] Y. Saad, Iterartive Methods for Sparse
Linear Systems. PWS Publishing Com-
pany, 1996.
Department of Computer Science
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4, Canada
e-mail: ascher@cs.ubc.ca

A Certain
Ambiguity.
A Mathematical
Novel
by Gaurav Suri and Hartosh Sing Bal
PRINCETON, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS,
2007, US$ 27.95, 292 PP. ISBN-13: 978-0-691-
12709-3
REVIEWED BY TOM PETSINIS
orks of fiction containing
W varying degrees of mathe-
matics have burgeoned in
recent years. They include historical
fiction based on mathematicians, sur-
real works exploring mathematical
ideas, and speculative fiction based on
famous theorems and conjectures.
Publishers see such books as demysti-
fying the subject and perhaps making
it accessible to a wider readership.
Conversely, the general reading public
must be interested in the subject mat-
ter, or new titles would not be
emerging with such frequency.
Co-authored by Suri and Bal, A
Certain Ambiguity is a weighty addi-
tion to what is becoming a genre. The
novel is narrated by Ravi, a young
Indian whose interest in mathematics is
ignited by his grandfather Vijay Sahni,
who dies tranquilly at the beginning of
the book. At 18, Ravi leaves India for an
unnamed American university, intent
on pursuing a career in finance. In his
first semester, he enrolls in an elective
unit called ‘‘Thinking about Infinity,’’
presented by the inspiring Nico Alip-
rantis, an unconventional lecturer
whose skill in making baklava suggests
a Greek background. Ravi soon learns
that his grandfather visited America in
the early decades of the 20th century,
and this sets him off on a trail of
detection. It turns out that as a visiting
scholar in the fictional town of
Morisette, New Jersey, Vijay was
imprisoned for expounding mathe-
matical ideas that were construed as
blasphemous. (He was prisoner num-
ber 1729—an obvious reference to the
Indian mathematician Ramanujan who,
on his death-bed, saw this number as
the smallest number that could be
expressed as the sum of two cubes in
two different ways.) From newspapers
and transcripts of the trial, Ravi dis-
covers that Vijay developed a rapport
with John Taylor, the presiding judge.
The two men discussed at some length
the question of God’s existence,
Euclid’s axioms, and the nature of ulti-
mate truth. In the end, the judge
questioned his own religious views,
secured Vijay’s early release, and the
two men went on to maintain a lifelong
friendship.
As Ravi’s course progresses, he is
forced to decide between a career in
finance to repay his family’s invest-
ment in his education, or one in
mathematics in honour of his beloved
grandfather. The authors withhold his
decision, though the reader feels the
young man’s journey, his enquiring
nature, and the influence of the
charismatic Nico will draw him to
mathematics.
The relationship between Ravi and
his grandfather recalls another novel
with mathematical content: Uncle
Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture by
Apostolos Doxiadis. The authors of A
Certain Ambiguity could have used
Doxiadis’s economy in structuring their
novel. As it stands, their work is overly
discursive, with long tracts of mathe-
matical exposition that interrupt the
narrative flow. At times it appears as
though the narrative is nothing more
than a vehicle for lectures on mathe-
matics. This is often the problem with
novels of this type: They fail to strike the
right balance between the didactic and
the dramatic. In this case, the novel’s
didactic sections are lucid and engag-
ing. The history of mathematical infinity
is clearly outlined, beginning with
Zeno’s Paradoxes through to conver-
gent series. Cantor’s hierarchy of
Ó 2008 SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
infinity is expressed and illustrated in a
manner accessible to the general
reader. Euclid’s fifth postulate is dis-
cussed at some length, with interesting
references to Gauss, Bolyai, Lobachev-
sky, Riemann, and Einstein. But despite
the admirable collection of well-
explained ideas, the book falls short in
many areas of literary fiction. Ravi, the
main character, is thinly drawn and fails
to grip the reader with his first-person
voice. There is little sense of time and
place. The mathematical interpolations
are too lengthy and come at the
expense of narrative, to the extent of
diminishing the reader’s interest in the
characters. Other material appears in
the novel without preparation or justi-
fication. There a several gratuitous
‘‘diary’’ entries from mathematicians
ranging from Pythagoras to Gödel. In
what is essentially a realistic novel,
these entries are not sufficiently framed
by the story. Had they been Ravi’s
dreams or daydreams, there may have
been some justification for them: As it is,
they are simply further exposition
without integration. The novel ends
with a chapter-length diary record of
Judge Taylor’s experiences and trip to
India to visit Vijay. The literary writing is
at its strongest here, with the Judge,
more so than Ravi, emerging as the
novel’s best-developed character.
Authors who embark on novels of
ideas, especially mathematical, face the
challenge of making those ideas
appear to come naturally from the
characters; in other words, the ideas
must be shown through flesh and
blood. One of the attributes of good
fiction is its power to pull readers into
its world and keep them interested in
its characters. A Certain Ambiguity is
quite strong on mathematical exposi-
tion. Unfortunately, as a novel, it
doesn’t fully draw the reader into its
fictional landscape.
Teaching and Learning Services
Victoria University
Footscray Park, Melbourne
VIC 8001, Australia
e-mail: tomp@csm.vu.edu.au
75

Symmetry
and the Monster
by Mark Ronan
NEW YORK, OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2006,
255 PP. US$27.00 ISBN 978-0-19-280722-9.
REVIEWED BY KISHORE MARATHE
S
ymmetry and the Monster
recounts the story of an excep-
tional result in the history of
mathematics: The classification of finite
simple groups. The existence and
uniqueness of the largest sporadic
group, dubbed the Monster, was
the last piece in the classification. The
complete classification is arguably the
greatest achievement of 20th century
mathematics. In fact, it is unique in the
history of mathematics: The result of
hundreds of mathematicians working in
many countries around the world for
over a quarter century. This global ini-
tiative was launched by Daniel
Gorenstein, whose book [5] is still an
excellent general reference for this
material.
We now describe the highlights of
this fascinating story. The first four
chapters introduce groups and their
application in Galois’s work. Recall
that a group is called simple if it has
no proper nontrivial normal sub-
groups. Thus, an Abelian group is
simple if and only if it is isomorphic
to one of the groups Zp, for p a prime
number. This is the simplest example
of an infinite family of finite simple
groups. Another infinite family of
finite simple groups is the family of
alternating groups An, n [ 4 that we
study in the first course in algebra.
These two families were known in the
19th century. The last of the families
of finite groups, called groups of Lie
type, were defined by Chevalley in
the mid 20th century. Chapters 5 to 9
discuss this material. By the early 20th
century, the Killing–Cartan classifica-
tion of simple Lie groups defined over
the field C of complex numbers had
produced four infinite families and
five exceptional groups. This classifi-
cation starts by classifying simple Lie
algebras over C and then constructing
76 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
corresponding simple Lie groups. In
1955, using this structure but replac-
ing the complex numbers by a finite
field, Chevalley’s fundamental paper
showed how to construct finite
groups of Lie type. This work led to
the classification of all infinite families
of finite simple groups.
