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M us e um o f S ci e nc e a nd T e c h no l o g y – B e l g r a d e
Музеј науке и технике – Београд
м узеј науке и технике – београ д
M u s e u m o f S c i e n c e a n d T e c hnolog y – B e lg r a d e
PHLOGISTON
29
ЧАСОПИС ЗА ИСТОРИЈУ И ФИЛОЗОФИЈУ
НАУКЕ И ТЕХНОЛОГИЈЕ
Београд – Belgrade
2021
ФЛОГИСТОН
Број 29 – 2021 / Issue Nо. 29 – 2021
Издавач / Publisher
Музеј науке и технике – Београд
Скендер-бегова 51
тел: 30 37 962; факс: 32 81 479
е-пошта: Phlogiston@MuzejNT.rs
Museum of Science and Technology – Belgrade
51 Skender-begova Street
Tel: +381 11 30 37 962; Fax: +381 11 32 81 479
Email: Phlogiston@MuzejNT.rs
Лектура / Proofreading
Катарина Спасић (KAUKAI) / Katarina Spasić (KAUKAI)
Превод / Translation
Катарина Спасић (KAUKAI) / Katarina Spasić (KAUKAI)
Прелом / Layout
Кранислав Вранић / Kranislav Vranić
Штампа / Printing
BiroGraf, Земун
ПРИКАЗИ/PRIKAZI
Abstract
1. Introduction
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2. René Magritte
The Belgian artist René Magritte3 is one of the most famous representa-
tives of surrealism, a school of thought from the first half of the 20th cen-
tury that addresses unconsciousness and dreams by creating paintings
that depict these worlds with remarkable precision.
As it happens, many of Magritte’s works can be given a mathematical
interpretation. For instance, Le fils de l’homme, which depicts a man with
a bowler hat whose face is covered by an apple, visualizes the human
desire to see beyond what can be seen, and La Clairvoyance shows a man
who is observing an egg but drawing a flying bird. Both works perfectly
interpret what mathematicians are driven by and how a mathematical
mind works.
One of Magritte’s best-known works is a series of paintings in which
he shows everyday objects with different labels or text describing them.
The text is the heart of these works, since they confuse, puzzle and even
irritate the observer. This is because the text seems to be contradictory
at first glance, challenging our intuition and our experience. The most
famous one, La Trahison des Images, shows a realistically drawn pipe and
the text Ceci n’est pas une pipe–This is not a pipe–written below.
3 Todd Alden, The Essential René Magritte (New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc.,
1999).
10
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
3. Henri Matisse
Technique used in this work was inspired by the late work of Henri
Matisse4 who, with fragile health resulting from an intestinal operation,
developed the method of drawing with scissors, as he called it. He had
an assistant who painted a paper board in different colours and later
cut them into the shapes he needed. The reason why this technique is
referred to in this work is connected to the fact that Matisse refused
to give up once he was no longer able to create paintings. Rather, he
made up a new way to express himself, which is why the scissors repre-
sent perseverance, creativity and reinvention. This dead-end situation
and Matisse’s reaction to it can be compared to the background that
this work refers to and to the attitude that the mathematicians dis-
cussed in this work have shown when facing these problems. Obtaining
a counterintuitive result is unsettling and baffling and the discovery of
an antinomy within a formal system carries with it a certain fatality, a
doom. Such a discovery causes the teetering of the system and with
it, our convictions and everything we believe to be true. However, it is
precisely the capability to adapt to those unexpected results and rede-
fine the foundations of mathematics to prevent it from collapsing like a
house of cards that has distinguished those mathematicians who made
these discoveries.
4 John Jacobus, Henri Matisse (New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc., 1983).
11
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Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
It must have been quite a shock to discover that this is not entirely
true, at least not in the way that these mathematicians thought.5 Given
the direct connection to Pythagoras’ theorem, it is often believed that
the discovery of the irrationality–non-rationality, to be more precise–
of the square root of two was the idea that showed them this fact.
