Sophus Lie And Felix Klein

The Erlangen program expresses a fundamental point of view on the use of groups and transformation groups in mathematics and physics. This volume is the first modern comprehensive book on that program and its impact in contemporary mathematics and physics. Klein spelled out the program, and Lie, who contributed to its formulation, is the first mathematician who made it effective in his work. The theories that these two authors developed are also linked to their personal history and to their relations with each other and with other mathematicians, incuding Hermann Weyl, Elie Cartan, Henri Poincare, and many others. All these facets of the Erlangen program appear in this volume. The book is written by well-known experts in geometry, physics and the history of mathematics and physics.

Sophus Lie (1842-1899) is one of Norways greatest scientific talents. His mathematical works have made him famous around the world no less than Niels Henrik Abel. The terms "Lie groups" and "Lie algebra" are part of the standard mathematical vocabulary. In his comprehensive biography the author Arild Stubhaug introduces us to both the person Sophus Lie and his time. We follow him through: childhood at the vicarage in Nordfjordeid; his youthful years in Moss; education in Christiania; travels in Europe; and learn about his contacts with the leading mathematicians of his time.

In the late summer of 1893, following the Congress of Mathematicians held in Chicago, Felix Klein gave two weeks of lectures on the current state of mathematics. Rather than offering a universal perspective, Klein presented his personal view of the most important topics of the time. It is remarkable how most of the topics continue to be important today. Originally published in 1893 and republished by the AMS in 1911, we are pleased to bring this work into print once more with this new edition. Klein begins by highlighting the works of Clebsch and of Lie. In particular, he discusses Clebsch's work on Abelian functions and compares his approach to the theory with Riemann's more geometrical point of view. Klein devotes two lectures to Sophus Lie, focusing on his contributions to geometry, including sphere geometry and contact geometry. Klein's ability to connect different mathematical disciplines clearly comes through in his lectures on mathematical developments. For instance, he discusses recent progress in non-Euclidean geometry by emphasizing the connections to projective geometry and the role of transformation groups. In his descriptions of analytic function theory and of recent work in hyperelliptic and Abelian functions, Klein is guided by Riemann's geometric point of view. He discusses Galois theory and solutions of algebraic equations of degree five or higher by reducing them to normal forms that might be solved by non-algebraic means. Thus, as discovered by Hermite and Kronecker, the quintic can be solved "by elliptic functions". This also leads to Klein's well-known work connecting the quintic to the group of the icosahedron. Klein expounds on the roles of intuition and logical thinking in mathematics. He reflects on the influence of physics and the physical world on mathematics and, conversely, on the influence of mathematics on physics and the other natural sciences. The discussion is strikingly similar to today's discussions about "physical mathematics". There are a few other topics covered in the lectures which are somewhat removed from Klein's own work. For example, he discusses Hilbert's proof of the transcendence of certain types of numbers (including pi

I. Clebsch.--II-III. Sophus Lie.--IV. On the real shape of algebraic curves and surfaces.--V. Theory of functions and geometry.--VI. On the mathematical character of space-intuition, and the relation of pure mathematics to the applied sciences.--VII. The transcendency of the numbers [Greek letter epsilon] and [Greek letter pi].--VII. Ideal numbers.--IX. The solution of higher algebraic equations.--X. On some recent advances in hyperelliptic and Abelian functions.--XI. The most recent researches in non-Euclidean geometry.--XII. The study of mathematics at Göttingen.--Appendix.