However, it was known that there
were finite simple groups, called spo-
radic groups, that did not belong to any
of these families. Chapters 10 to 14 are
devoted to the discoveries of the 26
sporadic groups. The first sporadic
group was constructed by Mathieu in
1861. In fact, he constructed five spo-
radic groups, now called Mathieu
groups. There was an interval of more
than 100 years before the sixth sporadic
group was discovered by Janko in 1965.
Two theoretical developments played a
crucial role in the search for new simple
groups. The first of these appeared in
Brauer’s address at the 1954 ICM in
Amsterdam. It gave the definitive indi-
cation of the surprising fact that general
classification theorems would have to
include sporadic groups as exceptional
cases. In fact, Fischer discovered and
constructed his first three sporadic
groups in the process of proving such a
classification theorem. Brauer’s work
made essential use of elements of order
2. The second came in 1961, when Feit
and Thompson proved that every non-
Abelian simple finite group contains an
element of order 2. The proof of this
one line result occupies an entire 255-
page issue of the Pacific Journal of
Mathematics (Volume 13, 1963). Before
the Feit–Thompson theorem, the clas-
sification of finite simple groups
seemed to be a rather distant goal. This
theorem and Janko’s new sporadic
group greatly stimulated the mathe-
matics community to look for new
sporadic groups.
John Leech had discovered his 24-
dimensional lattice while studying the
problem of sphere packing. The Leech
lattice provides the tightest sphere
packing in 24 dimensions. (However,
the sphere packing problem in other
dimensions is still wide open.) Sym-
metries of the Leech lattice contained
Mathieu’s largest sporadic group. It
also had a large number of symmetries
of order 2. Leech believed that the
symmetries of his lattice contained
other sporadic groups as well. Leech
was not a group-theorist and he could
not get group-theorists interested in his
lattice. But he did find a young math-
ematician (who was not a group-
theorist) to study his work. In 1968,
John Conway was a junior faculty
member at Cambridge. He quickly
became a believer in Leech’s ideas. He
tried to get Thompson, the great guru
of group-theorists, interested in his
work. Thompson told him to find the
size of the group of symmetries and
then call him. Conway later remarked
that he did not know that he was using
a folk theorem which says: The two
main steps in finding a new sporadic
group are (i) find the size of the group
of symmetries, and (ii) call Thompson.
Conway worked very hard on this
problem and soon came up with a
number. This work turned out to be his
big break. It changed the course of
his life and has made him into a
world-class mathematician. He called
Thompson with his number. Thomp-
son called back in 20 minutes and told
him that half his number could be a
possible size of a new sporadic group
and that there were two other new
sporadic groups associated with it.
These three groups are now denoted
by Co1, Co2, Co3 in Conway’s honor.
Further study by Conway and Thomp-
son showed that the symmetries of the
Leech lattice give 12 sporadic groups in
all, including all five Mathieu groups. In
the early 1970s, Conway started the
ATLAS project to collect all essential
information (mainly the character
tables) about the sporadic groups and
some others. The work continued into
the early 1980s when all the sporadic
groups were finally known.
After Conway’s work, the next
major advance in finding new sporadic
groups came through the work of
Berndt Fischer. Working under Baer,
Fischer became interested in groups
generated by transpositions. Recall
that, in a permutation group, a trans-
position interchanges two elements.
Fischer first proved that a group G
generated by such transpositions falls
into one of six types. The first type is a
permutation group and the next four
lead to known families of simple
groups. It was the sixth case that led to
three new sporadic groups, each rela-
ted to one of the three largest Mathieu
groups. The geometry underlying the
construction of G is that of a graph
associated to generators of G. Permu-
tation groups and the classical groups
all have natural representations as
automorphism groups of such graphs.
Fischer’s graphs give not only some
known groups, but also his three new
sporadic groups. He published this
work in 1971 as the first of a series of
papers; no further papers in the series
ever appeared. In fact most of his
work is not published. Fischer contin-
ued studying other transposition
groups. This led him first to a new
sporadic group, now called the Baby
Monster. By 1981, 20 new sporadic
groups were discovered, bringing the
total to 25. The existence of the 26th
and the largest of these groups was
conjectured independently by Fischer
and Griess in 1973. Several scientists
conjectured that this exceptional
group must have relations with other
areas of mathematics as well as with
theoretical physics. The results that
have poured in since then seem to
justify this early assessment. Some
strange coincidences noticed first by
MacKay and Thompson were investi-
gated by Conway and Norton. They
called this group the Monster and their
unbelievable set of conjectures ‘‘Mon-
strous Moonshine.’’ Their paper [2]
appeared in the Bulletin of the London
Mathematical Society in 1979. The
same issue of the Bulletin contained
three papers by Thompson discussing
his observations of some numerology
between the Fischer–Griess Monster M
and the elliptic modular functions.
Thompson stated his conjectures
about the relation of the characters of
the Monster and Hauptmoduls for
various modular groups. He also
showed that there is at most one group
which possesses the properties
expected of M and has a complex,
irreducible representation of degree
196883 = 47.59.71 (47, 59 and 71 are
the three largest prime divisors of the
order of the Monster group). Conway
and Norton had conjectured earlier that
the Monster should have a complex,
irreducible representation of degree
196883. Based on this conjecture,
Fischer, Livingstone and Thorne (Bir-
mingham notes 1978) computed the
entire character table of the Monster.
The construction of the Monster was
announced by Griess in 1981, and the
complete details were given in [6]. Griess
first constructed a commutative, nonas-
sociative algebra A of dimension 196884
and then showed that the Monster group
is its automorphism group. In the same
year, the final step in the classification of
finite simple groups was completed by
Norton by establishing that the Monster
has an irreducible complex representa-
tion of degree 196883 (the proof
appeared in print later). Combined with
the earlier result of Thompson, this
proved the uniqueness of the Monster.
So the classification of finite simple
groups was complete. The various parts
of the classification proof together fill
thousands of pages. The project to
organize all this material and to prepare
a flow chart of the proof is expected to
continue for years to come.
The last three chapters give a brief
account of the construction of the Mon-
ster and the Monstrous Moonshine
Conjectures. We now give a mathemati-
cal formulation of these conjectures.
Monstrous Moonshine
Conjectures
1. For each g [ M there exists a Mac-
Kay–Thompson series Tg(z) with
normalized Fourier series expan-
sion given by
X
1
Tg ðzÞ ¼ q
1 þ cg ðnÞq n ;q ¼ e 2piz :
1 satisfying these relations is uniquely
There exists a sequence Hn of rep-
resentations of M, called the head
representations, such that
cg ðnÞ ¼ vn ðgÞ;
where vn is the character of Hn.
2. For each g [ M, there exists a Hau-
ptmodul Jg for some modular group
of genus zero, such that Tg = Jg. In
particular,
(a) T1 = J1 = J, the Jacobi Hauptmo-
dul for the modular group C.
(b) If g is an element of prime order
p, then Tg is a Hauptmodul for
the modular group Gp studied
by Ogg.
3. Let [g] denote the set of all elements
in M that are conjugate to gi, i [ Z.
Then Tg depends only on the class
[g]. Note that from Equation (1) and
Ó 2008 The Author(s). This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
(2), it follows that Tg is a class
function in the usual sense. How-
ever, [g] is not the usual conjugacy
class. There are 194 conjugacy clas-
ses of M but only 171 distinct
MacKay–Thompson series.