Nevertheless, although the sources are not certain on this point, it is
more probable that these mathematicians encountered the irrationality
of the golden ratio first,6 mainly because the regular pentagon, in which
the golden ratio plays a fundamental role, was the symbol of their order.
The golden ratio is defined by
13
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With the discovery of the irrational numbers, we are virtually just a few
steps away from the definition of the entirety of the real numbers–a few
steps that took us more than twenty centuries to make–and with the
real numbers more problems arise. For in the realm of real numbers, we
encounter many unexpected and not-so-intuitive results, a fact that be-
comes evident when we focus on real functions.
Analysis is a field that many remarkable figures throughout the his-
tory have worked on, but some, such as Augustin-Louis Cauchy, Bernard
Bolzano and Karl Weierstrass, undoubtedly stand out. These men imple-
mented extreme rigour during the processing of the most fundamental
concepts of calculus, which turned out to be pivotal in the development
of this area, and introduced the arithmetisation of analysis, puzzling it out
from the contentious infinitesimals and introducing the now classical
definitions.7 In this way, the foundations of analysis found themselves
on terra firma, which does not mean that counterintuitive results can no
longer be found. There are continuous functions defined on a compact do-
main with infinite length, everywhere-continuous but nowhere-differenti-
able functions or functions that verify the intermediate value property but
are not continuous. It seems that one can construct a function with what-
ever property one desires it to verify. In summary, analysis is a pathway to
many properties that one may consider unnatural.
7 Jeanne Peiffer and Amy Dahan-Dalmedico, Wege und Irrwege-Eine Geschichte
der Mathematik (Basel: Basel Birkhäuser, 1994).
14
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
which is clearly finite. Now, for the area of the surface of the Gabriel’s
Horn, we have
15
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Bearing in mind that this idea is nonsense in the first place, since an infi-
nitely long object cannot be real, to explain the mistake in this reasoning,
it is sufficient to remark that paint particles are not infinitely small, which
is why this idea fails.
This example reveals our problems in intuitively working with the real
line. The fundamental role of the real numbers in mathematics and their
mathematical beauty are beyond doubt, but on the other hand, they lack
the intuitiveness of the rational numbers. When first confronted with
them, we are usually taught how to use real numbers without utterly un-
derstanding their true nature, which is due to the fact that there is a not-
so-evident abstraction hidden behind this set of numbers. This abstrac-
tion is strongly connected to the complex concept of the completeness
of the real numbers, a notion we implicitly owe to Richard Dedekind, who
was the first one to consistently describe the continuum with his novel
idea of what we now call Dedekind cuts.9 It requires a certain mathemati-
cal maturity to fully understand the axiomatic framework that underlies
this issue. This leads to the important question of how to teach abstract
concepts and ideas in a pedagogical and practical way without forget-
ting to transmit their true meaning. On a personal note, this manuscript
is the result of the answer I found to this particularly difficult question:
by telling stories around the abstract mathematics that is being taught
and thereby humanizing mathematics. In addition to this, we dare to ask
what led René Descartes to call these numbers real.
16
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
behind them, they seem unattainable and out of reach, and the mere
idea of looking in these directions seems to be a perilous and foolishly
hopeless endeavour. Today, we have the Millennium Prize Problems, an
example of a famous list of such problems, of which only Poincarè’s con-
jecture has been solved (by Grigori Perelman). Moreover, David Hilbert’s
list of 23 problems presented in 1900 during the Second International
Congress of Mathematicians in Paris is probably the most storied and in-
fluential list of open problems, for it shaped mathematical thinking for
decades to come.
