TCASCV/DAM Joint Seminar
Barus & Holley, Room 155
Thursday, November 20, 2003
4:30PM
The Decline, Fall, and Current Resurgence of Visual Geometry
Professor Philip Davis, Brown University, Division of Applied Mathematics
In the hands of Newton and Leibniz, calculus was a theory that involved geometrical figures. These formed a part of the reasoning. There followed thereupon a gradual decline of the image in mathematics in favor of the symbolic, and by the early 20th century, the image was all but dead. Why? Computer graphics has to some extent restored the image to its former prominence in mathematics and promises in the future to be an uneasy partner with the symbolic.