Luca Pacioli and his 1500 book de Viribus Quantitatis

Tese de mestrado, História e Filosofia das Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências, 2015As the field grows, History of Science has become wider-ranging than a purely progress-oriented view of the history of Science. The History of Mathematics, even though more resilient, has shown to follow the same development. The present dissertation tries to contribute to the general study by shedding some light on a book which has been belittled, misinterpreted or ignored altogether, De Viribus Quantitatis, one of the major historical recreational mathematics books, and its author Luca Pacioli. This text aims to provide a modern updated survey of the content of this book for related studies, as well as a résumé of its contents.Com o crescimento do ramo de História das Ciências este tem vindo a desenvolver um olhar mais abrangente que a clássica visão dedicada ao progresso das ideias científicas. A História da Matemática, embora mais resiliente, também tem vindo a mostrar interesse em expandir os seus horizontes. No presente texto tentamos contribuir para o estudo geral destas disciplinas estudando um tratado que pouca atenção tem tido até ao momento, sendo até mesmo mal interpretado. Trata-se De Viribus Quantitatis, sendo este um dos maiores compêndio de matemática recreativa no seu contexto histórico. O seu autor, Luca Pacioli, sendo uma personalidade de grande interesse e mais conhecido por outras obras suas. Nestas páginas tentamos fornecer uma versão atualisada da documentação relativa ao tratado tal como um resumo dos seus conteúdos

Luca Pacioli forjador de grandes obras

Se estudian algunos aspectos del quehacer matemático de Luca Pacioli en el siglo XV y su influencia sobre diversos aspectos culturales

Christianity and Gambling: An Introduction

Religions hold complex relations with games and, in particular, with gambling. The article focuses on Christianity. On the one hand, the history of this religion shows a tendency to condemn games as source of distraction from spiritual rectitude and to stigmatize gambling, above all, as opening to metaphysical randomness and, as a consequence, as challenge to the idea of divine omniscience. On the other hand, Christianity has also sought to reinterpret games, and even gambling, as possible occasion for moral improvement and as useful distraction from the hardship of monastic life. A theological perspective that reaches its peak in Thomas Aquinas, but has its roots in Aristotle’s evaluation of playfulness, tends to suggest the need for eutropelia, meant as the citizens’ virtue to appropriately have fun

Geometry in a book of mathematical riddles from the beginning of the 16th century

In this paper we present and analyse, from the linguistic point of view, the treatise Giuochi mathematici written by Piero di Nicolò d’Antonio da Filicaia. It is a very appealing witness of the history of the recreational mathematics from the beginning of the 16th century. After a brief introduction of Piero’s cultural background, we describe the structure of the treatise and its sources. We deal especially with the fourth part of Giuochi mathematici in which the author imitates the contents of Alberti’s Ludi matematici. Our analysis shows that textual reworking is quite deep although there is continuity as far as terminology and contents are concerned