Conway and Norton calculated all the
functions Tg and compared their first
few coefficients with the coefficients of
known genus-zero Hauptmoduls. Such
a check turns out to be part of Borc-
herds’s proof, which he outlined in his
lecture at the 1998 ICM in Berlin [1].
The first step was the construction of
the Moonshine Modul. The entire book
[3] by Frenkel, Lepowsky, and Meur-
man is devoted to the construction of
this module, denoted by V \ : It has the
structure of an algebra called the
Moonshine vertex operator algebra
(also denoted by V \ ). They proved that
the automorphism group of the infinite
dimensional graded algebra V \ is the
largest of the finite, sporadic, simple
groups, namely, the Monster.
The second step was the construc-
tion by Borcherds of the Monster Lie
algebra using the Moonshine vertex
operator algebra V \ : He used this alge-
bra to obtain combinatorial recursion
relations between the coefficients cg(n)
of the MacKay–Thompson series. It was
known that the Hauptmoduls satisfied
these relations and that any function
ð1Þ determined by a finite number of coef-
ficients. In fact, checking the first five
coefficients is sufficient for each of the
171 distinct series. Thus all the ‘‘Mon-
strous Moonshine’’ conjectures are now
ð2Þ parts of what we can call the ‘‘Moon-
shine Theorem.’’ Its relation to vertex
operator algebras, which arise as chiral
algebras in conformal field theory and
string theory, has been established. In
spite of the great success of these new
mathematical ideas, many mysteries
about the Monster are still unexplained.
A recent update on the Moonshine may
be found in the book by Gannon [4].
We conclude this summary with a
comment, a modification of the remarks
made by Ogg in [8] when the existence of
the Monster group and its relation to
modular functions were still conjectures
(strongly supported by computational
evidence). Its deep significance for the-
oretical physics is still emerging. So
mathematicians and physicists, young
77
and old, should rejoice at the emergence
of a new subject, guaranteed to be rich
and varied and deep, with many new
questions to be asked and many of the
conjectured results yet to be proved. It is
indeed quite extraordinary that a new
light should be shed on the theory of
modular functions, one of the most
beautiful and extensively studied areas
of classical mathematics, by the largest
and the most exotic sporadic group, the
Monster. That its interaction goes
beyond mathematics, into areas of the-
oretical physics, such as conformal field
theory, chiral algebras and string theory,
may be taken as strong evidence for a
new area of research which this reviewer
has called in [7] ‘‘Physical Mathematics.’’
Symmetry and the Monster is written
in nontechnical language and yet con-
veys the excitement of a great
mathematical discovery usually accessi-
ble only to professional mathema-
ticians. The author knew many of the
contributors, and this brings a nice per-
sonal touch to the narrative. His use of
nonstandard terminology seems quite
unnecessary, however. The term ‘‘atom
of symmetry’’ is not more illuminating
than ‘‘simple group’’ for the lay reader
and is annoying to anyone who has
taken a first course in algebra. There are
several factual errors and misstatements.
The worst puts Newton and Leibniz
developing calculus in the 16th century
(p. 87) and again in the 17th century
78 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
(p. 89). Janos Bolyai’s appendix is at the
end of his father’s book on geometry and
not in the book by Gauss (p. 195). Parts
dealing with physics, especially the last
chapter, contain misstatements. There is
no evidence at this time that string theory
combines quantum physics and general
relativity (p. 72) or that it provides a
model for elementary particles (p. 218).
The level of material varies greatly. It is
doubtful that a reader who needs to be
reminded of the quadratic formula,
golden ratio or p and e will take away
much mathematics from this book. But in
spite of these shortcomings, the book
gives a good description of many aspects
of an important event in the history of
mathematics.
OPEN ACCESS
This article is distributed under the
terms of the Creative Commons Attri-
bution Noncommercial License which
permits any noncommercial use, dis-
tribution, and reproduction in any
medium, provided the original
author(s) and source are credited.
REFERENCES
[1] R. E. Borcherds. Monstrous moonshine
and monstrous Lie superalgebras. Inventi-
ones Math., 109:405–444, 1992.
[2] J. H. Conway and S. P. Norton. Monstrous
moonshine. Bull. London Math. Soc.,
11(3):308–339, 1979.
[3] I. Frenkel, J. Lepowsky, and A. Meurman.
Vertex Operator Algebras and the Mon-
ster. Pure and App. Math., # 134.
Academic Press, New York, 1988.
[4] T. Gannon, Moonshine Beyond the Mon-
ster. Cambridge University Press,
Cambridge, 2006.
[5] D. Gorenstein, Finite Simple Groups. Ple-
num Press, New York, 1982.
[6] R. Griess. The friendly giant. Invent. Math.,
69:1–102, 1982.
[7] Kishore Marathe. A Chapter in Physical
Mathematics: Theory of Knots in the Sci-
ences. In: B. Engquist and W. Schmidt
eds., Mathematics Unlimited—2001 and
Beyond, pp. 873–888, Berlin, 2001.
Springer-Verlag.
[8] A. P. Ogg, Modular functions. In Santa
Cruz Conference on Finite Groups,
Proc. Sympos. Pure Math., 37, pp. 521–
532, Providence, 1980. Amer. Math.
Soc.
Department of Mathematics
City University of New York
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn, NY 11210, USA
e-mail: kmarathe@brooklyn.cuny.edu;
marathe@mis.mpg.de
Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the
Sciences Leipzig
Dresden, Germany

Ernst Zermelo. An
Approach to His
Life and Work
by Heinz-Dieter Ebbinghaus, in
cooperation with Volker Peckhaus
BERLIN, SPRINGER SCIENCE + BUSINESS MEDIA,
2007, XIV + 356 PP, €49.95, ISBN: 978-3-540-
49551-2
REVIEWED BY HENRY E. HEATHERLY
rnst Zermelo was the most influ-
E ential set-theorist of the first half
of the 20th century. He is best
known now for his work on the Axiom
of Choice and for being the first person
to give an axiomatic treatment of set
theory [1]. However, his mathematical
career began along quite different lines
with a doctoral dissertation on the
calculus of variations (Berlin, 1894), an
assistantship with Max Planck at the
Institute for Theoretical Physics in
Berlin, and several important, albeit
controversial, papers on thermody-
namics. Ebbinghaus has given us a full
biography of Zermelo the mathemati-
cian and scientist, as well as an
insightful description of Zermelo’s
professional and personal life, and his
interactions with colleagues and
adversaries.
Zermelo left Planck’s Institute in
1897 for further study in theoretical
physics at Göttingen, which resulted in
an Habilitation thesis on hydrody-
namics in 1899. However, soon after he
arrived in Göttingen, Zermelo began to
take serious interest in set theory and
logic. He later wrote (in 1930) that this
was due to the influence of David Hil-
bert. In the winter semester of 1900/
1901, Zermelo gave the first course ever
devoted entirely to set theory. By 1902,
he had published his first paper on the
subject, a short note on transfinite car-
dinal number addition. At the Third
International Congress of Mathemati-
cians (Heidelberg, August 1904), Julius
König delivered a lecture where he
claimed that Cantor’s Continuum
Hypothesis was false and that the car-
dinality of the continuum is not an
aleph. He also claimed to have refuted
the Well Ordering Principle (WOP).
