The Ancient Greeks and the Foundations of Mathematics 1.1 Pythagoras 1.1.1 Introduction to Pythagorean Ideas Pythagoras (569–500 B.C.E.) was both a person and a society (i.e., the Pythagoreans). He was also a political figure and a mystic. He was special in his time because, among other reasons, he involved women as equals in his activities. One critic characterized the man as “one tenth of him genius, nine-tenths sheer fudge.” Pythagoras died, according to legend, in the flames of his own school fired by political and religious bigots who stirred up the masses to protest against the enlightenment which Pythagoras sought to bring them. As with many figures from ancient times, there is little specific that we know about Pythagoras’s life. We know a little about his ideas and his school, and we sketch some of these here. The Pythagorean society was intensely mathematical in nature, but it was also quasi-religious. Among its tenets (according to [RUS]) were: • To abstain ...