Jump to content

Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Mathematics/2015 September 24

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mathematics desk
< September 23 << Aug | September | Oct >> September 25 >
Welcome to the Wikipedia Mathematics Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.


September 24

[edit]

Who invented the digamma function?

[edit]

And where did the notation come from? (The notation seems to be a pretty transparent philological joke.) Double sharp (talk) 09:30, 24 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Who invented the function? God, of course. Who was the first mortal human to describe it and give it a name, unfortunately, I can't tell you, but after a brief perusal of the relevant pages, I'd start looking with Gauss and Legendre. --Trovatore (talk) 20:16, 24 September 2015 (UTC) [reply]
Right, of course: that was what I had in mind. Double sharp (talk) 02:37, 25 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Wolfram seems to suggest in their PolyGamma article that it was James Stirling in 1730. Here is a link to the work in question, but you will need to know Latin to read it. SpinningSpark 18:28, 25 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]