• jas0n@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    4
    ·
    edit-2
    11 months ago

    Fun fact… a formal definition of irrational numbers didn’t exist until the 1880s (150+ years after Newton died). There were lots of theories before that time (including that they didn’t exist) and they were mostly ignored. Iirc, it was Euler’s formal definition of complex numbers and e (an irrational number) that led to renewed interest.

    E: Richard Dedekind