The Real Projective Plane - Macintosh Version [Third Edition]

H(arold) S(cott) M(acDonald) Coxeter (Author); George Beck (With An Appendix for Mathematica® by)

ISBN 10: 0387978895 / ISBN 13: 9780387978895

Published by Springer-Verlag New York, Inc., New York, et al., 1993

About this Item

222 + xiii pp. An excellent, spotlessly clean copy! Clean, fresh, sharp, tight, essentially and virtually flawless copy with crisp pages, spotlessly clean text, and very light shelf wear. No dust jacket. Diskette missing.

Seller Inventory # 5vEe0062

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Real Projective Plane - Macintosh Version [Third Edition]
• Publisher: Springer-Verlag New York, Inc., New York, et al.
• Publication Date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0387978895
• ISBN 13: 9780387978895
• Binding: Decorative Hardcover
• Illustrator: Dimitry L. Loseff (Production Managed by); Vincent Scelta (Manufacturing Supervised by)
• Edition: 3rd Edition
• Printing: 1st Printing
• Condition: Like New
• Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket

About this title

Synopsis

Along with many small improvements, this revised edition contains van Yzeren's new proof of Pascal's theorem (§1.7) and, in Chapter 2, an improved treatment of order and sense. The Sylvester-Gallai theorem, instead of being introduced as a curiosity, is now used as an essential step in the theory of harmonic separation (§3.34). This makes the logi­ cal development self-contained: the footnotes involving the References (pp. 214-216) are for comparison with earlier treatments, and to give credit where it is due, not to fill gaps in the argument. H.S.M.C. November 1992 v Preface to the Second Edition Why should one study the real plane? To this question, put by those who advocate the complex plane, or geometry over a general field, I would reply that the real plane is an easy first step. Most of the prop­ erties are closely analogous, and the real field has the advantage of intuitive accessibility. Moreover, real geometry is exactly what is needed for the projective approach to non· Euclidean geometry. Instead of introducing the affine and Euclidean metrics as in Chapters 8 and 9, we could just as well take the locus of 'points at infinity' to be a conic, or replace the absolute involution by an absolute polarity.