However, antiquity had its own problems. Three geometric problems
remained unsolved for more than twenty centuries,10 the most complex
among them probably being the quadrature of the circle. The goal was to
construct a square of area equal to the one of a given circle using only a
compass and a straightedge and nothing more. The impossibility of this
undertaking is a consequence of the proof that the number π is transcen-
dental, which was obtained in the 19th century.11
The other two problems, the construction of a cube that doubles the
volume of a given one and devising a general method to partition an angle
into three equal parts, can be settled using the results of Évariste Galois.
Once again, it is not possible to do what the problem asks us to do, which
means that all three of the classical problems of antiquity, which have
been waiting two thousand years for a solution, can still not be solved.
10
Edward V. Graef, “On the Solutions of Three Ancient Problems”, Mathematics
Magazine, 42, 1 (1969): 28–32.
11 Ferdinand Lindenmann, “Über die Zahl π“, Mathematische Annalen, 20 (1882):
213–225.
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Less disappointing, however, are the possibilities that arise from the
mathematics created by Galois in this context. The starting point of this
was the quintic equation, the question whether the roots of a polyno-
mial of degree 5 can be expressed in terms of radicals, which in itself has
been one of the most important open problems since the Renaissance.12
Galois answered that question negatively–apparently this was a bad
habit of his–by creating one of the most significant branches of algebra:
group theory. By stating that group theory is the study of symmetries,
we can understand why it is so influential and why there are that many
applications of Galois’s work in real-world phenomena, for our world and
the physics we use to describe it obey the laws of symmetry. To recapitu-
late, by answering a rather theoretical question about a polynomial equa-
tion, centuries-old questions were settled and two essential theories of
modern algebra, which have deep connections to our real world and the
way we describe it, have been developed.
When talking about open problems, one question always remains:
Which dragons will be tamed next? What problem will be solved in the
near future and what tools will be created to do so? Will a new branch of
mathematics emerge in the process? The thrilling thing is that we cannot
do anything other than speculate.
12 Dmitry Fuchs and Serge Tabachinov, Ein Schaubild der Mathematik (Berlin; Hei-
delberg: Springer, 2011).
13
Georg Cantor, “Beiträge zur Begründung der Transfiniten Mengenlehre“,
Mathematische Annalen, 46 (1895): 481–512.
18
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
“No one shall expel us from the paradise that Cantor created for us”,
David Hilbert exclaimed, and although this statement mainly mirrors his
viewpoint regarding many philosophical issues of his time, it also expounds
a particular idea: the idea that Cantor’s work on set theory is one of the
starting points of modern mathematics, a paradise worth fighting for.
Cantor created what we now call naive set theory, since it contains de-
ficiencies that had to be corrected afterwards. However, Cantor’s work
was a bold and audacious move, for it was the first time that infinity was
formally integrated into a mathematical theory. Not only that, but infin-
ity was also a key element of Cantor’s work. Until then, infinity had been
more of a philosophical notion than an entirely mathematical concept.
Whilst it was both implicitly and explicitly present in many mathematical
contexts–for instance, in the concept of infinite series or the principle of
induction–mathematicians tried to avoid working with it for obvious rea-
sons. As a consequence, Cantor’s theory sparked a widespread contro-
versy out of which new philosophical currents, such as intuitionism and
constructivism, which were opposed to Cantor’s work, emerged. Other
mathematicians refused to reason about infinity the way Cantor did, but
time proved Cantor right. It was madness, yet there was a method in it.
Cantor’s revolutionary ideas are now widely accepted and they are a part
of the mathematics we now teach and work with every day. Depending
on which area one works in, one will encounter different paradoxes re-
lated to infinity.
One famous paradox that comes from probability is frequently called
the infinite monkey theorem. Imagine that there is a monkey that ran-
domly types letters on a typewriter. Naturally, the result of the monkey’s
work will be a string of random and meaningless nonsense. But now
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As we have seen, infinity expresses itself in two main ways: the infinitely
large and the infinitely small, and both of them are equally unsettling. In
the case of the infinitely small, two Polish mathematicians, Stefan Banach
and Alfred Tarski, provided a shocking and disturbing, but also beautiful,
result that seems to put a limit to the real-world applications of mathemat-
ics the way we use it.15
14 Émile Borel, “Mécanique Statistique et Irréversibilité”, Journal of Physics, 5, 3
(1913): 189–196.
