Hoe is Leonhard Euler aan het getal e gekomen, en waarom noemde hij dit getal de natuurlijke logaritme
Marco
Leerling bovenbouw havo-vwo - dinsdag 2 november 2004
Antwoord
Op onderstaande website kun je lezen:
Why did he choose the letter e? There is no general consensus. According to one view, Euler chose it because it is the first letter of the word exponential. More likely, the choice came to him naturally as the first "unused" letter of the alphabet, since the letters a, b, c, and d frequently appear elsewhere in mathematics. It seems unlikely that Euler chose the letter because it is the initial of his own name, as occasionally been suggested: he was an extremely modest man and often delayed publication of his own work so that a colleague or student of his would get due credit. In any event, his choice of the symbol e, like so many other symbols of his, became universally accepted.
