Pierre de Fermat, Mathematical Induction and the Tangent Problem (The New Mathematics for the Millions Book 13)

During the course of history there have been a handful of remarkable men – Rogue Intellectuals – who have developed their intellectual prowess away from the dry and mundane world of academia. Pierre de Fermat was one such men.

These Rogue Intellectuals were their own Masters, and what Masters indeed – men like Pythagoras, Leonardo da Pisa, Leonardo da Vinci, Pierre de Fermat, Isaac Newton, Karl Frederick Gauss, Albert Einstein and Onsanger to name a few.

In some sense their isolation was crucial to their intellectual development, but nearly detrimental to their place in contemporary history. These Rogue Intellectuals would not by their own accord publish and promote their work. This would be done, for the most part, by others, people who would mentor and champion their work.

Had these others not recognized their brilliance and act as their champions, the remarkable work of these Rogue Intellectuals might have been lost for all times.

In the case of Pierre de Fermat, a Provincial French judge and “avid amateur mathematician” it would be the Father Marin Mersenne in Paris who first heard rumors of the Rogue Intellectual Pierre de Fermat.

Mersenne would not only instigate but cultivate a remarkable correspondence with Pierre de Fermat that would change the course of mathematical history for ever.

Mersenne would also act as a clearing house for Fermat’s manuscripts, which Mersenne copied and shared with scholars in Paris and London, and throughout the rest Europe.

Were it not for Mersenne diligence and generosity, Pierre de Fermat’s genius might not have flourished to the degree it did, nor his works been shared with the rest of the Europe.

In this book I will focus on his work in analytic geometry and the Tangent Question. I will write about Fermat and his work in number theory, as well as his Theory of Least Time, in later books of the New Mathematics for the Millions series.