Helaine Selin

Last updated

Helaine Selin (born 1946) is an American librarian, historian of science, author and book editor.

Contents

Career

Selin attended Binghamton University, where she earned her bachelor's degree. [1] She received her MLS from SUNY Albany. [1] She was a Peace Corps volunteer from the fall of 1967 through the summer of 1969 as a teacher of English and African History in Karonga, Malawi. [1] She retired in 2012 from being the science librarian at Hampshire College.

Selin is known for being the editor of Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures (1997, 2008 and third edition 2016) which is one of the first books which allows readers to "compare a variety of traditional systems of mathematics and cosmologies." [2] Mathematics Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Mathematics (2000), is considered by Mathematical Intelligencer as a companion to the Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. [3] The journal, Mathematics and Computer Education , wrote that Mathematics Across Cultures filled a gap in the history of mathematics and was "an exciting collection of papers on ethnomathematics." [4] Selin's editorial work, Nature Across Cultures: Views of Nature and the Environment in Non-Western Cultures (2003), was considered by Polylog to be a "valuable source for intercultural philosophers." [5] Selin edited the Encyclopaedia of Classical Indian Sciences (2007). [6] She has also edited several more books in the Science Across Cultures series: Medicine Across Cultures, Nature and the Environment Across Cultures, Childbirth Across Cultures, Parenting Across Cultures (second edition 2022), Happiness Across Cultures, Death Across Cultures and Aging Across Cultures.

Work as an editor

Related Research Articles

Ajima Naonobu, also known as Ajima Manzō Chokuyen, was a Japanese mathematician of the Edo period.

Japanese mathematics denotes a distinct kind of mathematics which was developed in Japan during the Edo period (1603–1867). The term wasan, from wa ("Japanese") and san ("calculation"), was coined in the 1870s and employed to distinguish native Japanese mathematical theory from Western mathematics.

Al-ʿAbbās ibn Saʿid al-Jawharī, known as Al-Jawhari, was a geometer who worked at the House of Wisdom in Baghdad and for in a short time in Damascus, where he made astronomical observations. Born in Baghdad, he was probably of Iranian origin. His most important work was his commentary on Euclid's Elements, which contained nearly 50 additional propositions and an attempted mathematical proof of the parallel postulate.

Jayadeva was an Indian mathematician, who further developed the cyclic method that was called by Hermann Hankel "the finest thing achieved in the theory of numbers before Lagrange ". He also made significant contributions to combinatorics.

Vaṭeśvara, was a tenth-century Indian mathematician from Kashmir who presented several trigonometric identities. He was the author of the Vaṭeśvara-siddhānta, written in 904 AD, a treatise focusing on astronomy and applied mathematics.The work criticized Brahmagupta and defended Aryabhatta I. An edition of the first three chapters was published in 1962 by R. S. Sharma and Mukund Mishra. Al Biruni referred to the works by Vateswara, particularly the Karaṇasāra, noting that the author was the son of Mihdatta who belonged to Nagarapura. The Karaṇasāra uses 821 Saka era as a reference year.

Munishvara or Munīśvara Viśvarūpa was an Indian mathematician who wrote several commentaries including one on astronomy, the Siddhanta Sarvabhauma (1646), which included descriptions of astronomical instruments such as the pratoda yantra. Another commentary he wrote was the Lilavativivruti. Very little is known about him other than that he came from a family of astronomers including his father Ranganatha who wrote a commentary called the Gụ̄hārthaprakaśa/Gūḍhārthaprakāśikā, a commentary on the Suryasiddhanta. His grandfather Ballala had his origins in Dadhigrama in Vidharba and had moved to Benares. Ballala had several sons who wrote commentaries on astronomy and mathematics. Munisvara's Siddhantasarvabhauma had the patronage of Shah Jahan like his paternal uncle Krishna Daivagna did. He was opposed to fellow mathematician Kamalakara, whose brother also wrote a critique of Munisvara's bhangi-vibhangi method for planetary motions. He was also opposed to the adoption of some mathematical ideas in spherical trigonometry from Arab scholars. An edition of his Siddhanta Sarvabhauma was published in the Princess of Wales Sarasvati Bhavana Granthamala series edited by Gopinath Kaviraj. Munisvara's book had twelve chapters in two parts. The second part had notes on astronomical instruments. He was a follower of Bhaskara II.

