Customer comments on this Cooking Book
Getting there naturally
I am a topologist by training who was Shanghaied into being an analyst when I was hired as a teacher. As a consequence of this, the Advanced Calculus course I taught was rather heavy on topology.
Over the course of time--having been transformed into more of an analyst that I would have ever dreamed--I've come to the conclusion that analysis is best learned before topology.
This is a text that accomplishes that by using the historical approach.
One learns how Newton approached problems, how Euler did, how Cauchy did. Not only is it interesting, it is enlightening. I've taught this course for 15 years now, and of all of the approaches I've taken, this has been the most fruitful.
My students have come from calculational courses, and the historical approach of this book provides a bridge over which they may come into the land of proof. They also see the issues that caused the need for modern rigor face to face
I do supplement the course with material that is more modern (Hardy's book A Course of Pure Mathematics) and material on the Riemann integral, but I've been spoiled for any other approach.
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