Mathpriest

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Ways to improve Artificium

Hi, I'm Lithopsian. Mathpriest, thanks for creating Artificium!

I've just tagged the page, using our page curation tools, as having some issues to fix. More references needed, specifically to demonstrate the title of the article which does not appear in the one reference given. Categories are always a good idea to help people find the article.

The tags can be removed by you or another editor once the issues they mention are addressed. If you have questions, you can leave a comment on my talk page. Or, for more editing help, talk to the volunteers at the Teahouse. Lithopsian (talk) 20:11, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Ok, Lithopsian, I added the requested reference. Mathpriest (talk) 20:11, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Canon Sinuum

Hello, Buergi's Canon Sinuum is thought to be lost, you should modify the page accordingly. Also, I suggest renaming the page, there have been Canons of sines before Buergi, so the minimum would be to call the page something like "Canon Sinuum (Buergi)". Thanks.Schwilgue (talk) 10:57, 15 March 2016 (UTC) Also, the Canon probably went from 0 to 90, not from 0 to 45. If you have sines and cosines, the half quadrant suffices, but if you have only the sines, you need the full quadrant.Schwilgue (talk) 10:58, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Hello, I have made a number of changes to the pages related to Buergi's tables of sines. First, I have included the name Buergi in the title of the pages on the Canon Sinuum (because Buergi's Canon is not the only one), as well as in other pages. Then, I have renamed Artificium into Kunstweg, because I think it is more accurate, and because this is used in Launert's edition of Buergi's Fundamentum. Some authors may have used the word Artificium, including Staudacher, but that doesn't mean that this should be the main term for the description of the algorithms. Then, there is the matter of the multiple algorithms. Buergi used several methods, and the iterative algorithm is only one of them, and not even the most important one. In the context of the calculus of differences, reference should be made to the work of Prony, because Buergi does exactly compute the sines as Prony will do 200 years later.

I have removed several references to MacTutor. MacTutor is basically an aggregating site, a third-hand encyclopedia. It is better to cite the works cited by MacTutor. MacTutor is not an authority site, only a site gathering information from other sources. (In a way, this is of course also true of Wikipedia.)

I also think that one should not be one sided, and not claim that most mathematicians this and that, especially without adequate citations. Also, citations on Buergi's work as a mathematician from 100 years ago have less value than current citations, because historical science has evolved. A 100 years ago, mathematicians knew nothing about Buergi, and each one was repeating what others had written. You can't add up such opinions. Cajori, for instance, had probably never seen Buergi's table of progressions. Current research has evolved and the accounts given by Wikipedia should at least reflect it. There may be arguments supporting the invention of logarithms by Buergi, but one should be careful not to put in the same pot what concerns progressions, sine tables, and prosthaphaeresis, or to use as a first hand source a mere passing mention in an article on another topic. There are also very good reasons for not supporting the view that Buergi invented logarithms, and an honest Wikipedia should reflect that. Schwilgue (talk) 13:57, 19 March 2016 (UTC)

I agree, we should simply list all sources, without interpreting them. Mathpriest (talk) 20:08, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

Bürgis Kunstweg

Hello @Mathpriest:,
Today, Ihave inserted an image in the article about Jost Bürgi's Kunstweg. Last week, I have also written a french-Wikipédia article about it. Click there if you want to show it. Regards. --Jacques Mrtzsn (talk) 06:52, 11 November 2020 (UTC)