15 Stefan Banach and Alfred Tarski, “Sur la décomposition des ensembles de
20
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
16
Thomas J. Jech, The Axiom of Choice (Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing
Company, 1973).
17
Ernst Zermelo, “Beweis, dass jede Menge wohlgeordnet werden kann“, Math-
ematische Annalen, 59, 4 (1904): 514-516.
21
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22
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
19 Jason Rosenhouse, The Monty Hall Problem (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2009).
23
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Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
you choose different integers out of the first , then there will be
two among them such that one divides the other one. As a side note, it
is worth mentioning that Paul Erdös liked this last problem so much that
he used it as an initiation problem, meaning that he confronted young
disciples with it to observe their answers.20
There is no doubt that the pigeonhole principle, which is attributed to
Peter Dirichlet, is a beautiful result. Many of the requirements we have for
a result to earn the epithet beautiful are fulfilled: it may be extremely sim-
ple, but it possesses applications in different fields of mathematics that
are also surprising. Mathematicians talk about the beauty in mathemat-
ics in different contexts. A proof can be called beautiful, usually implying
that it uses novel proving techniques or tools that are usually used in oth-
er areas and can unexpectedly be applied in this new context. However,
sometimes the result, rather than the proof, is the beautiful part. When a
large amount of information can be summarized with a brief and simple
formula, when two apparently disconnected branches can be connected
by one single result in a deep and elegant way, or when a theorem’s im-
plications give rise to a whole new branch of mathematics; then we usu-
ally talk about a beautiful theorem. For instance, Andrew Wiles proved
the connection between elliptic curves and modular forms elegantly
connecting two rather opposing theories and, as a consequence, prov-
ing one of the most discussed open problems of mathematics Fermat’s
last theorem. In recent years, a work by Michael Atiyah confirmed that
by showing different mathematical results to mathematicians, neuronal
processes were activated in their brains similar to ones activated in the
20 Martin Aigner and Günter M. Ziegler, Das BUCH der Beweise (Berlin: Springer,
Heidelberg, 2015).
25
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26
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
because, in these cases, one space will inherit all the properties the other
one possesses, and vice versa. A popular example of this are a mug and
a donut. It can be shown that the mug and donut both behave in exactly
the same way–at least in topological terms. This has been used for the
joke that a topologist cannot distinguish between what he wants to drink
for breakfast and what he wants to eat for breakfast. The key here is that
a donut and a mug both possess exactly one hole, and therefore, we can
imaginarily transform a donut into a mug.
Felix Hausdorff was one of the pioneers in topology, and probably
the one of the fathers of topology who is most strongly connected to
the establishment of the foundations of topology. A fundamental prop-
erty in topology that describes one way of distinguishing between differ-
ent points in a topological space is named after him23.There are numer-
ous ways of distinguishing between points in a topological space, and
although Hausdorff’s version is not used as an axiom of a topological
space the way he meant it to be used, it is widely accepted as the weak-
est definition that is also still useful. In other words, a Hausdorff space
distinguishes between different points in the most efficient way.
But what is the purpose of this if we cannot distinguish a mug from
a donut any longer? Why do mathematicians shamelessly create such
problems? The fact is that topology became one of the most omnipresent
branches of modern mathematics. All mathematical fields can be interpret-
ed in topological terms, and by these means, strong connections between
them can be created. Moreover, it is not surprising that it is possible to
discover real-world applications in the abstractness of topology. A rather
23 Felix Hausdorff, Grundzüge der Mengenlehre (Leipzig: Veit & Co., 1949).
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Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
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Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
This short story, which ends with the sorcerer restoring the order, is
frequently referred to when a scientific discovery gets out of the hands
of its originator, the discovery of nuclear physics and the resultant hor-
rific weapons being a sorrowful example of such. However, the story fits
the history of mathematics and its foundations with supreme elegance,
since once mathematics was brought to life, it stubbornly and fiercely
obeyed its own laws, and the only position left for the creators was the
role of the apprentice. There was nothing left to do but suffer the slings
and arrows of outrageous fortune.