Paṇḍita Jagannātha Samrāṭ (1652–1744) was an Indian astronomer and mathematician who served in the court of Jai Singh II of Amber, and was also his guru.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aida Yasuaki</span> Japanese mathematician

Aida Yasuaki also known as Aida Ammei, was a Japanese mathematician in the Edo period.

Sharaf al-Dīn al-Muẓaffar ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Muẓaffar al-Ṭūsī known more often as Sharaf al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī or Sharaf ad-Dīn aṭ-Ṭūsī, was an Iranian mathematician and astronomer of the Islamic Golden Age.

Ahmad ibn 'Abdallah al-Marwazi, known as Habash al-Hasib was a Persian astronomer, geographer, and mathematician from Merv in Khorasan, who was the first to describe the trigonometric ratios tangent, and cotangent. Al-Biruni who cited Habash in his work, expanded his astronomical tables.

Abū Kāmil Shujāʿ ibn Aslam ibn Muḥammad Ibn Shujāʿ was a prominent Egyptian mathematician during the Islamic Golden Age. He is considered the first mathematician to systematically use and accept irrational numbers as solutions and coefficients to equations. His mathematical techniques were later adopted by Fibonacci, thus allowing Abu Kamil an important part in introducing algebra to Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indian astronomy</span> Astronomy on the Indian subcontinent

Indian astronomy refers to astronomy practiced in the Indian subcontinent. It has a long history stretching from pre-historic to modern times. Some of the earliest roots of Indian astronomy can be dated to the period of Indus Valley civilisation or earlier. Astronomy later developed as a discipline of Vedanga, or one of the "auxiliary disciplines" associated with the study of the Vedas dating 1500 BCE or older. The oldest known text is the Vedanga Jyotisha, dated to 1400–1200 BCE.

Śrīdhara or Śrīdharācārya was an Indian mathematician, known for two extant treatises about arithmetic and practical mathematics, Pāṭīgaṇita and Pāṭīgaṇita-sāra, and a now-lost treatise about algebra, Bījagaṇita.

Kambei Mori or Mōri Kambei, also known as Mōri Kambei ShigeyoshiMōri Shigeyoshi, was a Japanese mathematician in the Edo period.

A jyotiḥśāstra is a text from a classical body of literature on the topic of Hindu astrology, known as Jyotiṣa, dating to the medieval period of Classical Sanskrit literature. Only the most important ones exist in scholarly editions or translations, while many remain unedited in Sanskrit or vernacular manuscripts.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Āryabhaṭa's sine table</span> First sine table ever constructed

Āryabhata's sine table is a set of twenty-four numbers given in the astronomical treatise Āryabhatiya composed by the fifth century Indian mathematician and astronomer Āryabhata, for the computation of the half-chords of a certain set of arcs of a circle. The set of numbers appears in verse 12 in Chapter 1 Dasagitika of Aryabhatiya and is the first table of sines. It is not a table in the modern sense of a mathematical table; that is, it is not a set of numbers arranged into rows and columns. Āryabhaṭa's table is also not a set of values of the trigonometric sine function in a conventional sense; it is a table of the first differences of the values of trigonometric sines expressed in arcminutes, and because of this the table is also referred to as Āryabhaṭa's table of sine-differences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Al-Kharaqī</span> 12th century Persian mathematician and astronomer

Abū Muḥammad 'Abd al-Jabbār al-Kharaqī, also Al-Kharaqī (1084-1158) was a Persian astronomer and mathematician of the 12th century, born in Kharaq near Merv. He was in the service of Sultan Sanjar at the Persian Court. Al-Kharaqī challenged the astronomical theory of Ptolemy in the Almagest, and established an alternative theory of the spheres, imagining huge material spheres in which the planets moved inside tubes.