This caused considerable controversy
in which Zermelo was actively
involved. He quickly found an error in
König’s argument, as did others. This
affair focused Zermelo’s attention on
the WOP.
By late September 1904, Zermelo
had a proof of the WOP and had
explicitly stated his ‘‘principle of
choice,’’ later called the ‘‘Axiom of
Choice.’’ He communicated these
results in a letter to Hilbert, and Hilbert
had the relevant parts published [2, pp.
139–141]. At the end of the paper,
Zermelo states that he owed the idea
of using the principle of choice to
Erhard Schmidt.
Zermelo’s proof of the WOP
became the object of intense criticism
that arose from three main sources: An
uneasiness with his new vehicle, the
principle of choice; suspicion of any
argument that seemed similar to those
which had led to recently discovered
paradoxes; and an old mistrust of
Cantor’s set theory. Among those who
were highly critical were Poincarè,
Schoenflies, Borel, and Felix Bernstein.
In 1908, Zermelo gave a second proof
of the WOP, again using the principle
of choice [2, pp. 183–198]. Also in this
paper is a critique of the objections
that had been raised against the first
proof.
To solidify the foundation for his
proof of the WOP, further its compre-
hensibility, and make clear the role of
the principle of choice, Zermelo for-
mulated the first axiomatic treatment of
set theory, which he published in 1908
[2, pp. 198–215]. He did this using
seven axioms, with the Axiom of
Choice (AC) being number six. He
noted that he was unable to prove the
consistency of these axioms, but he
showed that several of the known
paradoxes of set theory cannot be
obtained from his axioms. Although
Zermelo’s system was immediately
used by some, the general response to
it was ambivalent (see [1, Section 3.3]).
It is telling that Hausdorff did not use
the axiomatic point of view in his very
influential book on set theory pub-
lished in 1914. The first textbook on
axiomatic set theory was by Fraenkel in
1919, who used Zermelo’s system as his
base. In the early 1920s, both Fraenkel
and Skolem refined Zermelo’s system.
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Volume 31, Number 1, 2009
In 1930, Zermelo reformulated his sys-
tem, adding two more axioms. He
called this system the ‘‘Zermelo–
Fraenkel axiom system.’’ It included
AC, so now we would call it ZF + AC,
or ZFC.
From 1902 until 1907, Zermelo was a
Privatdozent at Göttingen. His aca-
demic career was progressing slowly,
possibly because of several interrup-
tions due to illness. Using his very
significant influence with the Prussian
Ministry of Cultural Affairs, Hilbert was
able to have Zermelo appointed to a
lectureship in mathematical logic at
Göttingen. Because of health problems,
Zermelo could not begin his lectures as
scheduled in the winter semester 1907/
1908, but in the summer semester of
1908, he gave the first course in math-
ematical logic ever offered at a German
university. Zermelo’s plans to write a
book on mathematical logic never
achieved fruition, however; the lecture
notes from his course on mathematical
logic are in the Zermelo Nachlass, [3].
The lectureship in logic was only a
temporary expedient. Zermelo wanted
a permanent position. By 1909, he had
impressive research credentials with a
substantial list of published work in
calculus of variations, thermodynam-
ics, hydrodynamics, and set theory. He
also was strongly supported by Hilbert.
Yet he had been passed over several
times for permanent positions. The
reasons were illness and controversy.
Zermelo’s early papers on thermo-
dynamics contained some sharp
disagreements with earlier work by
Ludwig Boltzmann, which led to a
public controversy between the two
lasting until just after Boltzmann’s
death in 1906. Ebbinghaus (see p. 25)
illustrates the degree of acrimony in
this affair with excerpts from a letter
from Boltzmann to Felix Klein. In
addition to the general controversy
over Zermelo’s work on the WOP and
AC, Zermelo was noted for the
‘‘polemical aspect’’ of his personality,
an attribute that was still being com-
mented on when Zermelo was in his
sixties. Helmuth Gericke, who was
Zermelo’s research assistant in 1934,
later commented that ‘‘sometimes he
even insulted his friends.’’ Among
other things, this caused a personal
controversy with Felix Bernstein,
which in turn became linked to
79
arguments within the Philosophical
Faculty at Göttingen.
Zermelo’s ill health, extending back
to his youth, frequently left him unable
to satisfy his teaching commitments. By
1905, it had become a serious cause of
interruptions in his career. He suffered
from respiratory illnesses and was
diagnosed in June 1906 with tubercu-
losis of the lungs. To this one must
add his occasionally erratic mental
condition.
In 1910, Zermelo’s outstanding
research record and the strong recom-
mendations by Hilbert and others
overcame the negatives and he was
offered a professorship at the Univer-
sity of Zürich. His time in Zürich, 1910
to 1916, is the only period in his life that
he held a paid university professorship.
In Zürich, Zermelo continued his
research on set theory as well as
working on measure theory, abstract
algebra, and game theory. The latter
concerned an application of set theory
to the game of chess (he was an
enthusiastic chess player). Zermelo’s
only doctoral student at Zürich was
Waldemar Alexandrow, who com-
pleted a dissertation on the foundations
of measure theory in 1915. Paul Bern-
ays and Ludwig Bieberbach each made
their Habilitation under Zermelo in
Zürich. In light of his later renown in set
theory and logic, it is somewhat sur-
prising that Bernays’s thesis in Zürich
was on modular elliptic functions; he
later did a second Habilitationsschrift
on logic at Göttingen under the direc-
tion of Hilbert. Long interruptions due
to illness hindered Zermelo in super-
vising the mathematical development
of students. His health continued to
deteriorate until he was forced to retire
from the University in April 1916.
For the next five-and-a-half years,
Zermelo had no academic home base.
In this interim he frequently stayed at
health resorts, but he continued to
work mathematically. In October 1916,
he was awarded the Alfred Ackermann-
Teubner Prize of Leipzig University. In
March 1921, Abraham Fraenkel began a
correspondence with Zermelo con-
cerning the independence of Zermelo’s
axioms for set theory. In one such let-
ter, Zermelo formulated a second-order
version of the axiom of replacement,
yet he also criticized this because of its
nondefinite character. He also took this
80 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER
ambivalent position publicly, for
example at a 1921 meeting of the Ger-
man Mathematical Union in Jena.
In October 1921, Zermelo moved to
Freiburg in southwestern Germany,
where he lived until his death in 1953. In
1926, he was appointed ‘‘full honorary
professor’’ at the Mathematical Institute
of the University of Freiburg. This car-
ried no salary, but he was given the fees
paid by participants in his courses. His
health improved somewhat, allowing
him to undertake modest teaching
activities. He typically gave one course
each semester, and these ranged from
applied mathematics to foundations, as
well as courses in complex analysis, real
functions, and differential equations.
His scientific activity increased remark-
ably. His work on applied mathematics
included a paper on ‘‘navigation in the
air as a problem of the calculus of vari-
ations’’ and one on evaluating the
results of chess tournaments. Of course,
he continued work on the foundations
of set theory and on logic. This included
work on infinitary languages and infi-
nitary logic.
