This week's Junior Colloquium speaker is our own Professor David Anderson.
As usual, the JC is at 3:35 in HBB 102; free pizza preceding it in Aconda
112.
Title: The Quaternions
Abstract:
On the evening of October 16, 1843, a man and his wife were strolling
along the Royal Canal in Dublin. He had a flash of genius, took out his
penknife, and carved the equations
i2 = j2 = k2 = ijk = -1
on a stone on Brougham Bridge. The man was Sir William Rowan Hamilton, and
these equations describe what is now called the division ring of
quaternions, a number system like the complex numbers except that
multiplication is not commutative. In this talk, we will discuss the
quaternions, their role in the development of algebra, and the number of
solutions of a quadratic equation. No specific mathematics is needed other
than a knowledge of the complex numbers.
Conrad Plaut
Professor, Director of UT Math Honors
Math Department
Aconda Ct. 104
1534 Cumberland Ave.
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, TN 37996-0612
Office: Aconda Ct. 401A
Phone: 865-974-4319
http://web.utk.edu/~cplaut