Kurushima Kinai, also known as Kurushima Yoshita and Kurushima Yoshihiro, was a Japanese mathematician in the Edo period.

Abu Muhammad Abd al-Haqq al‐Ghafiqi al‐Ishbili, also known as Ibn al‐Hāʾim (fl. c. 1213 was a medieval Muslim astronomer and mathematician from Seville.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter L. Antonelli</span> American mathematician (1941–2020)

Peter Louis Antonelli was an American mathematician known for his work on mathematical biology, Finsler geometry, and their connections.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "About Helaine". Helaine Selin. Hampshire College. Retrieved 22 January 2016.
  2. ↑ Merson, John (1999). "A Massive Compendium - But No CD-Rom!" . Metascience. 8: 494. Retrieved 22 January 2016– via EBSCO.
  3. ↑ Bellosta, Héléne (2005). "Mathematics Across Cultures". Mathematical Intelligencer. 27 (2): 85–88. doi:10.1007/BF02985803. S2CID   121462154.
  4. ↑ Rauff, James V. (1 October 2002). "Mathematics across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Mathematics". Mathematics and Computer Education. Archived from the original on 20 February 2016. Retrieved 22 January 2016.
  5. ↑ Baatz, Ursula (2004). "Nature Across Cultures". Polylog: Forum for Intercultural Philosophy. ISSN   1616-2943 . Retrieved 22 January 2016.
  6. ↑ "An Authentic Version of History of Indian Science". The Hindu. 9 January 2007. Retrieved 22 January 2016.
  7. ↑ Selin, Helaine, ed. (1997). Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. doi:10.1007/978-1-4020-4425-0. ISBN   978-1-4020-4559-2.
  8. ↑ Astronomy Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 1. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. 2000. doi:10.1007/978-94-011-4179-6. ISBN   978-94-010-5820-9.
  9. ↑ Mathematics Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 2. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. 2000. doi:10.1007/978-94-011-4301-1. ISBN   978-1-4020-0260-1.
  10. ↑ Selin, Helaine, ed. (2003). Medicine Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 3. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. doi:10.1007/0-306-48094-8. ISBN   1-4020-1166-0.
  11. ↑ Nature Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 4. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. 2003. doi:10.1007/978-94-017-0149-5. ISBN   978-90-481-6271-0.
  12. ↑ Selin, Helaine, ed. (2008). Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures (2nd ed.). New York, Berlin: Springer. doi:10.1007/978-1-4020-4425-0. ISBN   978-1-4020-4559-2.
  13. ↑ Childbirth Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 5. Dordrecht; New York: Springer. 2012. doi:10.1007/978-90-481-2599-9. ISBN   978-90-481-2598-2.
  14. ↑ Happiness Across Cultures. Science across cultures. Vol. 6. Dordrecht; New York: Springer. 2012. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-2700-7. ISBN   978-94-007-2699-4.
  15. ↑ Parenting Across Cultures. Science Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Science. Vol. 7 (2nd ed.). Dordrecht; New York: Springer. 2014. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-7503-9. ISBN   978-94-007-7502-2.
  16. ↑ Death Across Cultures. Science Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Science. Vol. 9. Dordrecht, New York: Springer. 2019. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-18826-9. ISBN   978-3-030-18825-2.
  17. ↑ Aging Across Cultures. Science Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Science. Vol. 10. Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature. 2021. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-76501-9. ISBN   978-3-030-76500-2.
  18. ↑ Childhood in Turkey: Educational, Sociological, and Psychological Perspectives. Science Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Science. Vol. 11. Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature. 2022. doi:10.1007/978-3-031-08208-5. ISBN   978-3-031-08207-8.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.