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24/05/2013

Selection of BBC World Service Programmes BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service.

A Brief History of Mathematics

Image for Nicolas Bourbaki

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Nicolas Bourbaki

Episode 10 of 10

Duration:
15 minutes
First broadcast:
Friday 25 June 2010

This ten part history of mathematics from Newton to the present day, reveals the personalities behind the calculations: the passions and rivalries of mathematicians struggling to get their ideas heard. Professor Marcus du Sautoy shows how these masters of abstraction find a role in the real world and proves that mathematics is the driving force behind modern science.

Today, the mathematician that never was, Nicolas Bourbaki. A group of French mathematicians, working between the two world wars and writing under the pseudonym Nicolas Bourbaki transformed their discipline and paved the way for several mathematical breakthroughs in the 21st century.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

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  1. Image for A Brief History of Mathematics

    A Brief History of Mathematics

    Professor Marcus du Sautoy argues that mathematics is the driving force behind modern science. Ten...

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