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We still mostly use Leibniz' dy/dx notation. Newton's fluxions and y-dot (a dot over the y) notation are largely forgotten. The Hooke debate gave us a great qu
by btilly 2y ago
We still mostly use Leibniz' dy/dx notation. Newton's fluxions and y-dot (a dot over the y) notation are largely forgotten.
The Hooke debate gave us a great quote from Newton. "If I have seen farther than others, it is because I stood on the shoulders of giants." (Hooke was a dwarf...)
- hydrogen7800 2y ago~20 years ago in school, I encountered dy/dx and y-dot with about equal frequency (and maybe y' & f'(x)) in engineering and calculus courses. Engineering favored the dots.
- rtkwe 2y agoI went though most of a pure math degree along side my CS degree and I don't think I ever saw ẏ used, mathematics as far as I know basically completely adopted the Leibniz notation.
- btilly 2y agoI got most of the way to a PhD and only saw y-dot in one differential equations course.
- abhgh 2y agoSame here, and also agree with the "prime" notation, i.e., y'! One of my instructors had joked that the dot/prime notations saved printing costs in the days when printing was expensive - not sure if there is any truth to that.