BDSL,1- Transgressive maths depictions in literature

[bandwraith at aol.com]

Transgressing accepted boundaries in maths and
"Natural Philosophy" has been, historically,  just as
revolutonary as breaking the more prosaic forms of
social taboo. Think of Gallileo, and the need for stealth.

One of the more peculiar examples is the story of the
inventionm (discovery?) of the Imaginary Unit,
the sq root of -1, as transgressive as any venture into
new cultural territory.

Long preceding tendril, but things got really interesting
around, natch, the end of the Counter-Reformation, in
Italy, with the priority dispute between Niccolò Fontana
Tartaglia and Gerolamo Cardano. The story of Nick,
known as "the stammerer", reads like something right
out of "The Courier's Tragedy"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niccol%C3%B2_Fontana_Tartaglia

He was definitely passed over. Cardano, stole the glory.

Farina and Pynchon use sexual (and other forms of)
transgression for various reasons. It's a good hook,
for one. Cyprian, a great character, forms a link between
the crossing of sexual boundaries, and others, of a more
philosophical nature, The sexual trangression is obvious.
The philosophical transgression is more hermetic, as one
might expect, else his creation be described as some
"hokey" allegorical, dimensionally challenged, stand-in.

A mere Pythogorean pun.

  "He lifted out each of Dean Magnolia's minero-
   logical specimens, crystal, shale, semiprecious
   quartz, igneous delights, and laid them all on
   the rug in the shape of an equilateral triangle.

    'What the hell are all those, Paps?'

    'A whole lot of doodley-shit,' from Gnossos,
   bringiing the hammer down ferociously on the
   first of the stones, smashing it violently into dust
   and sand." (Random House, p.87)

Dust to dust, but surely the souls escaped?