GEORG CANTOR

Date of Birth: March 3, 1845

Date of Death: January 6, 1918

Major Contributions:

Set Theory

Set

 He introduced the concept of set and defined it, as any collection of well-
distinguished and well-defined objects considered as a single whole.

Sets and Infinite Sets

 He proved that real numbers is not denumerable infinite set or, of uniquely higher
order of infinity compared to the denumerable infinite sets including whole
numbers, rational and algebraic numbers. .
 The set of integers has an equal number of members (or same cardinal number)
as the set of even numbers, squares, cubes, and equation roots.
 The number of points in a line segment is equal to the number of points in an
infinite line and all mathematical spaces (e.g. plane).
 The cardinality of transcendental numbers, values like pi which is equal to
3.14159 and e having 2.71828 that cannot be used as a solution to any algebraic
equation, were much larger compared to the number of integers.

Continuum Hypothesis

o It is one of his famous works, which states that the infinite set of real
numbers is the next higher order of infinite sets following denumerable
infinite sets including the set of all natural numbers.

Transfinite Numbers

 The infinite subsets of the natural numbers, for example, the set of perfect
squares) can be put into one-to-one correspondence with the set of natural
numbers. For this reason, it goes to show that the number of members of such
subsets must be the same as the number of elements in the set of natural
numbers.

Diagonal Proof
 o This showed that the set of rational numbers (e.g. fractions) can be put
into one-to-one correspondence with the natural numbers, thus, has the
same cardinality as the set of natural numbers.

Cantor’s Theorem

 If A and B are sets with set A equivalent to a subset of B and set B equivalent to
a subset of A, then A and B are equivalent.

Biography:

Georg Ferdinand Ludwig Philipp Cantor or Georg Cantor for short, a German
mathematician was born on the 3rd day of March, year 1845 in St. Petersburg, Russia.
His father, Georg Waldemar Cantor is a Protestant and an affluent merchant at that
time, working as a wholesaling agent in the aforementioned city while his mother, Maria
Anna Bὂhm is a Roman Catholic and came from a family of finest musicians.
Additionally, he was the eldest from his five siblings.

Raised with influence of music, he displayed a passionate interest for music at an

early age and was even recognized as a great violinist. Furthermore, he notably
excelled in his studies from undergoing private tutoring and attending primary school,
thus had built an exceptional quest towards mathematics.

Equally important, his religion prestige from both parents despite of their unlikely
religions would play a pivotal role on his early mathematical studies. This has something
to do with his father as a deeply religious man and is raised in a Lutheran mission. He
was able to inherit his father’s personal strong convictions given by theological
perspective.

However, his father got sick and this forced them to move to Frankfurt, Germany
after the eleven years of stay in Russia where he finished his early education. Needless
to say, this was the momentum of how he would start building his own mark, since
Cantor would spend the rest of his life in Germany on his quest towards mathematics
with the recovery of his father.

. This conviction of him is evident as he excelled in mathematics, but more

evident as he plead towards his father for his dream to become a real mathematician
someday. Even though at first, he was afraid and can’t oppose his father’s decision to
become an engineer, still he was able to make it through as years passed with his
earned several years of training to his desired field of study. At last, just before entering
college, he gained an approval to study mathematics.

Being worthy of the privilege coming from his father, he focus much on his
mathematical studies from his early education. He studied mathematics, philosophy
and physics at the University of Berlin where he had the chance to work with some of
the greatest mathematicians at that time namely Kronecker and Weirstrass. Afterwards,
he received his doctorate in 1868 from the University of Berlin.

However, not all things went right. His obtained doctorate has no major use
since he was not able to find a good and stable job and was even forced to accept a
position as an unpaid lecturer and later on, as an assistant professor in 1869 at the
University of Halle.

Significantly in 1874, he published his first paper on set theory after the scrutiny
and deep experimentation into its foundation namely finite and infinite sets. Further, it
was in the same year he became a married man and gradually had six children.

Going back to his study, he considered infinite sets not as merely going on
forever but as finished entities. In other words, the concept of infinity deals with the
actual yet infinite number of members, and are called actual transfinite numbers. For
this reason, he gained promotion to full professorship in 1879.

On the other hand, his new ideas also received criticisms from many
mathematicians as they can just only accept things as they are and only shattering what
is known to be true. One of his critics was Leopold Kronecker who simply could not
handle actual transfinite numbers.

Still, there were particular individuals who supported his ideas and even attacked
Kronecker’s actions like the great Karl Weirstrass, and long-time friend Richard
Dedekind.

Yet, Kronecker, simply as a strong critic made a tremendous impact to his life as
he suffered with depression and mental illness in 1884. Too late to taste the fruit of
being stuck in a third-rate institution, being stripped of highly deserved recognition, he
spent the rest of his life in and out of mental institutions.

At last, his theory of sets especially about infinities is widely recognized today. In
fact, he was awarded a medal by the Royal Society of London in 1904. Likewise, he
was made a member of both the London Mathematical Society and the Society of
Sciences in Gottingen. He also received honorary degrees from many universities.
 In the present times, his work is widely used in many branches of mathematics.
In fact, his theory on infinite sets reestablished the foundation of nearly every
mathematical pursuit and make way to modern mathematics.

He was considered as one of the prominent mathematicians who unluckily lived

his remaining days in illness and even poverty. He died on a mental institution on the
6th day January, year 1918.

NOBLE, RENIA J.

BSED-MATHEMATICS 1-4