David Corfield Historical Motivation

The Mac Intyrean? idea that intellectual enquiry relies on historical understanding of its development to flourish.

In Section 1 I have gathered some historical facts concerning the various ideas that have lead to derived algebraic geometry. Its content does not pretend to be exhaustive, and also reflects some personal taste and interpretation. I have tried however to cover a large variety of mathematical ideas that, I think, have influenced the modern development of the subject. This first section is of course independent of the sequel and can be skipped by the reader if he wishes so (the mathematical content truly starts in §2.1), but I have the feeling that it can explain at the same time the motivations for derived algebraic geometry as well as some of the notions and the definitions that will be presented in the next sections. (Toën, Derived Algebraic Geometry)

Frank’s lectures were in a sense all about his motivation for wanting such localizations. So, philosophically, I might argue that motivations for mathematical developments might best be sought in their historical context, rather than abstractly, even for a category theorist. (Peter May, MO)

Created on July 11, 2014 at 20:09:00. See the history of this page for a list of all contributions to it.