This irremediable dilemma has led to what we know today as the
foundational crisis of mathematics,27 a debate that tried to settle the
27 Ibid.
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32
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
one of his most well-known quotes: “We must know–we will know!” But
Hilbert was deceived, for none of this turned out to be feasible.
Another of Hilbert’s fundamental legacies is the way that we under-
stand axioms today,28 including the meaning we give them and the char-
acter they possess. Originally, axioms were meant to be unquestion-
able, plausible notions. Their validity was to be unquestioned and self-
evident, like Euclid’s “all right angles are equal to one another”, and, like
many concepts of a mathematical nature, the significance of the axioms
remained unchallenged for 25 centuries. However, during the crisis, the
whole mathematical world was–necessarily–turned upside down. For
the axioms, this meant that they lost this intuitive meaning, their self-
evidence, and started possessing significance depending on the logical
implications that are associated with them, the axiom of choice being
just one of the many axioms that fall into this category. This remodelling
of our way of understanding axioms had major implications for the way
we work in mathematics, since we now do not care what lines, points or
planes are, but only what properties they satisfy and what we can de-
rive from them. Hence, many philosophical questions that had no clear
answer and stood in the way in the daily routine of mathematicians,
such as what lines, points and planes are, were banished from everyday
concern.
We now have a notion of what axioms are and how we treat them.
In different branches, we work with different groups of axioms, and al-
though the axioms are widely accepted, they are not undisputed. Will we
change this concept in the future? Will we change the axioms we believe
in? In order to answer these questions, it is paramount to understand
the philosophical and mathematical meanings of axioms, and to do so,
many spirited discussions with well-founded, opposing standpoints are
called for.
28 Penelope Maddy, “Believing the Axioms”, The Journal of Symbolic Logic, 53, 2
(1988): 481–511.
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where can be any statement, such as Y: These are no glasses. The prob-
lem with the whole statement is that it can be used to “prove” any affir-
mation at all. This can easily be shown step-by-step by using the law
of identity with our statement and applying other elemen-
tal logical laws. Thus, we obtain the conclusion that by allowing state-
ments such as , and are both derivable, which, of course, is not
acceptable.
However, self-referential statements can also be used constructive-
ly, as Kurt Gödel showed with his colossal incompleteness theorems,29
which are probably the most significant theorems in mathematical log-
ic. In the first theorem, Gödel proves that in mathematics, more pre-
cisely, within any recursive consistent axiomatic system strong enough
to describe the natural numbers, there will necessarily be true state-
ments that cannot be deduced using the chosen axioms. This exhibits
the limits of mathematical growth. The second theorem states that no
such system will be capable of proving its consistency from within the
system. In other words, both of these theorems reveal the impossibil-
ity of Hilbert’s program. Gödel showed this by explicitly constructing
a true statement that cannot be proven or disproven within such an
axiomatic system.
Gödel later said that the origin of the ideas that led to his incom-
pleteness theorems resided in the epiphanic realization that provability
is not equal to truth. This might be considered natural today, since the
definition of a provable statement is well-defined today, yet despite our
34
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
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hypothesis probably being the most famous. The imminent question that
the incompleteness theorems imply is: What can we prove? Which open
problems can we prove with our axioms, and which are out of reach? These
are particularly important questions to ask when facing conjectures, espe-
cially those that stubbornly withstand any proving attempts over the years.
36
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
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pondering about its creators, including their lives, motivations and ideas.
