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Re: [HM] Cauchy
Posted:
Nov 22, 2006 1:44 AM
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Le 14/11/06 16:52, dans « Gunnar Berg » <gunnar@math.uu.se> a écrit :
>
> Dear all.
> In perusing Cauchys "Cours d'analyse" (1821) I have come across the
> following (p.35):
>
> "Enfin, lorsqu'un fonction f(x) cesse d'etre continue dans le voisinage
> d'une valeur particuliere de la variable x, on dit qu'elle devient
> alors discontinue, et qu'il y a pour cette valeur particuliere
> solution de continuite."
>
> What puzzles me is the last phrase - "solution de continuite" -
> I simply cannot make any sense of it. What can Augustin-Louis mean?
> I look forward to hear from those whose knowledge of Cauchy and his
> times are more profound than mine.
>
> From Uppsala, deep in the gloom of November.
>
> Gunnar Berg
In French, "solution" has there different meanings : solution as in English
with his two meanings corresponding to solve an dissolve ; but also missing,
absence. Solution of continuity means simply absence of continuity (in
mathematics and in medicine, for wounds) ; this last meaning can be thought
as related to dissolve ; it is still used in mathematics.
-- Claude Marti
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