ユークリッド、アリストテレス、エウドクソス、アルキメデスらも取り組んだテーマ「無限」について解説します。その概念、微分積分学、フーリエ解析、フラクタルにおける無限について解説し、宇宙・時間・物質における無限の役割について論じます。無限が関わる哲学的側面や論争、そこへ今日の数学的見解が光明を投じることができるのかや、日常に「無限」の概念を適用する重要性についても探ります。
  

• Explains the mathematical concept of infinity and its uses in calculus, Fourier analysis, and fractals
• Discusses the role of infinity in the physics of space, time, and matter
• Describes philosophical aspects and debates involving infinity, and shows how current mathematical thinking can be used to illuminate some of those issues.
• Considers the important applications of the concept of infinity to everyday reality

Infinity is an intriguing topic, with connections to religion, philosophy, metaphysics, logic, and physics as well as mathematics. Its history goes back to ancient times, with especially important contributions from Euclid, Aristotle, Eudoxus, and Archimedes. The infinitely large (infinite) is intimately related to the infinitely small (infinitesimal). Cosmologists consider sweeping questions about whether space and time are infinite. Philosophers and mathematicians ranging from Zeno to Russell have posed numerous paradoxes about infinity and infinitesimals. Many vital areas of mathematics rest upon some version of infinity. The most obvious, and the first context in which major new techniques depended on formulating infinite processes, is calculus. But there are many others, for example Fourier analysis and fractals.

In this Very Short Introduction, Ian Stewart discusses infinity in mathematics while also drawing in the various other aspects of infinity and explaining some of the major problems and insights arising from this concept. He argues that working with infinity is not just an abstract, intellectual exercise but that it is instead a concept with important practical everyday applications, and considers how mathematicians use infinity and infinitesimals to answer questions or supply techniques that do not appear to involve the infinite.