Turing’s story is well-known, but it is not the only story. Hausdorff, for
instance, never stopped doing research–not even during the National
Socialistic regime under which he suffered persecution and discrimina-
tion. The compromises that he had to make in his devotion to his work
are truly admirable. When Hausdorff and his wife eventually received a
deportation letter, they made a desperate and tragic decision to take
their own lives. Tarski, on the other hand, was more fortunate during this
same despotic era. Wishing to attend a forthcoming conference in the
United States, he took the last ship leaving Poland prior to the German
and Soviet invasions and thereby escaped almost certain death. He was
later reunited with his wife and children. In times of war and turmoil,
Bertrand Russell declared himself a pacifist and paid for his convictions
with his liberty. He used his time in prison to write a memorable book,
Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy. On a lighter note, it is said that
during his citizenship hearing, Gödel claimed to have found an inconsis-
tency within the U.S. Constitution that allowed the U.S. to be turned into
an autocracy. Support from his friends Oskar Morgenstern and Albert
Einstein, who both attended the hearing, was necessary to prevent
Gödel’s chances of obtaining citizenship from running aground.
One can find similar stories about almost every mathematician, and
they will all have a different effect on us. However, without any doubt,
these stories give mathematics a special meaning, a reason for its
existence.
17. Conclusions
In this work we saw how the mathematical results, methods and ideas
of numerous pivotal mathematicians in human history are intrinsically
connected and how the paradoxes they dealt with and the artistic inter-
pretation in the series The Treachery of Mathematics exhibits these con-
nections. The art created by René Magritte and Henri Matisse serves as
tool to do so. The philosophy found in Magritte’s work provides an artis-
tic way of representing the mathematical concepts, the paradoxes and
counterintuitive results, and the style used by Matisse helps to highlight
the key role that many distinguished mathematicians played in the his-
tory of mathematics and the settlement of its foundations. In this way, a
novel and creative approach to different philosophical and mathematical
issues has been created.
38
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
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39
Phlogiston 29/2021 http://www.muzejnt.rs
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40
Demian Nahuel Goos, The Treachery of Mathematics
ОБМАНА МАТЕМАТИКЕ
41
оригиналан научни рад
udc 524.352
Дејан Урошевић1
Универзитет у Београду, Математички факултет,
Катедра за астрономију,
Београд
Апстракт
У овом раду је дат преглед појава експлозија супернових звезда
које су забележене током историје. Додатно се анализира могућ-
ност да су наши преци, који су живели на овим просторима (Бал-
канско полуострво), могли да уоче те несвакидашње небеске поја-
ве. Уз астрономске податке везане за експлозије, биће приказане
и основне историјске чињенице везане за епоху у којој се експло-
зија могла видети, у смислу у којој држави су у том тренутку жи-
вели наши тадашњи преци, ко је био владар и која су била најваж-
нија обележја тог периода. Током последњих две хиљаде година,
укупно је забележено десетак ових спектакуларних догађаја који
су сви анализирани у овом раду.
Кључне речи: историја астрономије, супернове
1. Увод
1 dejanu@matf.bg.ac.rs
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5 Jacco Vink et al., „The X-Ray Synchrotron Emission of RCW 86 and the
Implications for Its Age”, The Astrophyscal Journal Letters, 648 (2006): L33–L37.
6 Zhentao Xu, David William Pankenier and Yaotiao Jiang, East Asian Archaeo-
astronomy: Historical Records of Astronomical Observations of China, Japan, and
Korea (Amsterdam: Gordon and Breach Science Publishers, 2000); David H. Clark,
and Richard F. Stephenson, „The remnants of the supernovae of AD 185 and AD
393”, The Observatory, 95 (1975): 190–195.
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2.3. SN 1006
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10
Детаље видети у: Filipović et al., „European historical evidence of the super-
nova of AD 1054: sky above Europe on 4th July 1054”, 147–160.