During his Freiburg period, Zermelo
became involved in several acrimoni-
ous controversies with leading figures
in set theory and logic. The first was
with Fraenkel. Zermelo served as editor
for the publication of Cantor’s collected
mathematical and philosophical works.
This project, which Zermelo recom-
mended to the Berlin publishing house
Springer-Verlag in 1926, led to contro-
versy and hard feelings with Fraenkel.
The main point of contention con-
cerned the biographical essay of Cantor
that Fraenkel wrote for the collected
works and Zermelo’s highly critical
remarks concerning this in correspon-
dence with Fraenkel.
The next controversy Ebbinghaus
calls ‘‘A ‘War’ Against Skolem.’’ In both
his published comments and in per-
sonal correspondence, Zermelo reacted
vigorously and even harshly to Thoralf
Skolem’s 1929 paper which gave a ver-
sion of definiteness that essentially
corresponds to second-order definabil-
ity. Zermelo felt that axiomatic set
theory was threatened by Skolem’s
results and that he had ‘‘a particular
duty’’ to fight against it.
Soon after this, Zermelo became
involved in the controversy swirling
around Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem
of 1930. This led to a lively personal cor-
respondence with Gödel, as well as public
or published remarks by each of them.
Zermelo conducted himself in his usual
tactless style and seemed to be concerned
with ‘‘plots’’ against him. During this per-
iod, he suffered a nervous breakdown
from which he quickly recovered.
Less than two years after the Nazis
took power in Germany, Zermelo ran
afoul of the regime. In January 1935,
Eugen Schlotter, an assistant at the
Mathematical Institute and an ardent
Nazi, denounced Zermelo to the uni-
versity authorities. Other accusations
quickly followed, and a formal inves-
tigation was undertaken by the rector,
who officially recommended that Zer-
melo give up his teaching duties. In
March 1935, Zermelo resigned from his
position at the University of Freiburg.
The loss of his honorary professor-
ship and his disappointment over the
behavior of some of his former col-
leagues left Zermelo bitter. The year
1935 marks the beginning of a decline in
Zermelo’s mental energy. He worked on
a book on set theory which was never
completed. By the end of the 1930s, he
had withdrawn completely from the
scene of foundations of mathematics.
However, he continued some smaller
mathematical projects, pure and applied,
as evidenced by his Nachlass. In October
1943, he married Gertrud Seekamp,
whom he had known for some time. In
1946, Zermelo was reappointed as hon-
orary professor at Freiburg, but he was
unable to return to lecturing because of
increasing blindness and infirmities of
age. He died on May 21, 1953. Gertrud
lived to be over 100, outliving Ernst by
more than 50 years.
The biography under review contains
numerous photographs of Zermelo, his
family, and his colleagues. Some of these
give insight into Zermelo’s personality,
e.g., Zermelo at the dinner table with his
dog (p. 175) and the small three-wheeled
car that he drove in the early 1930s (p.
146). Of considerable interest, as well as
being helpful in getting an accurate,
unvarnished perception of events and
personalities, are the many excerpts
from letters, not only to or from Zermelo,
but also correspondence between other
major figures. There is an extensive list of
references and a helpful chronological
vita. The book is well edited, with only a
few minor typographical errors. It is
highly recommended for university
libraries and for those interested in
the history of mathematics of the 20th
century.
REFERENCES
[1] Gregory H. Moore, Zermelo’s Axiom of
Choice. Its Origins, Development, and
Influence, Springer-Verlag, New York,
1982.
[2] Jean van Heijenoort, From Frege to Gödel.
A Source Book in Mathematical Logic,
1879–1931, Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, 1967.
[3] Ernst Zermelo, Mathematische Logik. Vor-
lesungen gehalten von Prof. Dr. E. Zermelo
zu Göttingen im S.S. 1908, lecture notes
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
by Kurt Grelling. Universitätsarchiv Frei-
berg, C129/224 (Part I) and C129/215
(Part II), Freiberg.
Mathematics Department
University of Louisiana at Lafayette
217 Maxim Doucet Hall, P.O. Box 41010,
Lafayette, LA 70504-1010, USA
e-mail: mcheath@bellsouth.net
81

Number Theory
Through Inquiry
by David C. Marshall, Edward Odell,
and Michael Starbird
WASHINGTON, DC, THE MATHEMATICAL ASSOCI-
ATION OF AMERICA, 2007, HARDCOVER, IX +
140 PP., US$51.00, ISBN: 978-0-88385-751-9
REVIEWED BY JOHN J. WATKINS
. L. Moore strode like a giant over
R the mathematical landscape of
America during the first half of
the twentieth century. Born in Dallas,
Texas, he spent 49 of his illustrious
64-year career at the University of
Texas. A key member of the American
school of point-set topology, Moore
served as president of the American
Mathematical Society, produced 50
doctoral students, six of whom even-
tually became either president or vice-
president of the AMS, while five served
as president of the Mathematical Asso-
ciation of America, and now these 50
students have themselves produced
2239 doctoral descendants. In 1999,
at the end of the millennium, Keith
Devlin in his MAA Online column
claimed that R. L. Moore was the
‘‘greatest university mathematics tea-
cher ever.’’ It is hard to dispute that
claim, though sadly it should be added
that Moore’s reputation carries with it
an often ignored blemish: Moore held
deeply racist attitudes toward black
students.
While still a student at the Univer-
sity of Chicago from 1903–1905, Robert
Lee Moore conceived of a radical new
style of teaching. He would soon mold
this idea into a highly successful tech-
nique, a new method of teaching that
would eventually bear his name: the
Moore Method. It is very likely that, in
the end, it is this innovative teaching
method that will be Moore’s most
lasting contribution to mathematics.
Even now, more than a hundred years
later, people enthusiastically follow the
example set by Moore. An extremely
ambitious and attractive new textbook,
Number Theory Through Inquiry, by
David C. Marshall, Edward Odell, and
Michael Starbird, has been written
specifically to use the teaching
82 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
technique that has now become
known as the Modified Moore Method.
Moore developed his method to
produce research mathematicians. He
hand picked students for his graduate
course in topology, and as far as he was
concerned, the less they knew, the
better. He once told a young woman
who had written to him asking for
advice about preparing for his course,
‘‘whatever else you read about this
summer, do not read any point-set the-
ory if you can help it.’’ He would begin
on the first day of his course by giving
several definitions and stating a few
theorems. The students were then left
on their own to prove the theorems and
were not allowed to collaborate or do
any reading whatsoever. Gradually,
students would work out proofs of the
theorems for themselves and present
them to the rest of the class. The key as
Moore saw it was not to feed informa-
tion to students by lecturing or giving
them a text to read, but to have them
gain for themselves the power of being
able to do mathematics by making
mistakes, getting things wrong, and
yet eventually discovering their own
arguments for settling questions cor-
rectly. His guiding principle was: ‘‘That
student is taught the best who is told
the least.’’
