Squaring The Circle - History

History

Methods to approximate the area of a given circle with a square were known already to Babylonian mathematicians. The Egyptian Rhind papyrus of 1800BC gives the area of a circle as (64/81) d 2, where d is the diameter of the circle, and pi approximated to 256/81, a number that appears in the older Moscow Mathematical Papyrus, and used for volume approximations (i.e. hekat (volume unit)). Indian mathematicians also found an approximate method, though less accurate, documented in the Sulba Sutras. Archimedes showed that the value of pi lay between 3 + 1/7 (approximately 3.1429) and 3 + 10/71 (approximately 3.1408). See Numerical approximations of π for more on the history.

The first Greek to be associated with the problem was Anaxagoras, who worked on it while in prison. Hippocrates of Chios squared certain lunes, in the hope that it would lead to a solution — see Lune of Hippocrates. Antiphon the Sophist believed that inscribing regular polygons within a circle and doubling the number of sides will eventually fill up the area of the circle, and since a polygon can be squared, it means the circle can be squared. Even then there were skeptics—Eudemus argued that magnitudes cannot be divided up without limit, so the area of the circle will never be used up. The problem was even mentioned in Aristophanes's play The Birds.

It is believed that Oenopides was the first Greek who required a plane solution (that is, using only a compass and straightedge). James Gregory attempted a proof of its impossibility in Vera Circuli et Hyperbolae Quadratura (The True Squaring of the Circle and of the Hyperbola) in 1667. Although his proof was incorrect, it was the first paper to attempt to solve the problem using algebraic properties of pi. It was not until 1882 that Ferdinand von Lindemann rigorously proved its impossibility.

The famous Victorian-age mathematician, logician and author, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (better known under the pseudonym, "Lewis Carroll") also expressed interest in debunking illogical circle-squaring theories. In one of his diary entries for 1855, Dodgson listed books he hoped to write including one called "Plain Facts for Circle-Squarers". In the introduction to "A New Theory of Parallels", Dodgson recounted an attempt to demonstrate logical errors to a couple of circle-squarers, stating:

"The first of these two misguided visionaries filled me with a great ambition to do a feat I have never heard of as accomplished by man, namely to convince a circle squarer of his error! The value my friend selected for Pi was 3.2: the enormous error tempted me with the idea that it could be easily demonstrated to BE an error. More than a score of letters were interchanged before I became sadly convinced that I had no chance."