11 Ibid.
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North Star had traveled across the night sky to that point where it’s shining now,
at one o’clock, Marcellus and I…”.
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Д. Урошевић, супернове кроз историју
Слика 11. Лево: Оригинална скица Тиха Брахеа у којој објекат означен
као “I” представља нову звезду у сазвежђу Касиопеја.
Десно: Остатак Тихове супернове
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2. „Скривене” супернове
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Слика 13.
Османлијско царство
на врхунцу своје
моћи
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3. Закључак
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Литература
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Dejan Urošević
University of Belgrade, Faculty of Mathematics, Department of Astronomy,
Belgrade
62
оригиналан научни рад
udc 141.7(=163.41)(091)
7.013(=163.41)(091)
271.222(497.11)-722.51-74 Сава, свети
Предраг Д. Милосављевић1
Универзитет у Београду, Учитељски факултет, Београд;
Универзитет у Београду, студије при Универзитету,
Историја и филозофија природних наука и технологије, Београд
Апстракт
Овај рад је настао као резултат дела истраживања светосавског
наслеђа посматраног кроз призму примене ареопагитског сраз-
мерског обрасца и успостављања друштвеног поретка заснованог
на принципима скла�а („согласја“ или хармоније). Полазна основа
истраживања иницирана је тежњом за ширим обухватом еписте-
молошке анализе Законо�равила Све�о� Саве (1219) и српског на-
родног усторојства које је из њега проистекло, као и узрока кон-
тинуалне посвећености српских ставралаца идеји хармоније. Циљ
овог рада је да прошири слику о основама и искуствима уграђе-
ним у наше средњовековно наслеђе и учење о начелу склада и
сагласја које се у српском народу кроз светосавље пренело све
до савременог доба. Сврха рада је да се кроз шире мултидисци-
плинарно сагледавање прошири увид о основама и историјском
обухвату развоја идеје хармоније у стваралаштву српског народа,
односно вековне тежње да се успостави складна мера и сагласје у
духовном развоју појединца и саборном односу народног, цркве-
ног и државног живота и деловања. Рад је посвећен обележавању
осам векова светосавља.
Кључне речи: Свети Сава, Законоправило, сразмера, склад, хармонија
1 pmilosavljevic@gmail.com
2 Рад је проистекао из истраживања спроведених у оквиру научног пројекта
Теорија и �ракса науке у �руш�ву: мул�и�исци�линарне, образовне и међу�е-
нерацијске �ерс�ек�иве (ОИ 179048, Министарство науке, просвете и техно-
лошког развоја, Република Србија).
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П. Д. Милосављевић, Склад и сагласје у српској култури и науци
књигу Зла�ни број (Lе Nombre D’Or), у оквиру које је дао опширнији
увид у резултате истраживања који се односе на примену златног пре-
сека и оптичких корекција у архитектури (заснованих на новим ме-
рењима античких објеката).24
На хармонијске основе златног пресека пажњу је скренуо и ју-
гословенски архитекта, сликар и теоретичар уметности Леонид
Шејка (1932–1970). Своје гледиште у вези са зла�ним �ресеком, чију
је суштину довео у везу са једном од апсолутизованих метода у умет-
ности, Шејка је исказао у књизи Трак�а� о сликарс�ву (1964).25 Том
приликом, Шејка је подсетио на састанак који су 1912. године одржа-
ли кубисти, коме (како је још констатовао) нису присуствовали осни-
вачи кубизма Жорж Брак (Georges Braque) и Пабло Пикасо (Pablo Ruiz
Picasso), о чему се изразио на следећи начин:
„Брак и Пикасо су, такође, сваки за себе, пример дубоко про-
тивречних, трагичних уметника мучених контрадикцијама, кон-
традикцијама које су наметнуте положајем уметника у ‘оскуд-
ном времену’. Брак и Пикасо као први творци кубизма нису се
појавили на великом састанку кубиста 1912. године, састанку
‘златног пресека’, где је требало тековине кубизма апсолутизо-
вати као метод”.26
Важност којa је златном пресеку (као геометријском принципу и
методи) била додељена у југословенској уметности друге половине
20. века, управо се огледа у поменутој Шејкиној констатацији, која је
имала посебног одјека, када се у обзир узме чињеница да је Шејка
био један од оснивача и најзначајнијих теоретичара у оквиру уметнич-
ке групе Бал�азар (1957), која је током 1958. године прерасла у ути-
цајну уметничку групу Ме�иала.