The book Number Theory Through
Inquiry has been designed to be used
in the spirit of Moore, but not at all in
the rigid way that Moore treated his
own graduate students. These days,
the Modified Moore Method is a far
gentler and much more patient style of
teaching that allows for a wide range
of students—both in terms of abilities
and levels, including undergradu-
ates—to experience through a process
of guided discovery the genuine
benefits of learning to think indepen-
dently, to depend on their own
resources rather than those of an
authority, and to discover that they
have within themselves the power to
create truly important ideas. The
authors believe, and I certainly agree,
that these benefits extend well beyond
the mathematics classroom. As Paul
Halmos put it, the Moore approach of
trying to instill in the student an ‘‘atti-
tude of questioning everything and
wanting to learn answers actively’’ is ‘‘a
good thing in every human endeavor,
not only in mathematical research.’’
This is why Number Theory
Through Inquiry is an ambitious book,
because it is not merely trying to teach
number theory, it is trying to change
student attitudes. The goal is to liberate
students for a lifetime of learning, dis-
covery, and exploration. It could be
said, however, that there is nothing
particularly new about all this as a goal
in teaching. The Socratic method, after
all, has been around for a very long
time. All great teachers—Mr. Chips is
one notable example—are far less
interested in the specific subject matter
at hand than in the overall growth of
their students (one of R. L. Moore’s
students in later years even referred to
Moore as ‘‘Mr. Chips with attitude’’).
Jaime Escalante, memorably portrayed
by Edward James Olmos in the 1987
film Stand and Deliver, borrowed from
Nike their inspirational trademark ‘‘Just
do it’’ to invoke for students the spirit
of active versus passive learning that
was at the core of his own remarkable
teaching style.
Number Theory Through Inquiry is
an extremely thin book. A typical page
contains a definition or two, and then
several questions, exercises, and theo-
rems connected by the barest
minimum of prose. An instructor
choosing this book for a course needs
to be fully committed to the intended
method of instruction. An instructor
also needs to truly believe the course is
about empowering students and not
about covering material. Students
could not possibly prove anywhere
near all the theorems in the book in a
typical semester course.
An instructor would have many
decisions to make about how to teach
such a course. Do you want the stu-
dents to collaborate? How much do you
guide the students? One of the most
difficult things when using this method
is learning to resist the natural impulse
to jump in and correct students when
they make mistakes. Allowing students
the luxury of making mistakes, finding
their mistakes, or having other students
find the mistakes is at the very heart of
the method. What do you do if no one
in the class can seem to get started on a
proof? This list of pedagogical ques-
tions could go on and on.
An instructor choosing this book for
a course not only needs to be an
excellent teacher, and probably
already quite experienced, but also
needs to know number theory cold.
Even a pro like Paul Halmos talked
about needing a couple of months
preparing to teach a course using this
method and said, ‘‘As the course goes
along, I must keep preparing for each
meeting: to stay on top of what goes
on in class. I myself must be able to
prove everything. In class, I must stay
on my toes every second.’’
Here are just a few examples of
how the authors approach specific
material. To have students prove there
are infinitely many primes, they first
ask them to think of a natural number
that is divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 5. Next,
they ask them to think of a natural
number that has a remainder 1 when
divided by 2, 3, 4, and 5. Then they get
them to generalize this idea by proving
that for any natural number k, there is
another (much larger) natural number
not divisible by any natural number
less than k except 1. Of course, by now
the students have been handed the
answer (k - 1)! + 1 on a silver platter.
The next theorem they have the stu-
dents prove is that for any natural
number k, there is a prime larger than
k, which in turn leads immediately to
the infinitude of primes theorem. So, it
is somewhat debatable as to whether at
this point the students have actually
discovered a proof of the infinitude of
the primes. Perhaps they have just
been led by the hand to what is
effectively Euclid’s proof. Still, this is a
good, active way to present this proof.
The authors follow this up in an
excellent way by having students
prove what they call the infinitude of
4k + 3 primes theorem. Then they ask
whether there are other theorems like
this that can be proved. Here, I suspect
many students will fall into the trap of
believing they can prove an infinitude
of 4k + 1 primes theorem in a similar
way, but then won’t have time in their
course to reach page 90, where they
might learn that in order to prove
this important theorem you really need
to know that –1 is a quadratic residue
modulo primes of the form 4k + 1.
A difficulty with the technique of
guided discovery—all too familiar to
anyone who has ever used it—is that
students often don’t go where we think
we are leading them. This happened to
me (playing the role of the student) in
a section of the book where Euler’s
theorem is to be used to solve con-
gruences, and the authors asked
whether I could think of an appropri-
ate operation to apply in each case to
both sides of the congruences x5 : 2
(mod 7) and x3 : 7 (mod 10).
Not realizing where they were
hoping to lead me, I multiplied both
sides of the first congruence by x, and
then could easily solve 1 : 2x (mod
7) by inspection to get x = 4; for the
second congruence, since / (10) = 4,
I again multiplied both sides of the
congruence by x and could solve
1 : 7x (mod 10) by inspection to get
x = 3. But, as I discovered in the next
paragraph, they had really intended for
me in each case to raise both sides of
the congruence to some appropriate
exponent (5 works for the first con-
gruence, and 3 works for the second),
because this is the approach that gen-
eralizes to the theorem they were
trying to lead us toward.
Occasionally, the notion of discov-
ery or inquiry seemed to go completely
out of the window: For example, when
students are simply told that half the
numbers less than an odd prime p are
quadratic residues and half are not.
Why not let them discover this on their
own? Or when the authors simply list
for the students the primes among the
first 30 primes for which 2 is a quadratic
residue, and those for which it is not.
There also are places in the text
where the authors may not be giving
students enough guidance. I’d be sur-
prised if students could prove that
Euler’s /-function is multiplicative,
having been told only to circle num-
bers relatively prime to numbers such
as, say, 36 written down in a 4 by 9
array; or if they could prove the case
n = 4 of Fermat’s last theorem even
having been told to prove the stronger
statement that there are no nontrivial
integer solutions to x4 + y4 = z2.
I would like to try using Number
Theory Through Inquiry for a course,
though perhaps not exactly in the way
intended by the authors. Rather than
have the students use it as a text, I think
I’d prefer to take a somewhat less gui-
ded approach in order to remain truer
to the Modified Moore Method by
providing students with selected defi-
nitions and theorems taken from the
book. I might, however, have them start
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
using the text at some point midway in
the course once they had fully devel-
oped their own independence. This is a
hybrid technique suggested by one of
Moore’s students, F. Burton Jones, who
allowed his own topology students to
use Kelley for bedtime reading begin-
ning about Christmastime. Anyone who
is thinking of adopting Number Theory
Through Inquiry as a text should be
aware that there is an instructor’s man-
ual available from the publisher where
the authors discuss the philosophy of
the book and provide tips for the first
five chapters—the likely content for a
first course—based on their own expe-
rience with students.
There is much to be gained teaching
a course using a well conceived and
well executed text such as Number
Theory Through Inquiry—one might
even use this book as a template for
designing one’s own course in virtually
any subject. However, something
valuable could be lost, too. Number
theory developed not in the inevitable
way that a subject such as calculus did,
but in an undeniably quirky human
way, and this treatment of number
theory strips away so much of its rich
history that it is left a bit too bare and
lifeless for my taste.
