Notes and bibliography - Oxford University Press

"Function, rightly understood, is existence considered as
activity."
144: [Fermat and Descartes invent the coordinate plane] K 302.
146: [Schopenhauer's joke] Scho ii 271. By contrast, Descartes said
that the angle between two curves was "...the most useful, and
the most general problem, not only that I know, but even that I
have any desire to know in geometry." (K 345).
147: [Rootlets in the middle ages] See for example S ii 684-5 on
Jehudah Barzilai, 13th c.
147: [17th century toying] What follows is seen first in Fermat,
1629, published in 1637 (K 344-5); but there are many tentative
predecessors, such as Oresme in the 13th century and much
earlier, Tabit ibn Qorra (c. 870): see S ii 685.
151: [Fermat: "Remove it"] K 345.
151: [Lore and language of the Almost Nothing] Not only are there
Western tales of will o' the wisps, pocket Undines, fairies and
familiars, but these minuscule apparitions seem universal.
Consider, for example, the Menehune in Hawai'i (Pu passim).
151: [Why shouldn't least be most?] Compare the similar mid-19th
century American criticism of homeopathy's "less is more"