Током друге половине шездесетих година 20. века, златним пресе-
ком је наставио да се бави Милан Злоковић, који је у раду Мо�уларна
коор�инација, објављеном 1965. године, на више места указао на раз-
личита правила и дијаграме који се односе на синтезу зла�но� �ресека
и осталих ирационалних вредности изведених из геометрије правил-
них полигона.27 С друге стране, о практичном принципу примене злат-
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40
Милан Будимир, Са балканских ис�очника (Београд: Српска књижевна за-
друга, 1969), 90.
41 Branko Gavela, Istorija umetnosti antičke Grčke (Beograd: Naučna knjiga,
1969), 316.
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42 Ibid., 186.
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48 Ibid., 7–8.
49 Aleksеj Brkić, „Inverzije dijalektike oblika (VII): Dijalektika sistema ili dijalektika
antihaosa”, Izgradnja, 2 (1979): 5.
50 Aleksеj Brkić, Predgovor za jednu teoriju grada (Vrnjačka Banja: Zamak kulture,
1981), 121–122.
51 Ibid., 140.
52 Ibid., 158–159. Бркићев став о „хармонијским финесама” у погледу кон-
ципирања нових архитектонских форми проналазимо и у његовом делу Зна-
кови у камену. Видети: Алексеј Бркић, Знакови у камену: ср�ска мо�ерна ар-
хи�ек�ура: 1930–1980 (Београд: Савез архитеката Србије, 1992), 196; такође,
видети: Даница Стојиљковић, С�рук�урализам у архи�ек�ури Ју�ославије у
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2. Хармонија и светосавље
О томе да су све до 20. века Срби били свесни заслуга Светог Саве
у успостављању културе засноване на начелу хармоније (сагласја)
постоје и писана сведочанства. На то нас, пре свега, упућује објављени
говор који је 1924. године, на Савиндан, одржао истакнути српски
математичар Богдан Гавриловић (1864–1947), ректор Београдског
56 Након поменутог скупа у Београду, под руководством истог научног од-
бора, одржана су још два научна скупа посвећена хармонији. Други по реду
научни скуп, под називом Хармонија и хаос, одржан је 20. маја 1999. године
на Пољопривредном факултету у Београду – у време агресије НАТО снага на
Републику Југославију, док је трећи скуп одржан 29. септембра 2005. године у
Струги (Северна Македонија).
57 Александар Петровић, одг. ур., Фло�ис�он – часо�ис за ис�орију науке:
Хармонија у �риро�и, науци и уме�нос�и, 7 (Београд: Музеј науке и технике,
1998).
58
Милош Чанак, Ма�ема�ика и музика: ис�ина и ле�о�а – је�на зла�на хар-
монијска ни� (Београд: Службени гласник, 2009).
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61
Јустин Поповић, Све�осавље као философија живо�а (Ваљево: Манастир
Ћелије, 1993), 62.
62 Ibid., 64.
63 Ibid., 24.
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П. Д. Милосављевић, Склад и сагласје у српској култури и науци
64 Ibid.
65 Николај Велимировић, Рели�ија Ње�ошева (Београд: Издање С. Б. Цвијано-
вића, 1921), 11.
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�ре�ак савременик .
=
савременик �о�омак
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4. Закључак
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Литература
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