REFERENCES
[1] D. W. Cohen, A Modified Moore Method
for Teaching Undergraduate Mathematics,
The American Mathematical Monthly, 89
(1982) 473–474; 487–490.
[2] K. Devlin, The Greatest Math Teacher Ever,
Devlin’s Angle, MAA Online (May 1999)
http://www.maa.org/devlin/devlin_5_99.
html.
[3] K. Devlin, The Greatest Math Teacher Ever,
Part 2, Devlin’s Angle, MAA Online (June
1999) http://www.maa.org/devlin/devlin_
6_99.html.
[4] F. B. Jones, The Moore Method, The
American Mathematical Monthly, 84
(1977) 273–278 .
[5] J. Parker, R. L. Moore: Mathematician &
Teacher, Washington, DC, The Mathemat-
ical Association of America, 2005.
Department of Mathematics
and Computer Science
Colorado College
Colorado Springs, CO 80903, USA
e-mail: jwatkins@coloradocollege.edu
83

King of Infinite
Space: Donald
Coxeter, the Man
Who Saved
Geometry
by Siobhan Roberts
WALKER & COMPANY, 2006, 386 PP, US$27.95
ISBN 13 978-0-8027-1499-2
REVIEWED BY ULF PERSSON
M
odern mathematics is a forbid-
ding subject: Highly technical,
involving a formidable con-
ceptual apparatus, necessitating years
of study before it even starts making
sense in the way many other sciences
immediately make sense to the public.
Is there a royal way to mathematics, a
way of getting to the heart of the subject
without extended preliminaries? There
famously is no royal way to geometry,
but maybe geometry itself is the royal
way to mathematics. If so, who would
be more fitting to be the king than the
subject of the book under review—
H. S. M. Coxeter? A man who showed
that, even with elementary tools, it is
possible to penetrate deeply into math-
ematics, giving heart to the hope that
the subject can be enjoyed directly
without the alienation that comes with
high technology: In short, that it is still
possible to retain this sense of innocent
wonder which initially seduced most of
us into the subject.
Harold Scott MacDonald Coxeter
(known as Donald) was born in 1907,
the only child of a mismatched couple.
His father, Harold Coxeter, an amateur
sculptor and chain-smoking baritone
singer, made a living in the family busi-
ness of purveying surgical instruments;
his mother was a painter of some
renown, specializing in portraits and
landscapes. When in spite of shared
cultural interests they later divorced, his
father remarried a woman only six years
older than his teenage son, thereby ex-
acerbating an emotional trauma Donald
would never fully overcome.
84 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
As a bright solitary child, Donald
found pleasures in lonely pursuits such
as inventing imaginary languages, com-
posing music, and engaging in mathe-
matical investigations. His parents were
both proud of and concerned for their
gifted but delicate child. They sought
professional guidance how to best care
for his talents. It was decided early on
that music was really not his forte. His
prospects in mathematics were far more
promising. At the age of 16, on the
advice of Bertrand Russell, they con-
tacted the mathematician E. H. Neville,
who recommended that Donald drop
all subjects except mathematics and
German. Neville delegated him to Alan
Robson, a senior mathematician at Marl-
borough College. Donald sat for the
Cambridge University entrance exam in
1925 and qualified for King’s College,
but Robson urged him to try for Trinity.
Another year of study did the trick. He
submitted his first mathematical paper
when he was about to enter University.
He had done some work on spherical
tetrahedra, obtaining definite integrals
he challenged readers to evaluate direc-
tly. The paper appeared in the Mathe-
matical Gazette and intrigued G. H.
Hardy, who could never resist the temp-
tation of a definite integral.
At Trinity, Coxeter came under the
tutelage of Littlewood, devoted himself
single-mindedly to his studies, and tried
to resolve his recurrent problems of
digestion by turning himself into a life-
long vegetarian, which caused him to
lose weight and render him his charac-
teristic taut and timeless appearance, so
fitting for a geometer. Predictably he did
very well on the Tripos, earning himself
the rank of Wrangler.
On a visit to Austria in the summer of
1928, Coxeter discovered the work of
Schläfli in the Vienna University library.
Schläfli, a Swiss schoolteacher ignored
during his lifetime, had anticipated
many of Coxeter’s later discoveries (in
fact, the standard notation introduced
by Coxeter for regular polytopes is an
adaptation of Schläfli’s), most notably
the classification of regular solids in four
dimensions. Coxeter would champion
him from then on.
Coxeter’s association with the lumi-
naries at Cambridge was somewhat
marginal. He started his doctoral studies
under the aged geometer H. F. Baker, a
British devotee of the Italian school of
algebraic geometry. Baker had, among
other things, instigated a tradition of
Saturday tea parties for his students and
associates, mixing mathematics with
biscuits. Once, Coxeter invited the aged
lady Alicia Boole Stott (a daughter of the
well-known Boole and a niece of the
surveyor Everest), a mathematical auto-
didact almost 50 years his senior, who
had rediscovered Schläfli’s results by
spatial intuition.
Coxeter’s thesis on polytopes earned
him a prize and, in 1932, a Rockefeller
Foundation fellowship to Princeton.
There, Solomon Lefschetz nicknamed
him Mr. Polytope and remarked, after
one of Donald’s seminars, that it was
sometimes good to hear about triv-
ial things. Oswald Veblen was a bit
more supportive, if distantly so. Yet the
mathematical environment at Princeton
exposed him to a great variety of intel-
lectual stimulation, such as that pro-
vided by John von Neumann. During
this time he developed his well-known
notation for reflection groups. He
returned for a second stint at the Insti-
tute of Advanced Study in 1934–1935.
The second visit turned out to be
even more fruitful, as his study of dis-
crete reflection groups tied in with
Hermann Weyl’s investigation of con-
tinuous group representations and root
lattices, and he was invited to contribute
an appendix to Weyl’s seminar notes,
which were widely distributed. On
Hardy’s recommendation, he was invi-
ted to edit Ball’s Mathematical Rec-
reations and Essays (an ambivalent
appreciation coming from Hardy, who
in A Mathematician’s Apology was
rather dismissive of Ball). The task
delighted Coxeter, and he certainly
was the perfect man for it, removing
outdated material and replacing it
with chapters on polytopes and other
geometrical gems.
The summer of 1936 turned out to be
crucial to Coxeter’s personal life. He met
his first girlfriend, a Dutch au pair, who
agreed to be his wife after a rather short
courtship. Just before the scheduled
marriage later that summer, his father
unexpectedly suffered a heart attack
and drowned as he was teaching his
younger daughters to swim. The wed-
ding went through anyway, but without
celebration. The young couple took off
for Toronto, where Coxeter would
remain until his death almost 70 years
later.
As one would expect, Coxeter pre-
ferred to stay aloof of administrative
duties, which may be why he became
a full-fledged tenured professor only
in 1948, 12 years after his initial ap-
pointment. The same year saw the
publication of Regular Polytopes, which
in some sense he had been working on
for the preceding 24 years. The book
made his reputation.
