How does one “invent new maths”? Like Isaac Newton inventing Calculus, or John Napier logs. How does one answer a mathematical question that’s never been answered?
In: Mathematics
Most answers here aren’t “ELI5 enough” in my opinion.
See, the universe works by a certain set of rules, just like a game. You can do a lot of different things, as long as you play by the rules.
Newton was doing just that. He saw a falling object and decided he wanted to describe its behavior. However, the velocity of a falling object is not constant, thanks to gravity. Now how do you express that in maths? Newton took the concept of “rate of change” and invented a way of doing maths with the concept using calculus.
So inventing things in maths is usually all about getting new perspectives and finding different ways to solve a new problem. It doesn’t mean writing new rules. It means defining the rules by which your universe works.
The more you play the game, the better you understand it.
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