Aesthetics and the ‘Mathematical Mind’

Abstract

This paper starts from some observations about Presmeg’s paper ‘Mathematics education research embracing arts and sciences’ also published in this issue.The main topics discussed here are disciplinary boundaries, method and, briefly, certainty and trust. Specific interdisciplinary examples of work come from the history of mathematics (Diophantus’s Arithmetica), from linguistics (hedging, in relation to Toulmin’s argumentation scheme and Peirce’s notion of abduction) and from contemporary poetry and poetics.