During the Second World War,
Coxeter espoused pacifism, which was
not entirely comme-il-faut in provin-
cial Toronto. During the McCarthy era,
he took a public stand for civil liberties
and was instrumental in finding a
sanctuary for Chandler Davis, a victim
of the witch hunt. He championed
nuclear disarmament and was a vocal
foe of American involvement in Viet-
nam. In his later years, he signed a
petition to protest the bestowal of an
honorary degree on former President
George Bush, Sr. Coxeter claimed that
there could be nothing worse than the
first President Bush—until the second
one came along.
Over the years, Coxeter won his
share of prizes and distinctions. In 1950,
he was elected a Fellow of the Royal
Society and later became an honorary
fellow of both the Edinburgh and
London mathematical societies. In 1997,
he was appointed a ‘‘Companion of the
Order of Canada,’’ the highest of three
levels of honor that Canada bestows.
The biography contains an apparently
complete list of Coxeter’s 250-odd pub-
lications (including subsequent editions
and translations of his books) spanning
almost 80 years, starting with his entry
in 1926 in the Mathematical Gazette to
his posthumous 2005 inclusion in the
memorial volume dedicated to Bolyai.
His articles appear both in technical
journals and popular magazines such as
the American Mathematical Monthly
and the Mathematics Teacher, in addi-
tion to the Gazette; but regardless of
where they are, all are accessible to the
general mathematician with geometri-
cal combinatorial leanings. The various
titles reveal the breadth of his interest,
ranging from polytopes and group the-
ory to physics, viral macromolecules,
the art of M. C. Escher, and music.
He even contributed to a philosophical
anthology with the article ‘‘Cases of
Hyperdimensional Awareness.’’ As to
his books, in addition to the one on
polytopes, his Introduction to Geometry
was widely acclaimed, and his Genera-
tors and Relations for Discrete Groups
(coauthored with W. O. J. Moser) pre-
sents his main contribution to profes-
sional mathematics.
Coxeter was blessed with a long life
and, more importantly, with a mind that
remained lucid to the very end. His last
public lecture was given in Budapest in
July 2002. This is the event with which
the author introduces her account of
his life. Just days before he died, nine
months later, he was busy readying the
lecture for publication. After his death,
his brain joined a ‘‘brain bank’’ at
McMaster University in Hamilton, On-
tario, where a neuroscientist already had
acquired the brain of Einstein.
In presenting the life of a mathema-
tician, it is the work that matters. This
poses a serious challenge to any biog-
rapher writing for the lay reader.
Coxeter was for most of his career def-
initely out of fashion. The mathematics
he was doing was seen by most math-
ematicians of the time as a quaint
vestige of Victorian mathematics. The
moral lesson that Coxeter provides is to
disregard fashion: Eventually you will
be vindicated (not necessarily within
your lifetime). But one should not, as
Roberts is somewhat prone to do, pit
Coxeter as a valiant David against
the Goliath of modern mathematics,
Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC., Voulme 31, Number 1, 2009
let alone resort to hyperbole comparing
Regular Polytopes to Darwin’s The Ori-
gin of Species.
To dramatize the conflict between
Coxeter and the mathematical estab-
lishment, the author sets up as the
‘‘villain’’ Jean Dieudonné, whose rally-
ing cry ‘‘Down with Euclid, death to
triangles’’ heads one of the chapters
in her book. The living geometry of
Coxeter is contrasted with the strict and
formal mathematics epitomized by the
Bourbakists in their relentlessly logical
expositions with no resource to visual
imagery and intuitive reasoning. Like
all clichés, this contains a significant
element of truth, but the author’s
presentation is a misleading oversim-
plification. And, as she admits, the
supposed conflict between so-called
Bourbakism and Coxeter had an ironic
and happy ending, as Coxeter’s main
insights of combining geometry with
the symmetries combinatorially articu-
lated through group theory became
the subject of the concluding volumes
of Bourbaki—some would say their
most successful ones. Unlike Buckmin-
ster Fuller and M. C. Escher, the asso-
ciation to whom is treated at length in
the biography, Coxeter was not an
alternative mathematician: He was a
professional whose insights were not
entirely the result of some kind of tran-
scendental meditation, but which also
rested on nonmagical algebraic manip-
ulations, without which mathematical
contemplation would not rise above the
level of insipid speculation.
Today, Coxeter’s mathematics has
come into its own, advancing from the
pages of recreational mathematics to
being an inescapable component of
cutting-edge mathematics.
Department of Mathematics
Chalmers University of Technology
Göteborg, Sweden
e-mail: ulfp@math.chalmers.se
85
 Stamp Corner Robin Wilson
The
Philamath’s
Alphabet:
TUV
Terrestrial globe
During the 16th century, with the new
interest in exploration and navigation,
terrestrial globes became increasingly
in demand. This terrestrial globe of
1568, made of brass, was constructed
by Johannes Praetorius of Nuremberg.
The map depicts the continents of
Europe, Africa, Asia, and America, with
America shown joined to Asia.
Thales of Miletus
The earliest known Greek mathemati-
cian is Thales of Miletus (c. 624-547
BC) who, according to legend, brought
geometry to Greece from Egypt. He
Thales of Miletus
Terrestrial globe
Please send all submissions to
the Stamp Corner Editor,
Robin Wilson, Faculty of Mathematics,
Computing and Technology
The Open University, Milton Keynes,
MK7 6AA, England
e-mail: r.j.wilson@open.ac.uk
86 THE MATHEMATICAL INTELLIGENCER Ó 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
investigated the congruence of trian-
gles, applying it to navigation at sea,
and predicted a solar eclipse. He is also
credited with proving that the base
angles of an isosceles triangle are
equal and that a circle is bisected by
any diameter.
Tic-tac-toe
The position game of tic-tac-toe, or
noughts and crosses, developed in the
19th century from earlier ‘‘three-in-a-
row’’ games such as Three Men’s
Morris. Two players take turns to place
their symbol (o or 9) in a square and
try to get three in a row. Variations
involve larger boards (4 9 4 or 5 9 5)
and three or more dimensions
(4 9 4 9 4 or 3 9 3 9 3 9 3).
Tsiolkovsky
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857–1935), a
pioneer of rocket flight, invented
multistage rockets and produced a
celebrated mathematical law that
relates the velocity and mass of a
rocket in flight. Tsiolkovsky’s law was
one of the ‘‘ten mathematical formulas
t-
Tic-tac-toe
Ulugh Beg
hat changed the face of the earth,’’ in a
set of Nicaraguan stamps issued in
1971.
Ulugh Beg
By the 15th century, Samarkand in
central Asia had become one of the
greatest centres of civilisation, espe-
cially in mathematics and astronomy.
The observatory of the Turkish
astronomer Ulugh Beg (1394–1449)
contained a special sextant, the largest
of its type in the world. Ulugh Beg
constructed extensive tables for the
sine and tangent of every angle for
each minute of arc, to five sexagesimal
places.
Vega
Logarithms were invented in the early
17th century. In the 1790s, the Slove-
nian Jurij Vega (1754–1802) published
a celebrated compendium of loga-
rithms, as well as seven-figure and 10-
figure logarithm tables that ran to sev-
eral hundred editions. He also
calculated p to 140 decimal places.
Tsiolkovsky
Vega