¶ Geometry of Vectors (1)
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Index Entry
Geometry of Vectors:
"At the Naval Academy we learned about Galileo’s parallelogram of forces. I liked the idea of vectors. I was excited by vectors because I felt that vectors did what the geometry teacher couldn’t do with her ‘purely abstract straight’ lines. Vectors had not only unique direction in relation to other experiences, but also were discrete in their relative lengths, which were arrived at by multiplying their object’s mass times their object’s velocity. We didn’t have to worry about the vector’s lines going to infinity. There was no such inference in their deliberately developed construction. A vector went just so far and that was the end of it. So a vector constituted an experimentally satisfactory kind of a line.
“Furthermore, I could convert mass and velocity into heat, and I could ascertain the time dimension from the velocity, thus all the qualities and behavioral characteristics plus the environmental conditions of ‘existence’ which I had been seeking, were satisfactorily expressed as vectors. So I said, ‘Might there not be a Geometry of Vectors?’ – and I remembered those equilength toothpicks of my kindergarten experimental exploration for logical structuring and the complex”
