Abstract
Let me give, as a preliminary, some historical facts. Imaginary numbers are said to have been used first, incidentally, to be sure, by Cardan in 1545, in his solution of the cubic equation. As for the further development, we can make the same statement as in the case of negative numbers, that imaginary numbers made their own way into arithmetic calculation without the approval, and even against the desires of individual mathematicians, as they occurred ever again by themselves during calculations, and obtained wider circulation only gradually and to the extent to which they showed themselves useful. Meanwhile the mathematicians were not altogether happy about it.
Access provided by Autonomous University of Puebla. Download to read the full chapter text
Chapter PDF
Keywords
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Klein, F. (2016). IV. Complex Numbers. In: Elementary Mathematics from a Higher Standpoint. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49442-4_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49442-4_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-662-49440-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-662-49442-4
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)